The First Punic War was fought from 264 to 241 BC.
It was the first of three wars fought between Ancient Carthage, which is modern-day Tunisia, and the Roman Republic.
For 20 years, the two powers struggled for supremacy in the Western Mediterranean Sea. At the start of the conflicts, Carthage was the dominant power. However, the Roman Republic eventually emerged as the victor.
This war pitted, on one hand, Quintus Fabius Maximux Verrucosus, a Roman dictator and army general, and on the other hand, the great Carthaginian general Hannibal Barca, who was considered one of the greatest military commanders and strategists in history.
At the start of the war, Hannibal boldly crossed the Alps in wintertime and invaded Italy, repeatedly inflicting devastating losses on the Romans.
Fabius was tasked with defeating Hannibal. He had great respect for Hannibal’s military skill and ingenuity, so he refused to meet him in open battle.
Fabius calculated that the way to defeat Hannibal was to avoid engaging him in pitched battles.
He instead opted to engage in a war of attrition, which was designed to exploit Hannibal’s strategic vulnerabilities.
He thus sent scouting parties to know where the bulk of Hannibal’s forces were at all times so they could be avoided, harassed Hannibal’s men around the edges through small skirmishes, prevented them from getting supplies, and burned the crops in the area Hannibal’s army was advancing to, hoping to starve the invaders into retreat.
The Romans hated this approach. They were Romans after all. And Romans didn’t chicken out of a fight. They gave Fabius his agnomen, the Cunctator, which meant ‘the delayer’.
His objective? To drag out the war for as long as he could to wear out Hannibal’s men, and degrade their capabilities. It was a strategy of containment.
This has since become known as the Fabian strategy in military parlance. It is where pitched battles and frontal assaults are avoided in favour of wearing down the opponent through a war of attrition.
While avoiding decisive battles, the side employing this strategy harasses its enemy through skirmishes to cause attrition, disrupt supply lines, sap out the enemy’s foot soldiers efforts, and affect troop morale.
Fast forward to present times in Kenya. There can be no mistaking that we are in a season of political wars where all guns appear to be trained against one presidential contender, Deputy President William Ruto.
Politicians intent on capturing the presidency in 2022, and their associates have laid bare their cards on the table. They have openly stated their number one priority is to stop Ruto from clinching the presidency.
Although how they intend to achieve this is as clear as mud, it is apparent that they and the incumbent government is applying tactics that mirror the Fabian Strategy in their execution of ‘operation stop Uliam’.
And like Fabius attack on Hannibal, their tactics have been piecemeal, cumulative, indirect while using innuendos to avoid frontal attacks.
For instance, Ruto has been slowly but systematically been edged out of the business of running the government of the day to the extent of being excluded when neighbouring Heads of State make official visits.
His duties have since been reassigned to other non-elected Cabinet secretaries, he has been denied access to State residences outside the capital city and his political rallies have been disrupted and cancelled by the police.
Additionally, his political allies in Parliament have been removed from leadership positions and his political-ideological framework has been ridiculed, derided and mocked.
But the most recent and humiliating act has been being barred from visiting Uganda on a private visit, the authentic reason advanced, notwithstanding.
Begs the question, are his nemesis applying the Fabian strategy? Are they employing tactics of harassment in a bid to wear him and his supporters out, sap their efforts, and lower their morale? Has this been a strategy of containment?
Meanwhile, like the Romans who don’t chicken out of a fight, there are those who are spoiling for a fight, yet a Fabian Strategy requires deliberate restraint.
They have admonished him to resign and dared his supporters to take to street protests as they have previously done when they felt aggrieved by the State machinery.
They have taunted him that if he is man enough, he should bring the nation to a standstill by rioting and disrupting business as they did.
But to their chagrin, he has done neither. Contrary to their expectations, he has instead adopted a sangfroid attitude, at least publicly.
Love him or hate him, it takes grit to demonstrate composure or coolness in the face of trying circumstances.
And the jury is still out on whether this reflects an excess of caution, tact, prudence or weakness on his part.
Regardless of which side of the political divide you support, you are probably hoping that I will tell you how this war will end; who will be the winner; and how they will win.
But let me give you an early disappointment because I cannot. And whoever purports to know this, including the warring parties themselves, is a fibster.
I submit, however, that the Fabian Strategy is a position of weakness, intended to buy time while support from stronger allies is secured.
And we have seen this through the President’s enlisting of the handshake brigade and supporting the One Kenya Alliance against Ruto.
Therefore, to win in a Fabian strategy, one must have time on their side, show indefinite commitment, and stay in the game long enough to outlast the competition.
So, between Ruto and his political nemesis, who will blink first?
Which side of the battle is in a rush to reach their prize lest their troops start losing interest in the war, and are likely to get frustrated because they lack, or are unsure of the long-term perspective?
Secondly, the Fabian strategist needs to know his finish line. This means knowing at what point you have won the war.
The only point at which Ruto’s nemesis will know they have reached their finish line is after the elections, depending on who will emerge victorious at the ballot box.
This means they will have spent a lot of their arsenal on ‘operation stop Uliam’, rather than on persuading the electorate on why they are the better alternative.
And we have seen this at every turn where Ruto’s political contenders criticise him at every turn, rather than endear themselves to their voters.
Thirdly, as with any other strategy, with the Fabian strategy, you do not see day to day results. You see the trend over time. It, therefore, becomes very tempting to change course when you don’t immediately realize the progress you envisioned.
And this is why the target on Ruto’s back keeps mutating. It started with accusations of him not supporting the President, to his allegedly corrupt nature, to his corrupt associates, to his hustler vs dynasty narrative, to ridicule of his political ideology, and now culminating into humiliation over a protocol mishap.
Fourthly, to win in a Fabian strategy, you need to compete where you have the best chance of succeeding.
This means knowing your opponents' weaknesses. Unfortunately, in our political scenario, everyone has been to bed with everyone.
And mud throwers never have clean hands. Hence this line of attack becomes a slippery slope that no one is really willing to pursue down its rabbit hole.
Lastly, the Fabian strategy relies on attacking the enemy’s supply lines and other soft targets in lieu of pitched battles.
Contrary to this, what we have seen is optics of several politicians decamping to Ruto’s caucus, and if rumours are to be believed, many others are waiting to cross over at the opportune moment, citing that this is what their political ‘ground’ is demanding.
A case in point is the recent Kiambaa by-election that produced the first UDA legislator.
Finally, my unsolicited advice is to Ruto: Sometimes the best way to win is simply not to lose. So is there enough squeeze in your lemons to make the juice?
The Spartans do not ask how many are the enemy but where are they. —Plutarch
