In the early 1950’s Isiah Berlin, a highly respected Oxford don, wrote an essay on Tolstoy’s theory of history as revealed in War and Peace. As a way of analysing this he referred to a fragment from Archilochus, an ancient Greek poet, which says: “The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing.” The analysis he developed from this was seen as highly revealing about the thinking of Tolstoy but was picked up and used much more widely to categorise writers, artists, statesmen and indeed humanity in general into hedgehogs and foxes.

Hedgehogs, see the world through the prism of one central and blinding truth. Indeed they make sense of the world and interpret it by referring back to that single organising principle, the force which underpins and drives the manifest reality we experience. So in Berlin’s view; Marx’s economic determinism; Plato’s ideal forms; and Hegel’s Geist or cosmic spirit are all examples of the hedgehog perspective where some force structures and determines reality.

Foxes on the other hand see reality emerging from the interaction of many things with the outcome being contingent and far from determined. They seek understanding by knowing many, often contradictory things and seeking to understand those many things in depth respecting their uniqueness. Not trying to fit them into some pre-existing model. Berlin refers to Aristotle’s taxonomy, Herodotus’s historiography, and Joyce’s stream of consciousness as typical of the foxes approach focusing on the individual and contingent as opposed to the universal and determined.

Berlin does not see this distinction as anything more than, “… a point of view from which to look and compare, a starting point for genuine investigation.”

What has all this got to do with Boris? Bare with… a little longer.

This “starting point for genuine investigation” was recently taken up by John Lewis Gaddis, a lecturer at Yale University on Studies in Grand Strategy, in his recent book “On Grand Strategy”. The work considers the histories of great leaders of the distant and recent past and anaylses their strengths and weaknesses in terms of Berlin’s distinction. In essence he believes successful leaders manage to combine the guiding compass of the hedgehog with the pragmatic adaptability of the fox. Indeed the mark of the truly great leader is their ability to hold two contradictory thoughts in their minds at one time and still be capable of operating effectively.

The benchmark of great leadership Gaddis sees as having been exemplified by Abraham Lincoln whose moral compass was set on the abolition of slavery, who however, recognised that when the direction pointed into a swamp it was necessary to tack and change direction to get around the swamp, but never losing sight however of his ultimate goal. For Lincoln that tacking involved: a lot of smoke filled rooms; the suspension of habeas corpus and defying the Supreme Court in time of war; retaining the allegiance of states where slavery was legal, as he is reputed to have said he “…wanted God on his side, but he must have Kentucky”. The trick was in holding the contradictory requirements of ultimate ends and immanent means in dynamic balance and always tending in the direction aimed for.

Someone, who failed to hold this balance according to Gaddis was Xerxes, Persia’s King of Kings in his invasion of Greece. He was a full-on hedgehog. On the Asian bank of the Hellespont he considers the 360 boats that have been lashed together to create a bridge for his invading army. He seeks the advice of his uncle and advisor Artabanus, an out-and-out fox, who recites all the problems the King may encounter and things which may go wrong. Xerxes listens but concludes if you considered all the risks in the world you would never get out of bed, so sends his uncle home and proceeds to cross the Hellespont.

Xerxes had a mighty army and a plan with a single goal, the capture of Athens. Nothing was to stand in the way of that. In order to demonstrate his resolve, when Pythius the Lydian provided him with all the troops and treasure he asked for, save the service of his eldest son, Xerxes had the son bisected and ordered his army to march between the two halves of the unfortunate young mans body.

Now, withdrawing the Whip from 21 loyal conservatives might not be anywhere near as brutal and bloody however it might be seen as equally gratuitous and spiteful. Certainly not judged to secure the affection and support of those who might have been seen as natural allies.

Like Boris Xerxes took ambition for capacity and expected to crush all before him to ultimate victory. His mistake was to fail to consider what things might undermine his vision. For example, geography could not always be simply overcome with initiatives such as pontoon bridge. The narrow pass at Thermopylae provided a bottle neck where the Spartan 300 held up the advancing force. Giving their lives to shake the vision of an invincible foe and delay their progress.

Furthermore, the other side did not act as they were supposed to. Just as Jeremy Corbyn refused to fight on the ground dictated by Boris, i.e. a snap general election, Themistocles refused to fight on the ground Xerxes expected. He evacuated Athens leaving Xerxes with a pyrrhich victory and approaching bad weather. His response was to stamp his feet and set fire to the Acropolis anticipating this would undermine the morale of the Athenian navy off shore. On the contrary he then watched as the Greek triremes battered his navy and slaughtered his sailors.

Xerxes retreat was ignominious and costly. His error in the eyes of Gaddis was his failure to calibrate his ends with his means. Ends arise in the mind of the leader. They are projections of what might be, and free of consideration of the messy realty of means can be infinite. First Athens then the world will be ours. First out of Europe and then the world will be ours.

When you are King of Kings it is easy to start to believe your own publicity and capacity to make things happen. The world however is an intractable place and there are others with different agendas. You may feel able to bulldoze through the opposition and at times that may be necessary. However, you need to know when those time are, and then, whether you have the resources and ability to do it.

Boris started out mistaking a “can do” attitude with a strategy. He has supplemented this with a call for “optimism” and “positivity” which are just as vacuous. His closest advisors, for all their classical eduction, are a nest of hedgehogs focused exclusively on Brexit at any cost. If their strategy is going according to plan it is a very cunning plan, cunning to the point of incomprehensible.

The very purity of their hedgehog vision may be their downfall as they ignore the legal and constitutional terrain they must fight across. “Can do” as hubris may yet trip them up. We can only hope. However we should not assume this will be the case. Their willingness to trample over conventions, figuratively bisect their opponents and only touch base with truth when it suits them means they could get to what is their increasingly clear goal – no ifs, no buts, no Deal.

Sadly, if they do, it is the vast majority of the population of the UK who will bear the pyrrich nature of their victory, not them.