One of Henry Kissinger’s best-known and most controversial quips, about the Iran-Iraq war, was that it was a pity both sides couldn't lose. Kissinger has a reputation as a cynical but ultimately clear-sighted strategist, but on this point, he is definitely wrong. Discourse about geopolitics is replete with various analogies to zero-sum games – chess, poker, maybe even backgammon. But it isn’t always so. It is very possible to have win-win situations, and perhaps even more so to have lose-lose ones.