Especially given that human power games are often irrational.

So? As long as they follow minimally predictable patterns it should be ok.

The U.S. has many more and smarter people than the Taliban. The bottom line is that the U.S. devotes a lot more output per man-hour to defeat a completely inferior enemy. Yet they are losing.

Bad analogy. In this case the Taliban has a large set of natural advantages, the US has strong moral constraints and goal constraints (simply carpet bombing the entire country isn't an option for example).

You are also not going to improve a conversation in your favor by improving each sentence for thousands of years. You will shortly hit diminishing returns. Especially since you lack the data to predict human opponents accurately.

This seems like an accurate and a highly relevant point. Searching a solution space faster doesn't mean one can find a better solution if it isn't there.