Why doesn't the AI reason "if I remove this hack, I'll be more likely to win?"

More interesting question is why it (if made capable of such reflection) would not take it a little step further and ponder what happens if it removes enemy's queen from it's internal board, which would also make it more likely to win, with its internal definition of win which is defined in terms of internal board.

Or why would anyone go through the bother of implementing possibly irreducible notion of what 'win' really means in the real world, given that this would simultaneously waste computing power on unnecessary explorations and make AI dangerous / uncontrollable.

Thing is, you don't need to imagine the world dying to avoid making pointless likely impossible accomplishments.