One of the basic axioms of classical military strategy is to encourage the loser to think that if it had not been for a few changes of luck, victory would have been theirs. In other words, encourage them to treat a loss like a near victory so that they are distracted from the introspection required to develop a winning strategy for the next time.

Elections are obviously not war, but judging by the Conservatives who have been willing to go on record since April 28, the party seems to be at risk of falling into this strategic trap.

Interim Leader Andrew Scheer has said: “We just need to find what are the missing pieces that will get us the next four or five per cent to form government, but to build on this incredible base that Pierre has built.”

Former Harper cabinet minister Peter MacKay said: “I don’t think it’s indicative of a party in crisis — it’s indicative of a party that’s in need of some fine-tuning, perhaps some policy and communications adjustments.”

Conservative commentators and some strategists have said that Poilievre clearly failed to pivot far enough or fast enough when Mark Carney and President Trump redefined the political landscape. Others have blamed the criticisms of Ontario Premier Ford and his senior campaign advisor. Still others have blamed Conservative campaign manager Jenni Byrne, a classic way of going after the leader without actually going after him.

All of these perspectives have a kernel of truth but in some ways were surface froth. They soft-sell the most extraordinary fact of the election: Polievre’s Conservatives had a 25-point lead over the Liberals as late as Jan. 20 and lost it completely by March 12, before Carney was Liberal Leader and three weeks before the election was even called.

That was the defining event of #elxn45. True, Trump was a huge factor. But why was Poilievre so vulnerable to the President’s interventions? True, Carney was a new leader who was supposed to cleanse voters of their anti-Trudeau bile. But this was a classic political “Hail Mary” pass typically flung in the dying days of a dying government hoping to stave off complete electoral disaster. Why did the “Hail Mary” work against Pierre Poilievre?

These are the questions on which Conservatives should reflect in the months ahead. Their precipitous decline and the ultimate loss showed that what seemed to be a two-year rock-solid Conservative hold on voters was anything but. Indeed, most voters were only too happy to jump the Poilievre ship when given a good reason to. Why was Poilievre just a port in the post-COVID affordability storm rather than a safe harbour?

Conservatives take comfort from the fact that they got the highest level of popular vote for a Conservative party since former Brian Mulroney in 1988, the last election defined by Canada-U.S. relations in the free trade election.

But unlike 1988, this happened in #elxn45 because the NDP vote collapsed, and the campaign became a two-horse race of the kind we have not seen since the 1930s. To their credit, the Conservatives got surprising shares of the NDP vote in many ridings, a tribute to their relentless tactical cultivation of private sector union votes. Even so, the NDP-Liberal switcher dynamic was stronger still, a simple reflection of basic voter math: the Liberal-NDP progressive voter pool is larger than the Conservative-union voter pool.

True, Carney was a new leader who was supposed to cleanse voters of their anti-Trudeau bile. But this was a classic political “Hail Mary” pass typically flung in the dying days of a dying government hoping to stave off complete electoral disaster. Why did the “Hail Mary” work against Pierre Poilievre?

This brings us to the fundamental questions that the Conservatives need to consider. Why did so many voters conclude that it was more important to stop Poilievre than to deny the Liberals a rare “four-peat?” How can they win if federal politics are indeed a two-horse race for at least the near future?

This suggests not a “near victory” but a decisive defeat. It suggests the need for a complete reassessment of Conservative strategy, from its focus on retaining the base, to excessive combativeness, to excluding Conservatives who did not conform to Poilievre’s definition of acceptable conservatism. This is a conundrum because some of it would require tearing down and reassembling Poilievre into a new version of himself who does politics quite differently.

Another axiom of war is that most battles are lost before they begin. An election strategy should position you to adapt to sudden shifts and events in the political landscape. Say what you will, but the Conservative strategy did not do that. It was designed for a specific set of political circumstances and could not adapt when those circumstances no longer prevailed.

Treating #elxn45 as what it was — a defeat and not a near victory — will be key for the Conservatives to win the next battle.