Mental Models
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Hi folks,
We're having a quick look at the OODA loop and John Boyd. Here are a few quotes from Boyd provided by Terry:
Boyd - Robert Coram
"If your boss demands loyalty, give him integrity. But if he demands integrity, then give him loyalty."
Boyd 2002 281
"Tiger, one day you will come to a fork in the road," he said. "And you're going to have to make a decision about which
direction you want to go."
He raised his hand and pointed. "If you go that way you can be somebody. You will have to make compromises and
you will have to turn your back on your friends. But you will be a member of the club and you'll get promoted and
you'll get good assignments."
Then Boyd raised his other hand and pointed in another direction. "Or you can go that way and you can do
something – something for your country and for your Air Force and for yourself. If you decide you want to do
something, you may not get promoted and you may not get the good assignments and you certainly will not be a
favourite of your superiors. But you won't have to compromise yourself. You will be true to your friends and yourself.
And your work might make a difference."
Boyd 2002 285
Make a difference True to your friends and yourself
"To be somebody or to do something. In life there is often a roll call. That's when you have to make a decision to be or
to do? Which way will you go?"
[Burton] started thinking only of doing what was right. And he came to find that freedom from the concerns that
govern the lives of most officers was remarkably liberating.
- the essence of warfare is Cheng and Ch'i, and
- to practice this most effectively a commander must operate at a quicker OODA Loop than does his opponent.
The orthodox and the unorthodox, the traditional and the unexpected.
Sun Tzu – "The Art of War" –
400 BC
Boyd explains that in combat, both at the highest command level and at the lowest, individuals first orient themselves
so they can understand the situation, then they make a decision to direct their activities, and then they take action.
... to shape the environment, one must manifest four qualities: variety, rapidity, harmony, and initiative. A commander
must have a series of responses that can be applied rapidly; he must harmonise his efforts and never be passive.
"Machines don't fight wars,...Terrain doesn't fight wars. Humans fight wars. You must get into the minds of humans.
That's where the battles are won."
Understanding the OODA Loop enables a commander to compress time – that is, the time between observing the
situation and taking an action.
A commander can use this temporal discrepancy (a form of fast transient) to select the least expected action rather
than what is predicted to be the most effective action. The enemy can also figure out what might be the most
effective. To take the least expected action disorients the enemy. It causes him to pause, to wonder, to question. This
means that as a commander compresses his own time he causes time to be stretched out for his opponent. The
enemy falls further and further behind in making relevant decisions. It hastens the unravelling process.
Least expected Most effective
... the main focus of effort... the underlying goal, the glue that holds together various units.
In a blitzkrieg situation, the commander is able to maintain a high operational tempo and rapidly exploit opportunity
because he makes sure his subordinates know his intent, his Schwerpunkt.
They are not micromanaged, that is, they are not told to seize and hold a certain hill, instead they are given "mission
orders." This means that they understand their commander's overall intent and they know their job is to do whatever
is necessary to fulfil that intent.
The subordinate and the commander share a common outlook. They trust each other, and this trust is the glue that
holds the apparently formless effort together.... Trust is the unifying concept.This gives the subordinate great freedom
of action. Trust is an example of a moral force that helps bind groups together in what Boyd called an "organic whole."
Fingerspitzengefuhl 30
8804 Robert Coram
... fingertip feel... a leader's instinctive and intuitive sense of what is going on or what is needed in a battle or, for that
matter, in any conflict.
Boyd 2002 334
Fingerspitzengefuhl
8806 Robert Coram
... when one has developed the proper Fingerspitzengefuhl for a changing situation, the tempo picks up and it seems
one is able to bypass the explicit "Orientation" and "Decision" part of the Loop, to "Observe" and "Act" almost
simultaneously. The speed must come from a deep intuitive understanding of one's relationship to the rapidly
changing environment.
Boyd... believed in attacking with "moral conflict" – that is, using actions that increase menace, uncertainty, and
mistrust in the enemy while increasing initiative, adaptability, and harmony within friendly forces.
Mental Models