The OODA Loop's four steps — Observe, Orient, Decide, and Act — were born in a madcap US Air Force Colonel's analysis of dogfights (airplane combat) in the Korean and Vietnam Wars. John Boyd was one of the US Armed Forces' smartest and most eccentric figures.
In the context of fighter aircraft pilots trying to kill each other, the process runs like this:
- You Observe that you're over Laos in a Phantom F-4 fighter, chasing a MiG-19. We're both climbing while banking to the right. I'm at 15K feet and he's 2K feet above me.
- Orient pulls in everything you know about the situation and sets up your choices, but quickly. He is likely a North Vietnamese trained in China. You're in your first dogfight. His plane can out-turn and out-gun yours. You've been separated from your flight and are unlikely to survive the encounter unless you exit quickly.
- You then Decide among my choices of action, and
- Act on your decision by pulling the throttle back, shifting the joystick and pedals, etc.
Whoever cycles through the OODA Loop more quickly wins the dogfight. One pilot "gets inside" the other's OODA Loop, making better decisions and acting on them more quickly. (Here's a more detailed explanation.)
Not just for dogfights
That's all well and good for aerial gladiatorial combat, but the OODA concept is surprisingly useful in other competitive situations, particularly in politics.
In the acknowledgements section of John Coram's biography Boyd, Coram gives special thanks to one character whose name you're sure to recognize: Dick Cheney. Well before he was the US Vice President, he was the Secretary of Defense for George HW Bush, and a major Boyd fan. In fact, Cheney called Boyd out of retirement to help develop the US Military's strategy in the First Gulf War.
Through Cheney and others, the OODA concept became common knowledge for Republican strategists; not so much the other side.
A few years later, during the Kerry-Bush Jr. presidential campaign of 2004, you'll recall Kerry being "swiftboated," being accused of flip-flopping, and more. That was OODA at work, and it helped a draft dodger hiding "youthful indiscretions" around drug use beat a decorated war hero who, on his return to the US, performed the second heroic task of testifying before Congress that the Vietnam War was not only futile, but involved war crimes by US forces.
Kerry and his Democratic advisors were completely unprepared for the OODA torrent heading their way. They faced headwinds, articulated nicely in two sayings:
- A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on (attributed to Churchill, but no proof he said it) and
- Brandolini's Law: The amount of energy needed to refute bullshit is an order of magnitude larger than to produce it.
That's sort of funny, but the situation wasn't, nor was its outcome.
Kerry and his advisors were incapable of replying firmly and quickly. Mainstream media, then still powerful, took the bait every time. When Democrats finally got around to replying, Republicans were happy to bat them around like a cat playing with a ball of yarn. And when the audience was tiring of the episode, a new missile would come out of the OODA launcher.
It wasn't just Kerry. You can see the OODA Loop at play in campaigns ever since, and it has gotten much more use in the era of disinformation and deepfakes.
The first 100 days of Trump II
In fact, the first 100 days of Trump's second administration may go down in history as the all-time apex OODA move in the political sphere.
Despite candidate Trump's disavowing the Heritage Foundation's Project 2025, it turned out to be the screenplay for Trump's second first 100 days, a script enhanced with unexpected twists such as a deputized Elon Musk launching and running DOGE like a ninja network.
The overwhelming force of many Republicans with marching orders operating behind Trump-declared Emergencies and Executive Orders (as opposed to the much slower legislative process) left Democrats hapless. Despite some small positive breaks, they remain clueless to this day.