Patterns of Conflict Slide 5

Patterns of Conflict

Patterns of Conflict Slide 5

Quantico Transcription

And when we look at that, we begin to see, we say, the idea of fast transients, I guess, in order to win we should operate at a faster tempo or rhythm in a very general sense over our adversary. Or pinning it down. Or better yet, get inside what I call observation-orientation-decision-action time cycle or loop, or we’ll say later on loops, time cycles or loops, because you do it more than once, obviously. It’s a feedback loop, and that’s why I use the word loop.

It doesn’t make any difference whether you’re a Russian, you’re an Englishman, an American, Chinese or what. You have to observe what the hell’s going on here. Then you have to, as a result of that, looking at the world, you generate images, views, and impressions in your mind. That’s what you call orientation. Then as a result of those images, views, and impressions, you’re going have to make a selection, what you’re going to do or what you’re going to do, that’s a decision. And then you’re going to have to implement or take the action. Then you’re going to have to observe the consequences of that action, plus you’re dragging peripheral information all the time, and roll back through that loop again.

And as you well know, we call it O-O-D-A, “OODA” loop. It’s easier to say right now, otherwise we have to say every one of those terms. You have to do it, I have to do it, everybody has to do it. And it’s all human. Machine. You know, human beings [unintelligible] they orient, they decide, they act. Human trait. It makes no difference if you’re back in the 15th century up to the 21st century. We do that thing. But note what it says. We want to be able to do it quicker than an adversary. In other words, we want to get inside his OODA loop, not him inside ours.

Why? Very simple. If we can do that, in a sense we at that point become unpredictable to him, we become ambiguous, hence unpredictable. We generate confusion and disorder in our adversary. Why is that the case? Because he’s going to be generating mental images or impressions that don’t match up to that continually, what, unfolding environment. They don’t match up.

In other words, we’re deliberately trying to generate a mismatch between that which he observes and what’s really going on out there. He can’t keep up. Because it generates confusion. Because as he tries to get that mental event, we shift to a new event, new event, new event, so as he falls back further and further and gets more and more out of tune with his environment, what’s going to happen?

[30:00] Have you ever been in a situation sometime where you’ve been overloaded with something and you can’t keep up? What does it do to you? We’ve all experienced something before.

Audience: —frustrates you.

Boyd: Not only frustrates you, but if your life’s at stake, you start coming unglued. And that’s exactly what you want to do, you want to pull that guy apart. Let’s say I put you in a competitive environment, as an example. You’re here, I’m picking on you, because you happen to be up front, that’s all, nothing against you.

Let’s say I put you in a competitive environment. And let’s say I’m your boss for this academic argument. And I give you a task, and you’re worried about, boy, how do I do this task, because I’m going to write your OER, or you’re going to get promoted, or I’m going to give you a shitty assignment if you don’t do it right. And then when you’re about halfway through it, about eighty percent loaded now, and I give you another task, and I say, well listen, you still got to do the other one too. And now I got you a hundred percent loaded and you’re still not done and I say oh, you got one more to do.

And now you’re trying to figure out, what the fuck do I do, I can’t do it all. In the meantime, can he get it all? No, you got to do it. Very uncomfortable. You’re going to grind yourself doing it. And that’s why you also should know your people. You shouldn’t give more than they can handle at certain times, too. You’ve probably faced that time in life and God, it’s a very uncomfortable feeling. And we’re all vulnerable to it. Particularly when your life’s at stake.

So the key idea, what you want to do is generate a mismatch between that which he perceives and that which he must react or adapt to. Note the key word: mismatch. We’ll get to that later on. It’s a very key idea. Menacing and faster. And there’s evidence of it over and over again. I’ll give you some examples here right now.

Audience: Sir, one thing going along here, this does not imply that you have to act first.

Boyd: Nope. Remember, overall view. I’m glad you brought that up because sometimes I forget. You bring up an associated point. When I bring this up, some people go, “you go fast, you go fast,” and Christ, we’ll all drive each other nuts. You don’t have to do that. We’re going to see in a minute. All I have to do is be faster than my adversary. I can be slow as long as I slow his down even more. So if I’m slow, as long as he’s slower, so it just doesn’t have to speed. It can be ambiguity, deception, many other things you can do. That’s what I’m saying.

That’s why the guerrillas, in a sense, were in effect operating at a faster tempo than we were over in Vietnam. They were operating very slow, but Christ, we were blundering all over and couldn’t even operate at their pace. We were doing things all disoriented. So we can slow the other guy down. You’ve seen it in basketball. Ever see a team when they start doing, Christ, the other guy slows them down so they get them out of their rhythm, they can’t function. You see it in many other areas. So remember, don’t think just speed, it’s what: relative speed, or relative tempo, or pace, whatever you want to use.

Lightfoot Transcription

22:29 so that that 22:33 IDE we begin to think about instead of 22:35 pring very specific inance we want to 22:38 generaliz in some sense what we're 22:40 saying and in some way we want to 22:42 operate a f Temple than 22:45 ourand it out talk physically you'll see 22:48 later on morally mentally and physically 22:50 right now we show you sort physically 22:53 let's pin that down a bit what we're 22:55 really saying better yet i' say what I 22:57 really want to do is get inside 22:59 observation orientation decision action 23:00 time cycle or Loop we'll show you later 23:02 on time cycles for 23:04 Loop or loop 23:08 again right exactly we want to pin 23:12 things down got to get inside his mind 23:15 look right inside 23:17 right but let's examine this what are we 23:20 really referring to as individuals here 23:21 we have to observe what's going on out 23:23 there with our 23:25 eyeballs or get somebody else's 23:29 observation or we in a Warfare sense 23:32 modern Electro mechanical equipment or 23:34 if an intelligence business e dropping 23:36 equipment Etc you're Gathering all that 23:39 information from all the different 23:40 sources you rather then pump that 23:42 information into your 23:43 brain what happens then when you pump 23:45 that information your brain you start 23:46 generating images views Impressions Etc 23:50 what I call 23:52 orientation Ori to what's going on you 23:54 start putting it all together you get an 23:57 orientation 23:59 out of that orientation possibilities

24:01 begin to suggest 24:02 themselves and you have to pick choose 24:05 or they say decide here upon the 24:06 responsibility you can't do them all you 24:07 say okay I'm going to go for these or 24:09 that you make that decision then you 24:12 have to implement that decision or take 24:13 the action then you have to observe the 24:16 consequences of that action and you roll 24:18 back to that L not only the consequences 24:20 of that action you're also doing what 24:21 you're drawing in ccal information at 24:23 the same 24:24 time and you roll through that well 24:27 guess what all human being 24:29 we all do our adversaries do we do but 24:33 no when I said we want to get inside his 24:35 move other words we want to be able to 24:36 roll through that at a faster Temple or 24:39 a faster Pace than he 24:43 can and why do we want to do 24:46 that why St because if we can do that we 24:50 will then begin to appear ambigous or 24:51 unic you not only that we can generate 24:53 confusion disorder in his system our 24:55 advisary 24:57 system now let's get a deeper sense of 24:59 that 25:00 why if you can do that he will be unable 25:03 to generate those appropriate images and 25:06 pictures that agree with that unfolding 25:08 phenomena both menacing and fasting no I 25:11 got them both 0:03 menacing in fact that's not medicine you

0:07 don't have to pay attention to my 0:09 goodness hey you gotta pay attention 0:12 physical remember when I'm talking about 0:15 man nothing just kill them as long as 0:17 you can threaten something that's a 0:20 value of him there's a value to him all 0:23 has to be back for this position of 0:25 pecking order respect from his peers or 0:29 his life whether it may be undervalued 0:30 and got a menacing impact so basically 0:38 doesn't snow that system a bizarre back 0:40 what am I really saying here in some 0:42 sense what you're really trying to 0:43 generate a mismatch between not what he 0:45 perceived and that's what you must 0:47 reactor down so therefore if I can work 0:51 my way to move faster than he can get 0:53 inside his room then we generate those 0:55 mismatched going to give you a feel and 0:59 the illustration is very important 1:02 that's just some we in this room are 1:04 gonna love to get some exit or some 1:06 other groups better which you people 1:08 next will be doing wait okay now let's 1:15 assume or say the academic arguments and 1:17 we can operate that fast with tempura 1:19 paper or food get inside his exactly 1:21 problems Soviet food here that turn cold 1:26 so let's assume we can get inside a room 1:29 what does that mean if he goes to make a 1:30 move we just inspected his room now no 1:34 longer row he tried to reboot we've 1:36 dusted hints no longer wrong 1:38 well after you laughter a couple of he's 1:40 gonna notice he's losing out we're ds1 1:42 further than further away physical well 1:44 one further further oh well this is 1:48 competitive wasting valuable going on 1:50 what's that going to do from thousand 1:52 surgeons and he's been into buildup in 1:54 his life and if we keep that pace on and 1:56 don't take the pressure off we transform 1:59 that diamonds are you completely 2:00 destroyed you probably seen with people 2:03 forward pressure coming unglued native 2:05 strange bizarre then it makes it even 2:06 worse unless somebody takes it squeeze 2:08 up 2:09 now if you have one group against 2:12 another group 2:13 in a group that other groups losing not 2:15 whatever maybe then they start 2:17 transmitting those doubts fears 2:18 uncertainties one to the other so not 2:20 only confusing disorders panic chaos 2:22 about we just see well up the 2:25 competitive totally and move and 2:26 function is organic whole they start 2:30 flowing fingers or one others nobody 2:31 wants to be a failure that helps even 2:32 more you've never seen that before 2:35 happen before the station bakery has a 2:46 thousand fathers just enormous one 2:58 against one thousand very important idea 3:10 thing when you get inside us to generate