OODA (Observe, Orient, Decide, and Act)

OODA (observe, orient, decide, and act) refers to a model of combat decision making formulated and popularized by John Boyd (1927–1997), former U.S. Air Force fighter pilot and influential American military thinker. Boyd theorized that adversaries in conflict observe the world, incorporate their observations [Page 1016]into a more general orientation, make decisions, and then translate their decisions into actions, the results of which feed back into the cycle, which repeats until the engagement ends. This model, also known as an “OODA loop” or a “Boyd cycle,” is popularly associated with the idea that a decisive advantage will accrue to the combatant who can go through the steps more rapidly over the course of successive decision cycles. However, recent scholarship has emphasized a much more complex ...