Earlier today, politicos across America proclaimed that Mitt Romney’s speech denouncing Donald Trump was a complete bust. Morning Consult polled Republicans and found that the broadside had barely moved the needle in the race:

Thirty-one percent of GOP voters said they were more likely to vote for Trump, while 20 percent said less likely, and 43 percent said it had no impact either way.

The poll, which was conducted March 4 through March 6, also finds that only five percent of Trump supporters said they are now less likely to vote for Trump. And, of those who voted for Romney in 2012, 30 percent said they were more likely to vote for Trump, compared to 20 percent who said less likely. Nearly half (48 percent) said it wouldn’t affect their vote either way.

The 2012 GOP nominee is the foremost representative of the loathed establishment, so it’s no surprise that his University of Utah speech didn’t change the minds of angry voters. But, of course, that wasn’t the purpose of Romney’s speech. Likewise, Marco Rubio’s mockery and Ted Cruz’s lawyerly deconstruction of The Donald weren’t primarily designed to make the Trumpenproletariat abandon their leader. Instead, they wanted to get inside Trump’s OODA Loop.

The OODA Loop

While in the US Air Force, fighter pilot Col. John R. Boyd created a decision-making model which allowed American pilots to dominate every dogfight. Marshaling his exhaustive knowledge of big thinkers from Sun Tzu to Werner Heisenberg, Boyd determined that victory isn’t merely a matter of superior technology and firepower. More important are brainpower, decisiveness, and fast choices.

OODA stands for Observation, Orientation, Decision, Action. The pilot must quickly observe the conditions, orient his jet before the opponent does, decide upon a plan, and then act against the enemy’s weakness. The faster through this cycle, the better. After the pilot’s initial decisive act, he immediately observes the new environment, re-orients himself, decides a second move, and acts on it. By employing this framework, Boyd promised he could best any of his fellow pilots despite starting a mock battle in a vulnerable position. He achieved his goal every time in less than 40 seconds.

The OODA loop is as applicable to business and politics as it is to dogfights. If you run a tech company, success isn’t merely having the best product, being fastest to market, or having the largest marketing budget. Those are helpful, but the essential element is to outmaneuver the competition. By taking fast, decisive action, you can get inside your opponent’s OODA loop, which Boyd said will “make us appear ambiguous, [and] thereby generate confusion and disorder.”

Getting Inside Trump’s OODA Loop

Until the past couple of weeks, Donald Trump has been the only candidate generating confusion and disorder. Always on offense, the media covers him non-stop, whether it’s for the petty insult of the day, a false claim, or strange behavior. When the news channels do cover his rivals, they mostly ask the candidates about Trump’s latest outrage. Nearly all of his opponents’ decisions have been defensive, responding to the frontrunner.

But as anyone who has watched The Donald knows, he is an insecure and undisciplined man who can’t resist responding to any perceived slight — often in embarrassing ways. So Rubio mocked his finger size … to which the Donald assured a vast debate audience that he had a large penis. Rubio exposed the Trump University scam … to which The Donald lied about an “A” rating from the Better Business Bureau which had actually granted it a D-minus. He spent days on Twitter calling the Florida senator a “leightweight” and a “chocker,” fueling even more mockery.

Around the time Rubio was taking it to The Donald, Romney demanded that Trump release his taxes and implied that the multizillionaire was hiding a far less impressive net worth. Trump responded in a long Twitter rant with more insults and over-the-top boasts about his financial acumen. Then Mitt implied The Donald might be hiding financial mismanagement and business failures. Trump jumped on the airwaves to respond, his face red with anger as he lied about his bankruptcies and hiring foreign workers. The press couldn’t help but explain the scandals to their viewers.

Then came March 3, the morning of a crucial debate in the delegate-rich state of Michigan: The ideal time for Mitt to really rattle the GOP frontrunner. Instead of resting up or doing debate prep, Trump watched Mitt’s speech denouncing him, then hastily staged a shouty, rambling speech of his own. He called in to talk shows and spoke of Mitt “dropping to his knees” for him. He again took to Twitter, focused entirely on a man who isn’t running against him. By the time the debate began, Trump was tired, peevish, and completely off his game.

Rubio and Cruz observed this fact, reoriented, decided on new attacks, and acted with vigor.

I’m sure Mitt and Marco would be happy if their attacks on Trump had convinced his fans to abandon their hero and join one of his rivals. They would have loved to see his poll numbers plummet overnight and his frontrunner status collapse like Herman Cain’s did in the 2012 race. But that wasn’t their primary goal.

Instead, they wanted to get inside Trump’s OODA loop, put him on the defensive for the first time in this campaign, and force him into costly mistakes. And, in that, they succeeded.