Friday, 15 September 2017
The OODA loop of Trump's Insurgency has been Smashed

Trump is in the White House today because an open source insurgency put him there. I first wrote about Trump's open source insurgency a year and a half ago (February 2016). At that point, it was already apparent Trump was very likely to win not just the primary, but the election.

However, as prescient as my article was, I did get the plausible promise -- the simple goal the effort that unites all of the disparate interests, the goal that animates an insurgency -- wrong. At the time, I thought it was about representing forgotten interests (an error many writers are still making).

Instead, the real uniting goal of Trump's insurgency was "opposition to a failed establishment"

That goal held the insurgency that put him in office together, despite gaffes, scandals, leaks, etc that would have ended the political career of any other candidate. It was also a goal that allowed the insurgency to continue after winning the election. In most cases, once the goal has been accomplished (i.e. remove Mubarak), the insurgency evaporates.

The reason it didn't: the media.

The media is the voice of establishment interests (social, economic, and national security). It locks establishment interests in place. It also explained away failure after failure (nutty Chinese trade policy, lie that led to Iraq war, unpunished financial crisis, etc.) of the US establishment, as if it never occurred.

The media kept the insurgency alive through its overwhelming opposition to the Trump Presidency and Trump helped keep it alive by provoking the media at every turn. The alignment of this very public struggle with the plausible promise of the insurgency kept Trump's support at about ~40% (and more than 50% in more than half of all Congressional districts nationally).

The end of the Insurgency

That insurgency is now over. Its OODA loop is smashed.

Worried that Trump would end existing US spending/policies (largely, still geared to cold war priorities), the senior military staff running the Trump administration launched a counter-insurgency against the insurgency. They have been successful (if only they were half as good fighting against real world insurgencies). Here's how:

Former generals took control of key staff positions.

They purged staff members that were part of the insurgency and tightly limited access to Trump.

Finally, and most importantly, they took control of Trump's information flow.

That final step changed everything. General Kelly, Trump's Chief of Staff, has put Trump on a establishment-only media diet. Further, staff members are now prevented from sneaking him stories from unapproved sources during the day (stories that might get him riled up and off the establishment message).

The impact has been immediate. As Maggie Haberman of the New York Times (Trump talks to her daily) says, "this is definitely true re the media diet, and part of what aides have described as a more sanguine POTUS."

In short, by controlling Trump's information flow with social media/networks, the generals smashed the insurgency's OODA loop (observe, orient, decide, act). Deprived of this connection, Trump is now weathervaning to cater to the needs of the establishment (as seen with his new stance on DACA and the Wall).

The insurgency appears to be dead.

If this is true, what can we expect now?

Trump's popularity will plunge into the 20's as he mainstreams -- large segments of the insurgency will walk away permanently and those who have opposed him will continue to oppose him (he won't get any credit for mainstreaming). At support in the mid twenties, the stranglehold that the insurgency has on Republican Congressman will end (impeachment/removal?) and rallies will become impossible (too many angry people).

JMR

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PS: Trump's insurgency was composed of many different groups, with very different reasons for joining. This makes it impossible to claim that his election was based on the desires of any single group of participants. For example: Russian hackers were also minor contributors to this insurgency, and the because it was an open source insurgency, their contributions were welcomed.

http://globalguerrillas.typepad.com/globalguerrillas/2017/09/the-ooda-loop-of-trumps-insurgency-has-been-smashed.html