door of his unconscious. This is a beautiful example of thin-
slicing in action. The fireman’s internal computer effortlessly
and instantly found a pattern in the chaos. But surely the most
striking fact about that day is how close it all came to disaster.
Had the lieutenant stopped and discussed the situation with his
men, had he said to them, let’s talk this over and try to figure
out what’s going on, had he done, in other words, what we
often think leaders are supposed to do to solve difficult
problems, he might have destroyed his ability to jump to the
insight that saved their lives.
In Millennium Challenge, this is exactly the mistake that
Blue Team made. They had a system in place that forced their
commanders to stop and talk things over and figure out what
was going on. That would have been fine if the problem in front
of them demanded logic. But instead, Van Riper presented them
with something different. Blue Team thought they could listen
to Van Riper’s communications. But he started sending messages
by couriers on motorcycles. They thought he couldn’t launch his
planes. But he borrowed a forgotten technique from World War
II and used lighting systems. They thought he couldn’t track
their ships. But he flooded the Gulf with little PT boats. And
then, on the spur of the moment, Van Riper’s field commanders