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In this chapter, I analyze former US president Barack Obama’s foreign policy decision-making process during his two terms of presidency between the years 2008 and 2016. The analysis covers six decisions with an emphasis on decisions concerning conflicts that embodied a potential for the use of force.

Using the Applied Decision Analysis (ADA) method, I find that Barack Obama’s decision-making pattern in these decisions fits the poliheuristic decision theory, where the domestic politics dimension constitutes a non-compensatory dimension. By understanding President Obama’s use of the poliheuristic decision code, this study can offer an explanation to his willingness to use force in some cases, and his avoidance of the use of force in others.

Understanding how leaders make foreign policy and national security decisions is of paramount importance for the policy community and academia. It is our assertion that decisions in these domains can be explained best by tracing the cognitive process leaders go through in formulating and arriving at their decisions, using the Applied Decision Analysis (ADA) method (Mintz, 2005; Mintz & DeRouen, 2010).

Consequently, this chapter summarizes the Applied Decision Analysis method which is utilized throughout the chapters comprising this volume. We then discuss the findings presented in this volume, while demonstrating the merit of both ADA and the poliheuristic theory of decision (Mintz, 2004), in the robust analyses of decisions made by Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Benjamin Netanyahu, Winston Churchill, Mao Zedong, Barack Obama, Saddam Hussein, Khaled Mashal, Muammar Gaddafi, Pieter Botha, and Frederik de Klerk. We conclude by providing a brief summary of the case studies which are included in this volume.