Wow, even I forgot I wrote this piece some time ago, sorry for letting it go inactive.
The key is not "
Trying" to do anything to him, but rather you let him think that you
"WILL" do anything to him.
This work both Psychological Torture or Physical Torture.
The key is, you let him think you will do whatever you threaten to do.
Say, if I tell you I am going to kill you and we never met. You would not believe that, right?
But if I made up some story, that either I have killed before? Or you and I have some sort of past tangled together before, then you will start buying that I am honestly wanted to kill you.
It's the same with Interrogating people. If you put on the table (Threats, Deal or whatever), there are at no position that the other person will believe that, but with a convincing story, you will. The key is, how you get that story??
Well, that is the idea in a nutshell.
I cannot say that I am a pro on interrogating people, but I do know how to break people. Hard to just clear it out with some word here and there, but the key to breaking a person is that you need to know him or god forbid, her, inside and out.
First you need to know what you are expecting, put them in a stress test is a good way to separate the trained dude and the untrained one. Then you work your own way to get the info you need. It may not be pretty every time, but people will talk, one way or another, you just have to be able to "Catch the wave", is the term that I coin, clicked and viola, you got your info.
I know it sounded cheesy, but this is how I work.
1.) There are many technique and they were shared in between Law Enforcement/Military Intelligence/Intelligence organisation.
No 2 cases are the same, so you are expect to mix around different technique to get the best result each time. All those are common ground.
However, what different is the raw parameter that goes with the interrogation.
You cannot use sleep deprivation as a tool to extract information out of a suspect if you are in Law Enforcement. And 9 out of 10 times the info you need at the end of the train is not as urgent as say to prevent your squad from getting ambush or preventing the next terrorist attack. There are literally no bound for the latter 2 cases but you are bounded by law because you are a Law Enforcement officer.
That is the big different, literally this different can lead to the total game changer. Otherwise, in term of technique, they are the same, just the degree on how far you can go is different.
2.) Police have their own system, while we have ours. Basically you are talking about the same technique but again the degree is different.
Say for example, I can tell my detainee that I got his sister and if you don't tell me something, I am going to sell her in the brothel (Of course you don't say it that politely....) or I am going to hand her to his secular enemy or even I am going to kill her. Which you cannot do that when you are a LEO interrogating a suspect. The prospect of "Duress" is the key different with both doctrine.
However, I should point this out now, both we and LEO were trained with
Reid Technique. Which are the core basic of interrogation. But how you interpret those technique is a different ball game between soldier and La Enforcement.
Intelligence Organisation have their own book, and I do not know how they do things, beside from very effective result every time. Well, if I knew how they do stuff, you think I will still be here posting in forum
3.)Assume you are talking about the tactics we used overseas. Cause interrogation is highly governed inside United States. Because of all those lawyer.....
Most people don't actually know what we were doing. Confused at best, but I would say misinform is the word.
Yes, there are people abusing others over there, there are always sadistic individual anywhere....I can tell you this, people who are responsible for Abu Ghraib know jack shiite about interrogation. At best they are just sadistically abusing those prisoner.
There is a call to break someone down in working interrogation. Humiliation is one of the things you use as a tool to break people down. In term of Interrogation, you let them feel shame and you move on, but not continue the cycle of keep shaming them. I am not saying shaming is a good tool to get someone to talk, but let say that it is, isn't it's enough to shame the person only once, but not over and over again?? What you need is a break down of self esteem, not to destroy the man altogether.
For what it worth, those was the case of sadistic individual who got hold of immense power. And that's what general American saw on TV, hence this is what they perceive what we are doing over there. It takes years to build reputation but it only take one moment to trash it
4.) After they were interrogated, depending from individual to individual, some of them pose no threat and no use to us will be release, other that post threat to us will be continue to be detained, or maybe transfer to local authority pending situation, some of them are released and got turned into informant.
5.) As you said, this varies very differently. But I guess the game of interrogation is very much an "End Result" game, result said it all, each interrogation is a good interrogation when your end goal is achieved. And I have seen people done it with their mind and with their fist.
I personally admire those who got people to talk with interaction only, no violent involve, but we can't all live in a perfect world now can't we??
6.) Basic did cover some interrogation stuff, well, if you call "name, rank and serial number is all I can tell you" is sort of an interrogation technique....
Basic help fortified your body and mind and in a way, that contribute to resisting torture/interrogation. However, you only taught something specific when you are chosen, either into Spec Ops, SERE training or Intel course. It is a need to know basis.
Thanks for your comment
Interview is one part of interrogation, by no mean the only part, it's a dynamic and my article is trying to point people to an idea that interrogation is not always rough people up and the tough guy routine, sometime when truth can be coming out of talking, then, why not just talk ??
