Educing Information: Interrogation - National Intelligence University

One of those can be found in the above passage. Interrogators must
consistently guard against taking actions that will prove counterproductive as
the process unfolds. Rather, interrogation must be approached in a systematic
fashion, thinking, as a chess master must, several steps ahead of the interrogatee.
This is where the aforementioned Law of Requisite Variety comes into play, as the
interrogator always maintains at least one more method of obtaining compliance
— be it a new line of questioning, an alternative approach, or a well-crafted ruse
(see below) — than the source has means of resisting. But, as the manual states,
employing those options in a confused, ill-conceived manner will only “increase
the interrogatee’s will and ability to resist.”
The KUBARK manual offers specific techniques (i.e., approaches) for use in
a non-coercive interrogation setting. Several of these have potential for application
in current intelligence collection operations.
Going Next Door
Occasionally the information needed from a recalcitrant
interrogatee is obtainable from a willing source…[t]he labor
of extracting the truth from an unwilling interrogatee should
be undertaken only if the same information is not more easily
obtainable elsewhere…. 78
One of the fallacies of interrogation — and one that continues to be a
significant factor in driving the use of coercive techniques — is the concept that
every detainee is a unique, invaluable, and irreplaceable source of intelligence
information and therefore must be leveraged into compliance. As with the
“ticking nuclear bomb” scenario so often cited in the debate over just how far
U.S. interrogators should go to force a source to cooperate, such instances are
extremely rare. Nonetheless, there is almost a default pattern wherein the path
of greatest resistance is taken with a recalcitrant source rather than taking the
more strategic route of seeking the same information from a more accessible and
compliant source.
This common miscue is based on two fundamental errors in judgment. The
first is an ego-based error. While persistence is a critical characteristic of many
successful interrogators, the most accomplished among them focus their finite
resources (e.g., time and energy) on the challenges that present the most attractive
risk/gain ratio. After spending sufficient time to establish that the source’s
resistance posture will be a significant hurdle, the wise interrogator quickly asks
himself/herself, in keeping with the KUBARK manual guidance quoted above,
“Where else can I obtain the information I need” Such prudent interrogators
are not driven by the need to demonstrate their skill in overcoming a particular
source’s line of resistance; rather, they are driven by the intractable need to obtain
the desired information from whatever source is liable to offer it up.
78
KUBARK, 66.
124