Educing Information: Interrogation - National Intelligence University

information, rather than to harm the source. However, the real interests of the
source may be to harm the United States and its representatives — and in so doing
he might even accept injury to himself or even affirmatively wish to be harmed.
Dealing with the possibility that an individual source intends harm to the
United States is particularly complicated, in part because we do not know what
a specific person intends until we design and implement a plan to find out — or
until the person acts. But even where the source is focused on harming the United
States, it does not follow that a reciprocal, negative strategy on the part of the
United States will be an effective way to acquire useful information from him.
There has been little research on how to convince an individual B, who wishes
to injure A, to become willing to collaborate (especially when B is willing to
accept or even seek injury to himself). Convincing a person to relinquish vengeful
interests, or to override the desire for revenge, is difficult. This is in part because
the wish to injure often derives from intangibles, and especially from perceived
humiliation. (My people and I have been humiliated. The United States is a sinful
state that must be brought to its knees. God wishes me to take revenge on His
enemies.)
Tangible losses can sometimes be dealt with more easily, by providing tangible
incentives to cooperate. If someone is “tangibly” harmed (I hit his car) it may be
relatively easy to negotiate a restitution with money. If someone is emotionally
harmed, or believes that someone close to him has been harmed or humiliated, the
path to dealing with that person’s “real interests” may be more complicated, and it
may be impossible to “buy him off” with money or creature comforts.
In addition, much of negotiations research has dealt with “tangible things of
positive value,” whereas wanting to injure someone or a nation is an intangible
(hard to see, understand, label, discuss, and quantify) and lies in a negative zone.
Thus, convincing a vengeful person to cooperate may require a change of attitude
on his part, all the way from very negative to positive, and may call for offering
intangibles of value. The next figure illustrates this graphically:
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