Understanding Human Intelligence (HUMINT) Part 2 - Conducting HUMINT OPs

[jhungary]

Understanding Human Intelligence (HUMINT) Part 2 - Conducting HUMINT OPs

As I mentioned In Part 1, there are 2 basic type of HUMINT Ops. In this chapter, we will cover the organisational requirement, missions planning, execution and debriefing, operational requirement and general guideline on a successful covert or overt HUMINT OPs.

(1) Organisational Structure

Contrary to many people imagination, the US runs a unified Organisational Structure within both Civilian/Military intelligence, under the Joint Intelligence Committee, all asset (Civilian, Military, Intelligence Asset) are group and handle by a single unified Structure, the structure, however was local to the location and have different leadership/role for different organisation.

For example, NCS (National Clandestine Service for CIA/NSA) would have their own leader and member within the same structure and DCS (Defence Clandestine Service for DIA) would have their own team and other Civilian Authority (DEA, FBI et al) would have their separate team. But they are under the same structure and work at the same place.

(1.1.1)National or Chief Advisor

-On the very top of the organisation, basically is the person debrief necessary associate within the Government (the ambassador, the State Department, the National Security Advisor or even the President.)
The job basically communicate between all groups and finalise or summarise a daily report with all the Intel at hand for debriefing government official. This position is always under official diplomatic cover and may not materialize if the department is small. If that is the case, then Station Chief would be doing this job.

(1.1,2)Station Chief

The chief of each department, CIA have their own Station chief, DIA have their own Station chief. FBI/DEA may have their own station chief (if so, would be called Liaison). Depending on the scale of operation, there can be multiple station chief or simply the one (Usually just CIA Chief)

Station Chief sometime take over the job of Chief Advisor to the Ambassador job if such posting does not exist (Again, depending on the scale of operation) Station Chief is an Official Diplomatic Cover, it usually reside within the Embassy. Its job include compile security report base on information obtained thru source and funding allocation (Which is a very important issue and will be discussed later on)

(1.1.3)Officer

Case officer or Operation Officer (Military or Civilian) manage and recruit local asset, where the Intel is going to be generated. Most case officer handle their own recruitment, but sometime enlist the help of Recruiting officer (Another post within the embassy) to recruit asset.

It would be interesting to know Case Officer is not a tangible position, literally all asset management agent are Case Officer. So if Asset A is managing another Asset B, then asset A would become a case officer for Asset B all in while Asset A may be managed by Case Officer C.

Case Officer can be of any Cover, they can be with Official Diplomatic Cover (With Diplomatic Immunity) Official Cover (Without Diplomatic Immunity), Unofficial Over (Covert Agent) or even member of the Military, particularly in a War Zone.

(1.1.4)Intelligence Officer

Basically, this job posting is for assessing Intel, contrary to common believe, Case Officer does not process Intel obtained by Asset, they do know what that Intel make sense to but without verification and probably third party supporting evidence, those Intel may not be useful at all. With intelligence officer, they will use multiple source to make sense of a current event. This is extremely important to separate a Case Officer and an Intelligence Officer to keep the organisation detail compartmentalised, otherwise compromising one section of asset and case officer would jeopardise the whole network.

Due to the sensitive nature of this operation, the Intelligence officer will be an official Diplomatic Covered job with little to no amount of time spend outside the embassy.

(1.1.5)Communication Officer

Handle Open communication between asset and station, both encrypted or non-encrypted. Close Communication are handled by case officer of the asset. Communication such as Number Station broadcast, Crypto-Message, Mail Correspondent, Radio Communication.

Communication done by either cryptic or non-cryptic method was handled by communication officer, again to compartmentalize the operation. So it will guarantee if one part of the operation is compromised, it would not affect another.

Again, due to the nature of this posting, this would be a Official Diplomatic Cover with Diplomatic immunity.

(1.1.6)Security Officer

Handle Physical and Cyber Security or all sort of operational security issue , the guy (or girl) that ensure the environment is secure, a technical post, they also are to fish out "mole" or double agent within the structure. It could have more than one posting of such in any structure. Usually Special Force trained if the Security Officer were involved in Physical Security and Specialist Trained for other Security Issue.

Security officer will be of Official Diplomatic Cover, with low end Diplomatic Coverage. Usually either posing as Military Attaché or Junior level Embassy Official.

(1.1.7)Deep Cover or Military Asset

Basically the local eyes and ears. In this day and age, most surveillance were done by SIGINT, but Ground Asset is still have their important.

While Deep Cover Asset Generate Intel, they could be either a Flip (Local Agent flipped by your intelligence service) or a Plant (an Local/Foreign Agent loyal to your organisation planted in position), while both doing the same job in the end, the way of they do it may be different. Usually a Flip would have more established network of source, and they are highly effective. But so does the risk that they are double agent is high. A plant would start from zero, and building a highly trusted network from ground up, would consider a "Long Shot" but if the plant is loyal to your own government, the Intel generated is less risky.

Military Asset included all Available Ground/Sea/Air Military Asset, most usually in the form of Tier 1 (Covert) Special Force Agent (e.g. Delta/SEALs), Sleeper Asset (Local Military), and Covert Military Force (Private Contractor). Military Asset main task is to conduct Interdiction ops and denied ops, where the first one mean a sabotage of sort and the second one mostly mean Kill/No Capture Mission. Military Asset however could also be used to retrieve HVI, either voluntarily (Rescue) or involuntarily (Abduction). Military Asset would also employed to interrogation of EPW or Rendition Prisoner.

This is very common to have both Deep Cover Asset and Military Asset to develop their own Asset and Intelligence network, they could be case officer for sub-level asset. Most Deep Cover Agent are Local, it can be Official non-Diplomatic Cover, usually not unofficial cover (I can't think of any Deep Cover asset that is unofficial cover....

Military Asset, on the other hand, range from Official Diplomatic Cover to Unofficial Cover.

 

[jhungary]

(2)Clandestine Intelligence Operation


So, now that you know the organisation within an Intelligence operation, the next thing you will need to know is How to conduct Clandestine Intelligence Operation, there are basically 2 type of Clandestine Intelligence Operation. Asset Penetration and Black Military Ops.

But before we start talking about how to conduct and what kind of Covert Ops there are, we need to cover the 2 basic ground rules on conducting Covert Intel Ops.

Rule1.) Only Penetrate when you need to. Building Asset Network is not the job for Intel op planner. It's the job of Case Officer and Asset. Technically speaking, the more asset you plan, the more chance they will get caught. And when it does, it could spell demise of the whole Operation in country. As a general rules, only plant asset when you want to know something you don't know.

Rule 2.) Never Repeat Penetrate. Very straight forward, when you try to insert asset once and you fail, naturally, you would assume the target would have up their game. Never insert asset twice in one target. If you want Operational Security, you can insert multiple asset (Known as Double/Multiple Penetration) to make sure one of them get thru, but when you got caught doing it once, never do it again.

(2.1)Asset Penetration Operation - Covers

Well, quite honestly you cannot get into a foreign country listing your occupation as Spies...(You can but it's kind of, well, dumb, don't you think?) So, a cover is always assign to any foreign agent and even some asset (If that asset is a plant)

Basically there are 3 type of cover Agent/Asset use to serve their role in a target country.

(2.1.1)-Official, Diplomatic Cover

Cover as a worker in the embassy of your own country. As a general rules, at least one person in an Foreign Embassy in your country is a spy. In Intel Ops, you need to assume All Employee of a foreign embassy is actually a spy.

Diplomatic Cover offer immunity, that mean if shit really does hit the fan, at best you will get a persona-non-grata and asked to leave from your host nation. Which would naturally comes in handy for spy.

It especially works with higher level agent and people who "Know too much" but as higher up as you go, you won't leave the embassy much as

(2.1.2)-Official Cover

Those who enter a foreign country legally but without diplomatic capacity. Hence, no diplomatic immunity for them. If they are caught, it's a fair game for the local country.

One need a reason to enter any foreign country, be that business, travel, study and so on. And that would be the front of a foreign asset and agent to get in the country.

The most popular cover is businessman, investment field particularly. As they would be more active in a foreign country and can build relationship pretty easy and more permanently stayed, the next best cover would be student. due to science and academic is two active field to be spy on, the down side of this cover is most country only allow student to stay temporary.

(2.1.3)-Unofficial Cover (Illegal Cover)

A cover denote that an agent enter a target country illegally and basically, without cover (Since he/she does not exist on paper). Such person would be called a "Ghost" as there are no paperwork on his existence on foreign soil anywhere.

Obliviously it cannot be use as a Deep Cover asset. But it would be invaluable for Black Op such as assassination or covert ops that cannot trace the origin, as the agent enter illegally, the track stop with him, unless the agent inform on the host country, the mission parameter is basically secure.

(2.2)Asset Penetration Operation - Missions

(2.2.1)Reporting Mission

Basic building block for any espionage mission, it cover surveillance, intelligence gathering and Manipulating missions. Reporting mission can be deep cover or just as is. For example, in WW2, Richard Sorge is a deep cover reporting agent for Soviet Russia, reporting on Japanese Military Activities. It's role is a deep cover one where he use Journalist as cover, to penetrate the Japanese Intel network and report Japanese move to the Soviet. And on the other hand, those Japanese tourist and resident in Hawaii taking troop movement and ship's movement is a prime example for the as is category

(2.2.2)Intelligence mission

Intelligence mission is to obtain target's Intel, Intelligence mission conducted with Asset penetration usually involve a plant agent/asset. Through mean of Deep Cover.

The basic of intelligence mission is to have someone in place of the organisation you want to infiltrate, whether the asset is a plant or a flip, They goal is the same, pass on information on your target to you.

(2.2.3)Counterintelligence Mission

Counter Intelligence mission is the prevention of enemy infiltration. In another word, whatever Intelligence in reverse in goal. As asset can perform both intelligence and counter intelligence mission, especially when the penetration is in target Intelligence agency.

Thru the use of mis-information and deception, an asset can throw target's intelligence agency into chaos, on the other hand, obtaining target's intelligence asset would deal a blow to target's intelligence capability.

(2.2.4)Direct Action Mission

This is a more recent common objective mission, basically what it does is to set up a team for supporting an on-going mission. That team, military and intelligence personnel would only focus on that particular objective. And nothing else.
It happened as a stand alone operation, with a single purpose, the biggest up-to-date direct action mission is the locating and eliminating of Osama Bin Laden

(2.2.5)Black Ops

Also known as Denied Ops, with the goal range from military intervention, assassination to coup. Black Ops can be part of Intelligence Operation(Like abducting an foreign official for interrogation), it can also be a bracketed complete mission (Like DA Ops)

(2.3)Asset Penetration Operation - Asset

Asset is the most important resource of any penetration, without asset, there will be no Intel. Here are a short description of different type of asset.


(2.3.1)Plant/Asset in Place/Dangled mole - An asset or agent loyal to you and you send them off to work for your target, reporting target Intel back to you. A plant can be a normal technician (Asset) or a trained Intelligence Operator (Agent)

(2.3.2)Mole - An asset which start out loyal to your target, then turned by your organisation. May or may not need to be trained intelligence operator, but since their background, it would never be used in capacity of a trained intelligence operator in your country. Regardless of the original status of a mole, they are all works as an asset to your organisation.

(2.3.3)Defector - An asset that worked for target country, and then defect to you. Usually only used to provide one off information. An defected agent is hence "burnt" (With the identity know on both side) and have no further value to either their own and your intelligence agency

(2.3.4)Double agent - An double agent is an trained Intelligence operator who loyal to you, who work for your target and indeed working for you. Or an agent who is working for your agency but in fact was loyal to someone else (As a mole) but your agency exposed the agent and have him/her work for you while letting the agent original loyalty believe that agent is still loyal to them.

The only different with double agent and a plant is that in this case, both side know the agent work for each side, but ultimately the ultimate loyalty lies is the final deciding point of a double agent.

A double agent usually comes into play by exposing enemy/target agent within your service, hence you coercer them into your service. However, in the modern usage, a double agent can in fact gain entry to your own intelligence service by other mean other than coercion.

(2.3.5)Re-doubled Agent - An re-doubled agent can be said a triple agent, for example, an agent originally worked for you, then got turned by your target by exposing him, but instead of pledging allegiance to your target to avoid prosecution, he/she continue to work for you under the pretext of working for your target. And turn one more time by you when the time is right. (usually a turned agent went thru a probation period)

The only different between a re-doubled agent and a triple agent, is the allegiance (ultimate) for the agent does not change in the end, while a triple agent can turn by yet a third party.

(2.3.6)Triple and Multiple Turned Agent - While it's increasingly difficult to have turn that many time, but example do exist and the basis of double crossing system used by the British allow an agent to turn multiple time before losing trust on the agent (Mostly turn by friend or foe's allies)

(2.3.7)Military Asset - Trained Covert Military Operator used to execute covert military ops. Usually under non-official cover, and when caught, they would have the same situation as a common criminal.

(3)How intelligence ops are conducted??

(3.1)-Agent Acquisition Cycle/Recruiting Cycle

To conduct an Intel op, the first basic commodity is asset in place, without asset, there would be no information.
The recruitment of an asset/agents is the job for case officer, basically, the Case officer build their own network of asset, using said network to obtain information on an Intel Op. Case officer can and sometime do depend on recruiting officer or access officer for asset recruitment.

(3.1.1)Spotting

The very first step of Recruitment. Not everyone have the potential to be recruited, case officer looking at person with either connection with authority, connection with academia, connection with Corporation and affiliation with Intelligence community to work for them. To pass information to them. But very oblivious you can't turn what you cannot see, hence spotting phase comes in handy.

Spotting can be done covertly or publicly, depending on the profile of the potential target. Case Officer can use public available information to look up potential target, or they could use their already in placed asset to spot for them, either way, once a case officer found a suitable candidate, it will then move on to the next phase.

(3.1.2)Assessment/Vetting

Once an potential target was spotted, then the cycle moves into Assessment phase. Basically this phase allows the case officer making direct approach to the target without breaking cover. The aims is to gather as much as you can read from the candidate and assess what value this candidate bring, his/her biography, basically just to know the candidate better.

The case officer will first make a physical approach to the candidate, then graduate build up the relationship between the candidate and the case officer, and thru this, get to know more of the candidate to access the suitability of the candidate.

(3.1.3)Development

When an candidate is suitable for recruitment. Then the next phase would be development phase, during this phase, the case officer will physically bond with the candidate. With the main theme of securing a physical personal relationship that allow the potential to trust the case officer.

During this phase, the case officer will start to grasp hold of the need of the candidate, as personal relationship improve, a more personal aspiration side of the candidate will came before the case officer, case officer will then use this aspiration to direct approach recruiting the candidate.

If there are no aspiration, or angle, to penetrate, the case officer will then terminate this contact (Terminate does not mean kills) and start over again at spotting phase

(3.1.4)Pitch

Once the case officer have enough detail to go on, then they will break their cover and start a pitch to the candidate. Pitching phase is the most important, or even paramount to the whole asset recruitment. It remains one of the most dangerous and thus most exciting part of the recruitment process.

The ramification is paramount, both to the case officer and to the candidate, as it's often see as a make or break, not only to the current recruit course, but to all the already established network of that case officer, or even the entire operation cycle of the local station representative.

If the candidate accepted the pitch, that means he/she would be agreeing to break the own laws of the country. Which translate to the candidate is now an asset and is a dependent of the case officer's skill to keep his/her cover.
Had the candidate refused the pitch, the case officer would be reported to local authority, result are vary, range from expel from host country (If case officer is with Official Diplomatic Cover) to outright execution by conducting espionage in the host nation (Without any diplomatic cover) And the Case officer network will be scrutinized and either disperse or get shut down as a result.

In the pitch phase, in hind sight would depend on a well and entrenched development to minimize the blowback and refusal of recruitment. However, not all case require a "warm pitch" which is a pitch done after substantial and thorough development. Cold pitch is sometime happens when there are not enough time to develop a case officer-candidate relationship. Either the general situation for recruitment got worse (Say the target country is nearly finished with their nuclear project, need for asset in place is greater than the risk) or the candidate is what we called a "Priority Candidate" usually a person with immense connection and/or in risk of being sway by other intelligence, either way, if the risk is justified, then the cold pitch would be going ahead instead of a warm pitch

(3.1.5)Handling

Once a candidate enter into agreement to provide the case officer with protected information, the cycle would then enter the handling phase, where the case officer will take care of the day-to-day finance of an asset, give them the remuneration or benefit asked by the asset and most importantly, teaches the asset "Tradecraft"

Tradecraft is espionage 101, it detail how the asset can maintain secrecy and to spy on their own organisation, tradecraft will be cover in later chapter.

Also happening in the handling phase, the case officer will be closely monitoring the asset to determine if the asset is genuinely working for the case officer or have other agenda in mind (i.e. a double agent) What the case officer do is to continue testing the asset regarding their loyalty and ongoing progress on receiving and transferring protected information.

Had the asset turned out to be a double agent, or a dangled mole, the case officer will then either move on to termination phase, or going back to pitch phase to turn the asset again,

(3.1.6)Termination

Not like how it sounded, termination is not simply killed off the asset when the case officer is done with it, in fact, it is quite bad for business for losing an asset, let alone killing one off.

Termination can come in any shape and form, ranging from caught, betrayal to simply the asset is no longer privy to sensitive information, i.e. lose his/her job to the information is no longer needed by the case officer.

Either way, when an asset is terminated, it can still be in play for re-activation, or simply have the relationship dropped or pull out and move to another location. But in the end, the "Agreement" between Case officer and the asset would end mutually.

(3.2)How to turn an asset

In the recruiting cycle, the pitch is known to be the most paramount, and the centre of the pitch is how to turn an asset. In the western intelligence agency, We follow either a older MICE model or a more recent MICED model. MICED Stands for

Money - income, greed, financial need (Medical expense, living expense)
Ideology - born into a wrong political/religious/belief system?
Compromise - Susceptible to blackmail? Emotional and Relationship?
Ego - Up to Challenge? Just to proof you can do it and get away with it?
Dissatisfaction - Not happy with current paid or current working environment?

There are probably a million reason out there to betray your own country, the reason is to be looked at in detail during the development phase of the cycle. When a case officer is bonded with the candidate, the candidate will open up freely to what "jiggling" and taunting him/her, case officer will use that to pitch to the candidate.

How and exactly what to do to manipulate the candidate is basic human psychology. There are rules and guideline on how and what to look for but those item cannot be discuss openly.

(3.3)-Trade Craft

Tradecraft involved in the skill necessary to survive as an informant. From running an operation yourselves to how to operate a camera...

Typical tradecraft involved:

• Asset handling
• Information Handling
• Data Processing
• Basic Surveillance Technique
• Basic Cryptography
• Dead Drop exchange
• Hacking
• Operational Handling
• Deception
• Interrogation
• Communication
• Steganography
• TEMPEST (Spying and Shielding thru leakage within IT System, Part of SIGINT)

Basic playbook on tradecraft is classified, but an agent is technically trained in all those field before commencing mission with case officer

 

[jhungary]

(4)Military Operation

Military Operation are used as a basin of intelligence gathering, by mean of Direct Action, Covert Action and also Military Surveillance. Normal Military Operation can potentially generate useful Intel by mean of Capture EPW (Enemy Prisoner of War) by chortling, coercion and interrogation of EPW

(4.1)Direct Action Operation (DA)

Direct Action Mission described as "Short term, small scale, non-sustainable strike conducted in a special operation environment in hostile, denied or political sensitive environment. It's main function is to seize, destroy, control, capture, exploit, recover and damage a certain target.

Special Force trained with DA mission and DA mission is a result orientated operation that have purposely use clandestine and overt method to gain entry to target.

Intelligence can be part or whole of the operation, the latter happen if the DA mission is aiming for acquiring enemy HVI for interrogation covertly.

DA Mission usually conducted behind enemy line. With SF unit may or may not been sanctioned, carry out hit-and -run attacks on target, The whole operation focus on time, get in, strike and get out. Unlike Special Recon Mission, which will cover below, SF itself is the weapon to perform the strike.

(4.2)Special Reconnaissance Mission (SR)

Special Reconnaissance Mission focus on the forward deploy reconnaissance unit. Defined as A small, tactical unit of specially trained personnel, operate behind enemy line avoiding engaging with the enemy, instead support and direct airstrike, damage assessment, data and Intel feedback for both HUMINT and SIGINT operation.

SR mission usually conduct with HUMINT in mind, where the recon team would be the eyes and ears of the agent, Agent require to assess and confirm the target after strike, and a SF team would send in after an surgical strike or a strike package to assess damage and whether or not the intent target have been taken out.

Another way to use SR team is for an agent to conduct a remote surveillance. Usually about troop movement, atmospheric parameter and any kind of Intel related Surveillance.
The 3rd most common mission is TECHINT. Where a SR unit will insert behind enemy line or an enemy fulfilling environment to Extra enemy technology, new weaponry, design or data. Famous example is the Enigma Machine during WW2.

SR vs. LRS - Another spectrum of SR is LRS- Long Range Surveillance, it would require a 6 men team to perform deep in-country surveillance, LRS formerly know as LRRP which is a type of special warfare style reconnaissance aiming at infiltrate and anti-infiltration of enemy territories, the different between SR and LRS is the operational parameter, while both perform specialist recon service, SR would be more heavily armed with more capable agent, can carry DA capability, usually a Tier 1 SF team running unsupported. On the other hand LRS is more formal force, lightly armed and usually avoid contact. Until the objective is over.

(4.3)Unconventional Warfare (UW)

A force that work behind Enemy line to subverts the enemy, intelligence gathering and psychological warfare. Unconventional warfare will bring in a new dimension of warfare. Unit that was inserted and left alone covertly will then infiltrate the local population.

The relation with HUMINT is an open one, it basically act as a subversion agent, meaning spreading misinformation to induce a hostile environment from the population to the host country. By working false flag ops, disinformation, and psychological operation, they could tear the support of a war from the local population.

(4.4)Intelligence Dissemination Management

As I said before, information from Intel source are highly compartmentalized for a reason, the fact that such information is highly volatile suggested that the collection and distribution method must be highly controlled.

With a single piece of Intel product, the range of information sensibility may vary, some part of the finding maybe highly classified, maybe due to the source that itself is highly secretive and highly covert, or the information itself may be sensitive to particular operation at hand. In general, people may have clear to access a part of Intel product, while regarding the other part "Out of their pay grade" That's why distribution of intelligence product must be highly governed.

Another reason why the distribution of classified information must be managed is due to the nature on those information is going to be used. Most of the classified Intel ended up in high level governmental decision making, and intelligence itself, maybe used upon as a measurement for such decision, but the Intel itself should not alter or dictate the policy. A full view of specific Intel may give a politician more choice than they should, or may limited the choice they should have been choosing.

(4.4.1)Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility (SCIF)

A SCIF is a place where the collected Intel being handled and processed, "off-shore" away from the actual and genuine use of information. SCIF is a specially designed, highly covert operation, it's location must satisfy the basic EMSEC and COMSEC rules for Shielding against SIGINT, and the whole area is restricted access to secure the information physically.

A SCIF can be located within Government, Military or Civilian Structure, SCIF would also share their information via secured network, and will carry away via secure/covert courier to another location may or may not be another SCIF.

SCIF is the information hub for intelligence organisation, information were sent all over the world into thousand of SCIF nationwide for information vetting and processing.

(4.5)Classification Level

As with all sensitive material, a federal level of classification system in place for intelligence. Classification level is used according to the "Need to know" Basis, an Intel analyst can acquire and process information according to his/her level, above that, he/she have no authority to.
IT's interesting to know, when a piece of information enter a SCIF station, it carries no classification, it would be a RAW Intel, and after processing,, then would an associated classification would be assigned to it, and the SCIF release it to other station/people according to the classification level.

There are 5 Federal Classifications

(4.5.1)Unclassified - Information that is sensitive but unclassified, or for official use only. It worth mentions that although it is legal, under Freedom of Information act to access unclassified material, some condition still applies. For example, item that are deemed sensitive but unclassified is restricted for non-Citizens. Hence an export control for the information. Unclassified does not equal to For Public Use.

(4.5.2)Public Trust - Public Trust is another Sensitive but Unclassified category, but with further restriction, usually would require for a basic vetting or background check before access to such information. It does not covered at all in Freedom of Information acts.

(4.5.3)Confidential - Required proper clearance to access these information. Usually within governmental access, but related to National Security. A person must obtain Confidential Clearance to access any confidential information, transfer of such information to non-clearance personnel is prohibited.

(4.5.4)Secret - An information deemed secret would present a major damage to national security, person with Secret Clearance can access both Secret and Confidential information

(4.5.5)Top Secret/For Your Eyes Only(FYEO) - The top of the line clearance which carry the most damaging (in NSA word, grave concern) information to National Security, a person in this position could access Secret and Confidential information as well as Top Secret.

TS information have an addition rules is that after the person have read the information, the person must destroy the document (No copies policy). Most TS material is paper base with some Electronic base over NSA Intranet.

(4.5.6)Core Secret/Or whatever the NSA called them today - Is a special clearance circulate within NSA network, only select few have this clearance and they do not come with person, they comes with job title. And this is a stand alone category which no one can apply for, as this is assigned with job title within the government.

Okay, that is all I have about clandestine operation (Well, I have more but unless you have a secret clearance, I can tell you but afterward i have to kill you) next, we will move onto Overt Intelligence Operation

 

[jhungary]

(5)Overt Intelligence Operation

Beside sending in Spy to do a little espionage, information can, and did come in with public and proper channel. Sometime Human Intelligence collection may not be as covert as you think, sometime it just mean some Pilot saw something on a fly over and getting a debrief.

Either way, this is the other part of the Human Intelligence stories.

Overt intelligence gather heavily rely on interviews, be that Friendly POW, EPW, Pilot, or that grandma living on the corner of the street that saw something. It's about 2 things, Interview and Debriefing .

(5.1)Debriefing

A debrief is an willing and cooperated object giving his/her view of the account of any incident. In Law Enforcement term, a witness, in Military term, an informant.

Usually in a given circumstance, people came forward, and volunteer their view on the given circumstance, they could have hold their tongue but then they volunteer.

A good debriefing, believe it or not, is to get contradict information. Basis was, no two man ever saw the same thing, no two account ever complement. People saw thing with their own perspective. They will put their own imagination (something not a bad thing at all) into what they saw. And if you have 2 accounts almost identical, you know that's something happening right there.

For example. A Man plant and IED on the side of the road, 2 resident volunteer their account to the incident, while one live on the right side of the street, the other live on the left side of the street.

Now, both may saw the same thing happened at the same time or not, but both of their story should only fit the bill in a general sense. Say when the man who planted the IED stop and look at his left and light a cigarette, then the person live on the left side of the street would see it, but the person who live on the right side of the street probably don't. But there will be discrepancy.

A trained person is lot easier to debrief, as he/she would know what you are looking for.

(5.1.1)The SALUTE format

The SALUTE format is a product created by the United States Army for use on reporting information of potential intelligence value during a debriefing. The format is to teach to all recruit what to look for and how to report/debrief enemy troop movement.

• Size - The size of the enemy, the size of their equipment
• Activity - What were they doing?
• Location - Where is the encounter
• Unit - Any insignia on the uniform? How about their equipment? Regular or Reserve?
• Time - time of the encounter
• Equipment - What kind of equipment they have. Tanks? Guns? Artillery? APC?

(5.1.2)False Debrief

False debrief mean someone volunteer false information, either to misinform or phishing for information, i.e. how much do you know. In most case, this is done by enemy agent/asset posting on a public figure and volunteer information to your side. Or civilian loyal to your target whom make false information to throw you off your sense

Most of this kind of agent usually divert information, or simply provide false information to you, the only way to catch those is to compare what they are saying to what the general believe. Sometime it turns out they are indeed knowing something other did not know, but most of the time they would stand out against.

more to come tomorrow, got the last part but editing the reddit...

 

[jhungary]

(6)Interrogation

Interrogation is used when one want to extract information from non-cooperative subject. Interrogation is a skilled operation, the outcome of an interview does solely rely on the skill of the interrogator, his/her method, approach, and most of all, attitude.


You can train an interrogator of all his/her skill, her method, her approach, but you cannot teach someone how to look at and how to react to an subject.

(6.1)Dynamic of Interrogation

I have already wrote this a long time ago, it will give you some insight to what you look for in an interrogation session.

https://defence.pk/threads/true-art-of-interrogation.258001/

But just so that you decided that is not a good idea, I will start here afresh briefly
In any given interrogation, first and the simplest thing to remember is the role, the role of the interrogator is to extract information, and the interview subject is the one that have the Intel you want to extract, you may laugh now, but I have actually did see an interview subject manipulating the interrogator.

Second thing to recognize is that most Intel are time sensitive and it would be the interviewee job to hold on as long as they can, contrast to most belief, interviewee does not try to sit on the chair and endure round after round of beating and keeping their mouth shuts. No, we don't do that here.

Instead what we are into is an elaborate mind game. In this game, we talk, they talk, there are no beating involve, there are no pulling fingernail involved. To understand this, one need to understand how people keep information from someone.

When you know something you don't want someone to know, the first thing you do is to think of a cover, like when you are capture in a warzone, why would you be there in a first place? To avoid suspicion, you would use a cover story, Like you are an journalist, a local trader and so on, and the cover story have to be believable, which will cover later.

So how do you break that cycle?

(6.2)The building of a lie.

To break the cycle, first you need to know how did a person lies. So, how to lies?
Believe it or not, but the building block of each lies is the truth. I mean even when you are lying, you tell your lies base on the truth you are hidden.

It's almost impossible to lie without any thing that's true, have you trying to tell a lies with no truth insight? It would be very hard to remember that lies, as the solid truth provide you with a bridge that you know something in it is true, and then you move on to remember or divert from that truth and hence made your lies. Also, to make one lies, you will need another one, two or three lies to back it up.

Say you are there to do reconnaissance, and you are captured, then you tell your interrogator that you are a photographer for a magazine, then you need to invent an organisation you work for or what is the assignment, which both of it is a lies. Then you will need to justified those two lies with two or more lies. See the snowball is rolling.

Each lies is build on the kernel of truth, so you would be able to remember

(6.3.1)Stress Test

Stress test is what you would do first to an interviewee, you put him in a stress situation, either physical stress or mental stress, base on the time you got, you can perform a physical stress test (Like ask him to stand or holding something in an awkward/stressful position) if you have not enough time, or simply just turn on the heater and let it stew if you got plenty of time.

The stress test is to separate a trained operator from a civilian. Sometime of course, there can indeed be civilian in a warzone, and even more so they could have carry weapon, but people carrying weapon in the street does not automatically mean they are insurgent and have anything to hide.

Of course, when you apply the stress test, you don't tell your interviewee you re doing one, you move in gradually. Like you put up the heat 1 degree at a time. And if he did not move at all, even at a temperature would felt uncomfortable for a normal human being, Then you can assume that person have some kind of training.

(6.3.2)Building Rapport

Building rapport is the second part following the stress test, by now, you as an interrogator should know if the target is trained, now what you need is to know what the other person is made of.

What you do is to build a working environment, or rather a need to work on a working environment, that's where you (Or rather, your partner) need to cosy up with the interviewee.
What you essentially do is to ask your HUMINT Source some seemingly (or rather actually) unrelated question, or what we call testing the water. What you eventually got is the response from the interviewee, while the interrogator watching.

Does the interviewee answer any question? All of them, some of them or none?

How does the interviewee/source answer your question? Scare? Angry? Reluctant? Willingly??

How much information did he put in on the answer?? Nothing at all? Short answer? long answer? Detail answer?

These question such as "How old are you? "Where do you live?" or "Do you want anything to eat or drink?" Help identified the willingness and state of mind of the source.

Say he can answer the question "Where do you live" in a certain way

"I live around the corner"
"I live around the corner behind the chapel."
"I live in "Some place" 2 street up and turn left"

These 3 answer give up the state of mind of the source, in this example, lets assume the source willingly answer the question and all 3 variation would mean the first one - source is not forthcoming with the information. Where the second one mean the source is sharing information, and the third one would have meant the source would share the information in detail.

By the end of building rapport, the interrogator would have a better strategy on how to interrogate the subject. Is he/she cooperative? how much information he/she is willing to share? OR what is his/her state of mind.

(6.3.4)Basic Interrogation technique

(6.3.4.1)Intimidation - It works at certain level, mostly people who are too scare, too proud falls into this category, it would also works when you offer a one way out of a 2 ways interrogation.

(6.3.4.2)Deception - Now, as the source don't know how much you know, sometime you just blatant lies to your source. And they would tell you or hint at you if your lies hold any truth, so you have an association with it.

(6.3.4.3)Guy/Bad Guy (Good Cop/Bad Cop) - An extension to build rapport and trust, they may tell you something if you have earn enough trust.

(6.3.4.4)Deductive Reasoning - A general observation of the subject and deduce that what his/her role was. Or how it come to be interrogate. Feature like their ages, sexes skin condition, facial expression, facial feature, gesture and the way they talk.

(6.3.4.5)REID Technique - REID is designed by North American Law Enforcement as an approach to extract information and confession from suspect. It involve 9 step and they are highly effective to extract a confession but it also works sometime to obtain information.
Step 1: Be confrontational - Let the subject know why he/she was detained and offer him/her a chance to explain him/herself.
Step 2: Shift the responsibility to someone else, easier to confess when the subject is rid of guilt of betrayal.
Step 3: Reaffirm the reason the subject is here to be interrogated, and reaffirm/suggest that he/she is guilty of something to be here for interrogation.
Step 4: Follow step 3, uses his denied and act against him
Step 5: Assure the subject it's ok to confess
Step 6: Suggesting alternative solution
Step 7: Offer possible scenario for what exactly happened, try to tone down one of the scenario and see if the subject choose either one. Guilt is implicated.
Step 8: Repeat the confession in front of a witness
Step 9: Document the report.

In the Military, Step 8 and 9 almost always used, as report are not generally filed and almost all interview done is not official. However, REID technique is not very welcomed in LEA because it was also highly suggestive, and regarding confession made within LEA guideline, a bait/suggestive confession may not be useable in court, but in the military, there are no such restriction applies.

(6.4)Advance Interrogation Technique

This is the kind of technique often made headline, and they are a wee bit progressive...

(6.4.1)Pride and Ego Down - Basically the interrogator will try to break the subject's self esteem, either by verbal or physical mean. That mean you say mean things to the subject or try to physically humiliate the subject. Although the technique will still stay non-intrusive, it is highly immoral to subject the subject this kind of embarrassment.

How does it works? By breaking one self esteem, it make them trying to defend their ego or self-esteem. For Example, when you capture a soldier near a important bridge, you question the enemy soldier and say "Why are you left behind? Can't catch up with your own? Or they left you behind because you are unfit?" By implication the soldier would jump to defend his/her ego by saying "I am here to rig the bridge to blow"

It does also work by physically humiliate the subject, like undress the subject and have them wait naked in the room, or parade the naked soldier in front of your own people? Spit on or sometime urinate on the subject would also be used in the extreme.

(6.4.2)Stress/Duress play - Stress and Duress is a play (Not the actual meaning "play") that uses way to induce the subject's stress and duress level. Basically we are talking about non-permanent intrusive technique such as water boarding, sleep deprivation, mock execution, and such to induce a stressful and duress state to the subject.

Stand alone would not achieve much, but they are design to use with other basic or advance technique, Stress and Duress play down the subject defence, and weaken their mind so they won't put up a fight much.

(6.4.3)Push-Pull/Give-Take technique - It work like a chess game. Basically only apply to subject that's willing to talk, but you expect the subject is just giving you some BS.

What you do is, first, try to remain a calm atmosphere and let the subject tell you his cover story. Which you know or you believe it is BS, well, cuz this is what I will do if we change seat.
Then you slowly up the tempo. Now that you go in and interrogate the subject, a bit more aggressive, and throw in a few temper. Then your subject will give you another story,
Now at this point, you are hit with a dilemma, you know a good operative will carry more than one cover, and you do know that they are trained to resist interrogation. So we are on a cross road here. You know that is probably not the truth and the subject is expecting another interrogation session, by then it may have been too late. So at this point, you go in, ignore the second story and progress the threat to maximum, by declaring an ultimatum.

At this point, you have studied the subject, you know what he is made of, you know, talk to people where he/she came from. So the first thing you need to know is, what did he want the most? You know that and take them off the table. Now that the subject knows whatever the subject do, it ain't gonna go his/her ways, now its time to make your move.

Now you find out what the subject cannot live without, everybody have something that he/she hold onto dearly. find that out and bring that in front of him/her and now you demand an ultimatum. Now, regardless of the second story the subject told you, then you move on to list your ultimatum, and that would make you seems desperate. That's good as the subject will believe you will indeed do what you tell the subject you will do.

then the next step is to make sure the subject know if your ultimatum, he/she is of no use to you and then you will, indeed play ugly.

(6.5)Permanent Intrusive technique - Not that this is done by many of us, but that indeed an option, especially in a black site. To be fair, basically they are outright illegal, even the stress/duress play is in the grey area. But this is outright illegal.

What permanent means they cannot be reverse or even if the effect can be reverse, it would already done a permanent psychological/physical damage to the subject.

I personally did not act in such a way, so I cannot tell any of youse in any detail, but what I hear is, this includes.

Amputation - Cut off any or all part of a body. Mostly ear or ears
Heroine Addiction - Inject Heroine or other drug so the subject is depend on the interrogator.
Traumatic Experience - Basically show the subject something traumatic happens to someone else. For example, actual execution of someone else.

Well, this is just what I heard, I will not guarantee nor adopt them officially, if anyone ask me, I will denied those method ever exist....

Ok, now you know how to operate HUMINT ops, the next part will be for the comparison of HUMINT to other Intelligence gathering method.

@Nihonjin1051 @SvenSvensonov @levina @Slav Defence @Neptune @RescueRanger @Oscar @Jungibaaz @AUSTERLITZ @Horus @WebMaster @Side-Winder @Hakan @FaujHistorian @DESERT FIGHTER @sandy_3126 @Gufi

Finally finished the part 2 of this article, this is basically all you need to and you can know as to how US conduct espionage and interrogation, this piece take 12 days to materialize, a bit more than half on writing it and the rest is checking it against the rules books, and it was censored by my friend still works for NSA (Hence some point may disappear) I don't think you can get anymore angle with the topic at hand then what I had told you all here.

Enjoy, part 3 is coming in later

 

[DESERT FIGHTER]

A pleasure to read your insightful post once again!

Thank you ..

 

[Aepsilons]

Well written, Gary. Thank you for sharing with us !

 

[AUSTERLITZ]

Read the whole thing and its your best article ever.Blew me away!

 

[jhungary]

A pleasure to read your insightful post once again!

Thank you ..

no problem, this also mark the first article I wrote without gotten drunk.........

And also a lot of carpel tunnel..

Well written, Gary. Thank you for sharing with us !

It took me 12 days................12 DAYS.....man, I didn't spend that much time on my Master dissertation for crying out loud....But to be fair, I have to write and check the books and then when I finished writing it, I have to make sure this does not exceed the NSA guideline, and have my friend in the NSA redact it.........I have written more but a lot of those were blacked out by my friend in the NSA...

Sometime I will show you that original copy.....

Read the whole thing and its your best article ever.Blew me away!

lol thanks, it's good to get out of the tactical field for a change, so now I am ready for the me vs. you challenge hehe

 

[Aepsilons]

no problem, this also mark the first article I wrote without gotten drunk.........

And also a lot of carpel tunnel..



It took me 12 days................12 DAYS.....man, I didn't spend that much time on my Master dissertation for crying out loud....But to be fair, I have to write and check the books and then when I finished writing it, I have to make sure this does not exist the NSA guideline, and have my friend in the NSA redact it.........I have written more but a lot of those were blacked out by my friend in the NSA...

Sometime I will show you that original copy.....



lol thanks, it's good to get out of the tactical field for a change, so now I am ready for the me vs. you challenge hehe

You bring a wealth of military information for all of us here at PDF, Thank You for sharing what you know with all of us here ! And yes, 12 days is a lot ! Again, Thank You !

 

[Hakan]

I gotta check this out later. Looks like alot of work was put in.

 

[Slav Defence]

no problem, this also mark the first article I wrote without gotten drunk.........

And also a lot of carpel tunnel..



It took me 12 days................12 DAYS.....man, I didn't spend that much time on my Master dissertation for crying out loud....But to be fair, I have to write and check the books and then when I finished writing it, I have to make sure this does not exceed the NSA guideline, and have my friend in the NSA redact it.........I have written more but a lot of those were blacked out by my friend in the NSA...

Sometime I will show you that original copy.....



lol thanks, it's good to get out of the tactical field for a change, so now I am ready for the me vs. you challenge hehe

Wonderful work Gary!
Oh,I am getting curious over the censored part,very bad-You can tell your NSA friend that we all are civilians in here
Dirtiest part of your excellent article: Humiliating prisoner by peeing him-
Okay,so far techniques you have mentioned to manipulate and break your subject's psyche till now are adopted by investigators,so that either they could distinguish as if he is trained or civilian-
But what about those inhuman treatments given to prisoners even after their confession?frustration? aggression or what?are investigators angry over severity of his crime?

no problem, this also mark the first article I wrote without gotten drunk.........

And also a lot of carpel tunnel..



It took me 12 days................12 DAYS.....man, I didn't spend that much time on my Master dissertation for crying out loud....But to be fair, I have to write and check the books and then when I finished writing it, I have to make sure this does not exceed the NSA guideline, and have my friend in the NSA redact it.........I have written more but a lot of those were blacked out by my friend in the NSA...

Sometime I will show you that original copy.....



lol thanks, it's good to get out of the tactical field for a change, so now I am ready for the me vs. you challenge hehe

You wrote this without getting drunk!?
Regards

 

[jhungary]

Wonderful work Gary!
Oh,I am getting curious over the censored part,very bad-You can tell your NSA friend that we all are civilians in here
Dirtiest part of your excellent article: Humiliating prisoner by peeing him-
Okay,so far techniques you have mentioned to manipulate and break your subject's psyche till now are adopted by investigators,so that either they could distinguish as if he is trained or civilian-
But what about those inhuman treatments given to prisoners even after their confession?frustration? aggression or what?are investigators angry over severity of his crime?



You wrote this without getting drunk!?
Regards

I told my NSA friend that none of this would see the end of days....Strange that he is actually the one took over my job after I got wounded in Afghanistan, so literally, he got my job in the NSA now...

The censored part is mostly copy directly from operation menu (Surprise, surprise) it involved some "more detail" organisational detail, and past operation I thought it was ok to disclose.

And well, all I can say is that once the person confess or spill the bean, we would have pass them on to other authority, what they do to them is not our business anymore. We will only hold them in custody if there are something we can further minde from them. Then depend on theirs level of cooperation, those treatment may have continued...

and I have been keen on using some of those technique on @jaibi, torture him so wee know the secret of PDF hehe

 

[Levina]

As always I loved the interrogation part best.
I liked the way you used Richard Sorge's example to help ppl like me understand reporting mission. I wish you'd used more such examples.

Now my doubts
1) Whats the difference between warm pitch and cold pitch?
2) Recently US special op forces failed not once but twice to rescue American journalist Somer's. Not just did they fail, the episode ended with the death of Somer and a South African teacher (who was to be freed next day). Asfaik there were about 36 commandos. I guess this shows intelligence failure. How could they 've avoided failure a second time??
This just incident just came to my mind and I thought you would be the best person to answer it.

 

[Slav Defence]

I told my NSA friend that none of this would see the end of days....Strange that he is actually the one took over my job after I got wounded in Afghanistan, so literally, he got my job in the NSA now...

The censored part is mostly copy directly from operation menu (Surprise, surprise) it involved some "more detail" organisational detail, and past operation I thought it was ok to disclose.

And well, all I can say is that once the person confess or spill the bean, we would have pass them on to other authority, what they do to them is not our business anymore. We will only hold them in custody if there are something we can further minde from them. Then depend on theirs level of cooperation, those treatment may have continued...

and I have been keen on using some of those technique on @jaibi, torture him so wee know the secret of PDF hehe

I do not understand the highlighted part.What do you mean?
Okay,I got the rest except the bolded part: You were only assigned to investigate and distinguish them.
Seriously, I have also enjoyed the art of interrogation more than anything.
Oh one more question:'What if you are assigned with a task to make a diplomat to spill beans or someone you can't capture but he has essential information about your target?
Regards