On 2004-06-12 23:56:00, Anonymous wrote:
"How about a link to brainwashing techniques from :question: Red China? nothing there? :question: "
The next section COMMUNIST CONTROL TECHNIQUES AND THEIR EFFECTS.
A description of usual communist control techniques follows.
1. Interrogation. There are at least two ways in which "interrogation" is used:
a. Elicitation, which is designed to get the individual to surrender protected information, is a form of interrogation. One major difference between elicitation and interrogation used to achieve brainwashing is that the mind of the individual must be kept clear to permit coherent, undistorted disclosure of protected information.
b. Elicitation for the purpose of brainwashing consists of questioning, argument, indoctrination, threats, cajolery, praise, hostility and a variety of other pressures. The aim of this interrogation is to hasten the breakdown of the individual's value system and to encourage the substitution of a different value-system. The procurement of protected information is secondary and is used as a device to increase pressure upon the individual. The term "interrogation" in this paper will refer, in general, to this type. The "interrogator" is the individual who conducts this type of interrogation and who controls the administration of the other pressures. He is the protagonist against whom the victim develops his conflict, and upon whom the victim develops a state of dependency as he seeks some solution to his conflict.
2. Physical Torture and Threats of Torture. Two types of physical torture distinguishable more by their psychological effect in inducing conflict than by the degree of painfulness:
a. The first type is one in which the victim has a passive role in the pain inflicted on him (e.g., beatings). His conflict involves the decision of whether or not to give in to demands in order to avoid further pain. Generally, brutality of this type was not found to achieve the desired results. Threats of torture were found more effective, as fear of pain causes greater conflict with the individual than does the pain itself.
b. The second type of torture is represented by requiring the individual to stand in one spot for several hours or assume some other pain-inducing position. Such a requirement often engenders in the individual a determination to "stick it out." This internal act of resistance provides a felling of moral superiority at first. As time passes and his pain mounts, however, the individual becomes aware that it is his own original determination to resist that is causing the continuance of pain. A conflict develops within the individual between his moral determination and his desire to collapse and discontinue the pain. It is this extra internal conflict, in addiction to the conflict over whether or not to give in to the demand made of him, that tends to make this method of torture more effective in the breakdown of the individual personality.
3. Isolation. Individual differences in reaction to isolation are probably greater than to any other method. Some individuals appear to be able to withstand prolonged periods of isolation without deleterious effects, while a relatively short period of isolation reduces others to the verge of psychosis. Reaction varies with the conditions of the isolation cell. Some sources have indicated a strong reaction to filth and vermin, although they had negligible reactions to isolation. Others reacted violently to isolation in relatively clean cells. The predominant cause of breakdown in such situations is a lack of sensory stimulation (i.e., grayness of walls, lack of sound, absence of social contact, etc.). Experimental subjects exposed to this condition have reported vivid hallucinations and overwhelming fears of losing their sanity.
4. Control of Communication. This is one of the most effective methods for creating a sense of helplessness and despair. This measure might well be considered the cornerstone of the communist system of control. It consists of strict regulation of the mail, reading materials, broadcast materials, and social contact available to the individual. The need to communicate is so great that when the usual channels are blocked, the individual will resort to any open channel, almost regardless of the implications of using that particular channel. Many POWs in Korea, whose only act of "collaboration" was to sign petitions and "pease appeals," defended their actions on the ground that this was the only method of letting the outside world know they were still alive. They stated that their morale and fortitude would have been increased immeasurably had leaflets of encouragement been dropped to them. When the only contact with the outside world is via the interrogator, the prisoner comes to develop extreme dependency on his interrogator and hence loses another prop to his morale.
Another wrinkle in communication control is the informer system. The recruitment of informers in POW camps discouraged communication between inmates. POWs who feared that every act or thought of resistance would be communicated to the camp administrators, lost faith in their fellow man and were forced to "untrusting individualism." Informers are also under several stages of brainwashing and elicitation to develop and maintain control over the victims.
5. Induction of Fatigue. This is a well-known devise for breaking will power and critical powers of judgment. Deprivation of sleep results in more intense psychological debilitation than does any other method of engendering fatigue. Fatigue, in addition to reducing the will to resist, also produces irritation and fear that arise from increased "slips of the tongue," forgetfulness, and decreased ability to maintain orderly thought processes.
6. Control of food, water and Tobacco. The controlled individual is made intensely aware of his dependence upon his interrogator for the quality and quantity of his food and tobacco. Studies of controlled starvation indicated that the whole value-system of the subjects underwent a change. Their irritation increased as their ability to think clearly decreased.
7. Criticism and Self-Criticism. These are mechanisms of communist thought control. Self Criticism gains its effectiveness from the fact that although it is not a crime for a man to wrong, it is a major crime to be stubborn and refuse to learn. Many individuals feel intensely relieved in being able to share their sense of guilt. Those individuals however, who have adjusted to handling their guilt internally have difficulty adapting to criticism and self-criticism. In brainwashing, after a sufficient sense of guilt has been created in the individual, sharing and self-criticism permit relief. The price paid for this relief, however, is loss of individuality and increased dependency.
8. Hypnosis and drugs as Controls. There is no reliable evidence that the communists are making 3widespread use of drugs or hypnosis in brainwashing or elicitation. The exception to this is the use of common stimulants or depressants in inducing fatigue and "mood swings."
9. Other Methods of control, which when used in conjunction with the basic processes, hasten the deterioration of prisoners' sense of values and resistances are:
a. Requiring a case history or autobiography of the prisoner provides a mine of information for the interrogator in establishing and "documenting" accusations.
b. Friendliness of the interrogator, when least expected, upsets the prisoner's ability to maintain a critical attitude.
c. Petty demands, such as severely limiting the allotted time for use of toilet facilities or requiring the POW to kill hundreds of flies, are harassment methods.
d. Prisoners are often humiliated by refusing them the use of toilet facilities during interrogation until they soil themselves. Often prisoners were not permitted to bathe for weeks until the felt contemptible.
e. Conviction as a war criminal appears to be a potent factor in creating despair in the individual. One official analysis of the pressures exerted by the ChiComs on "confessors" and "non-confessors" to participation in bacteriological warfare in Korea showed that actual trial and conviction of "war crimes" was overwhelmingly associated with breakdown and confession.
f. Attempted elicitation of protected information at various time during the brainwashing process diverted the individual from awareness of the deterioration of his value-system. The fact that, in most cases the ChiComs did not want or need such intelligences was not known to the prisoner. His attempts to protect such information were made at the expense of hastening his own breakdown.
The next section of the report is called The EXERCISE OF CONTROL: A "SCHEDULE" FOR BRAINWASHING.
Mentioned in this section are pressures which may vary in order, but are all necessary to the brainwashing process:
1. A feeling of helplessness in attempting to deal with the impersonal machinery of control.
2. An initial reaction of "surprise."
3. A feeling of uncertainty about what is required of him.
4. A developing feeling of dependence upon the interrogator.
5. A sense of doubt and loss of objectivity.
6. Feelings of guilt.
7. A questioning attitude toward his own value-system.
8. A feeling of potential "breakdown," i.e., that he might go crazy.
9. A need to defend his acquired principles.
10. A final sense of "belonging" (identification).
By the end of the brainwashing process a qualitative change has taken place within the prisoner. The brainwashed victim does not consciously change his value-system; rather the change occurs despite his efforts. He is no more responsible for this change than is an individual who "snaps" and becomes psychotic. And like the psychotic, the prisoner is not even aware of the transition.
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