Editing KUBARK Counterintelligence Interrogation Review: Observations of an Interrogator (section)

=== The All-Seeing Eye ===
The interrogator who already knows part of the story explains to the source that the purpose of the questioning is not to gain information; the interrogator knows everything already. His real purpose is to test the sincerity (reliability, honor, etc.) of the source. The interrogator then asks a few questions to which he knows the answers. If the subject lies, he is informed firmly and dispassionately that he has lied. By skilled manipulation of the known, the questioner can convince a naïve subject that all his secrets are out and that further resistance would be not only pointless but dangerous.82

Similar to the We Know All approach outlined in U.S. Army Field Manual 34-52, the All-Seeing Eye has proven consistently effective with a broad array of sources.83 While simple in concept, as with other effective approaches, the underlying dynamic can be far more complex. In this instance, two fundamental activities occur to render it effective in obtaining compliance from a resistant source.

First, Cialdini’s authority principle plays an important part in this approach. The source, convinced that the interrogator knows as much as (perhaps more than) he does, sees little to be gained from protecting information of such apparently little value, especially if he anticipates that the consequences of withholding such information are undesirable. Second, recalling the premise that two of the interrogator’s primary objectives are to increase the stress the source internalizes about the consequences of resistance while simultaneously reducing the internalized stress over the prospect of cooperating, this approach systematically targets the latter. By maintaining this approach over time, the interrogator is able to introduce a new and perhaps unexpected factor in the source’s resistance/ cooperation calculus.