COMMUNIST CONTROL METHODS, APPENDEX1: The Use of Scientific Design and Guidance, Drugs and Hypnosis in Communist Interrogation and Indoctrination Procedures.

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP65-00756R000400020007-9
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: S
• Document Page Count: 7
• Document Creation Date: December 9, 2016
• Document Release Date: December 23, 1997
• Sequence Number: 7
• Content Type: STUDY

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COMMUNIST CONTROL METHODS
APPENDIX 1: The Use of Scientific Design and Guidance,
Drugs and Hypnosis in Communist Interro-
gation and Indoctrination Procedures.
The startling and dramatic confessions of persons
who have been arrested, imprisoned and brought to trial
by the Communists, and the intensely pro-Communist
sentiments expressed by Americans released from Com-
munist prisons, has led to much speculation and theorizing
about highly organized scientific methods employed by the
Communists. The effectiveness of their methods has been
variously ascribed to modifications of Pavlovian conditioning
techniques, drugs, hypnosis, and other exotic and devious
means of controlling human behavior.
The main study (to which this is an appendix) demon-
strates that no such methods need be postulated to explain
and understand the apparent successes of Communist methods
of interrogation and indoctrination. However, because of
the widespread interest in the possible participation of
scientists in the design and development of Communist
control methods, a specific investigation of this question
was undertaken. The findings of this investigation are
that scientists have not participated. The uniformity of
control methods throughout the Communist countries makes
it apparent that they have been organized into a more or
less formal body of doctrine, and it is known that those
who use the methods are trained in the doctrine and try
to follow it, but all of the evidence points to the fact that
the doctrine was developed and organized by the police
officials themselves.
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It is true that from time to time Russian psychologists
have made public statements to the effect that Soviet training
is producing a new breed of men, generically referred to as
the "Soviet man". These statements appear to be designed
for public consumption and are not based upon any organized
body of data. Much of Soviet psychology is concerned with
adaptations of the conditioned reflex concepts of Pavlov,
one fundamental aspect of which is the belief that men can
deliberately be made to develop predesigned types of thought
and behavior under appropriately controlled environmental
conditions. Soviet laboratories have experimented with a
variety of situations for the acquisition of conditioned re-
flexes. The conditioning method has proved useful in
describing and predicting the learning of simple behavior
sequences, and Pavlovian psychology has been promoted
by the Communists to bolster the "scientific" basis of
Communist theory. But so far as can be ascertained the
limited scientific applicability of conditioning to intelligence
operations has never been exploited by the Communists.
Soviet and Satellite police officers have an earthy
contempt for psychology in general and for psychologists
and psychiatrists in particular. To be sure the KGB has
a medical department which is organized along the lines
of the medical department in one of our armed forces. The
mission of this medical department is to take care of the
illnesses of prisoners and KGB personnel. This department
does include a few psychiatrists. However, no medical
officer or psychiatrist is ever used in the interrogation
process itself. Their function in relation to prisoners
under interrogation is simply that of evaluating the state
of their physical and mental health, advising the interro-
gator when men are too ill for further interrogation, and
treating prisoners for the effects of the tortures which
have been carried out upon them. They sometimes ad-
minister stimulants to tired or sleepy prisoners to enable
them to continue with prolonged interrogations. They may
give sedatives to excited prisoners. They use antibiotics,
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vitamins, and any other available adjuncts of medical therapy
in the treatment of wounds and illness. But we have no reliable
evidence of any direct medical or psychiatric participation in
attempts to elicit information from prisoners or to produce
confessions. *
The central staff of the KGB and its predecessors does
not have any section devoted to psychological or medical re-
search. No scientists are known to have participated in the
planning of any of its procedures. It is said that during World
War II, Beria maintained a highly secret laboratory section in
Moscow, in which physicians and other scientists attempted to
develop new methods of covert poisoning and other means for
eliminating or disabling target individuals. He and his asso-
ciates were inspired by the activities of the Gestapo along
these lines, and established their laboratory primarily in
order to keep up with technological advances in the field. It
is reported that the results of this work were disappointing
and the whole outfit was abolished shortly after the war. The
physicians who took part in the work were not considered top
flight and were,looked down upon by KGB officers in general.
The former secret police informants are unanimous in
affirming that no training in psychology or psychiatry is given
to officers who attend the KGB schools.
Since the time of the Purge Trials there have been re-
current reports that the Communist secret police use drugs as
a means of obtaining confessions. All of the reports which
could be found have been reviewed. In no case has it been
possible to obtain any substantial evidence that any drug played
an important role in a known interrogation or confession. Our
informants, former Communist secret police officials, state
that no drug had been issued to the MVD for use in interrogations
as late as 1953.
*Communist intelligence services do, of course, utilize physicians
as agents, and these physicians may use drugs for purposes such
as abduction, demoralization, etc.; but this is a different matter.
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- -Z L- VMoiboibRINOW
There is, however, good reason to believe that secret
police in the Communist countries, especially those of Czecho-
slovakia and Russia, have experimented with the use of all the
commonly known psychochemicals and so-called "truth drugs".
This belief is based upon recurrent and scattered reports to
this effect, some from sources regarded as reliable. Further-
more, nearly all of these drugs and most of the scientific
literature describing their effects, are readily available to
the Communists. It is, therefore, important to consider the
possible role which drugs and psychochemicals might play in
interrogations.
The drugs which are of potential importance in interro-
gations are:
(1) Stimulants
(2) Hypnotics
(3) Hallucinogenic Agents
The stimulants, in general, have the effect of increasing
wakefulness and alertness at the expense of creating tremulous-
ness, feelings of anxiety and overactivity. Caffein, benzedrine,
and dexedrine fall into this category. There are a number of
derivatives of benzedrine which have essentially the same
action. "Aktedron", a synthetic benzedrine derivative, has
been used in Czechoslovakia and Southeast Europe. Coffee
and benzedrine derivatives are sometimes administered to
tired or sleepy prisoners in order to wake them up enough so
that the interrogation can be carried on. They have been used
in this manner in Eastern Europe, in Russia, and in China.
They, in and of themselves, have no important effect in pro-
ducing confessions. Used in combination with the system of
psychological and physiological pressures (as described in the
main report), such stimulants as benzedrine will, in many
cases, accelerate and exacerbate the profound fatigue, con-
fusion, loss of critical judgment, and breakdown of resistance
which is a consequence of the full course of control techniques.
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The so-called "hypnotics" do not actually produce
hypnosis. They are sleep producing drugs which have a
moderately intoxicating effect in small doses. The barbi-
turates such as nembutal and phenobarbital fall into this
category. So-called "truth serum" is sodium amytal or
sodium pentothal, both of which are rapidly acting barbi-
turates that are administered by vein. When these drugs
are given in the proper dosage, they have a relaxing and
befuddling effect similar to that produced by moderate
amounts of alcohol. Under some circumstances, individ-
uals intoxicated by these drugs become loose in their talk.
But these drugs have no effect in producing truth, and persons
under their influence can resist their action to the same ex-
tent that they can resist the action of alcohol. There is no
evidence that the Communists have effectively or extensively
used amytal interviews as a means of extracting confessions,
although it is quite probable that they have experimented with
this maneuver. The hypnotic drug which is most frequently
mentioned as a Communist tool is Scopolamine, a naturally
occuring substance long known in medical science. It is one
of the ingredients in the "twilight sleep" medication used by
obstetricians on women in labor. It, too, has an intoxicating
and befuddling effect in small doses, an effect which would be
difficult to distinguish from that of the profound fatigue, sleep
loss, undernourishment, anxiety and confusion produced by
the usual Communist control techniques.
In every instance in which there is direct evidence that
Communist police have given hypnotic and sedative drugs to
prisoners, they have administered these drugs for the purpose
of calming and relaxing excited and fatigued individuals. Ameri-
can physicians would be likely to use these drugs in a similar
manner for the same reason.
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C, r, ^ A Li T
The hallucinogenic agents have likewise been known
for a long time. Marijuana falls into this category. Persons
under the influence of these agents have a disturbance of their
thought processes which can be profoundly disorganizing to
them. During the past few years LSD-25 and Mescaline (a
derivative of a Mexican plant) have attracted much attention
because of their use in experimental psychiatry. All intel-
ligence services have been much concerned with them. It
is known that the Russians have investigated both of these
substances but there is no evidence that they have ever used
them in attempts at operational interrogation.
Before concluding this statement on the operational use
of drugs, it should be emphasized that the covert administra-
tion of !ny drug (stimulant, hypnotic, or hallucinogenic agent)
can produce an impact on the individual undergoing the stress
of prolonged imprisonment and interrogation which goes beyond
merely accelerating the fatigue, disturbed judgment, and other
effects of the usual prolonged control pressures. The covertly
administered drug can make the prisoner feel that the interro-
gation is affecting him more than it really is. The drug effect
may make the prisoner feel that the interrogator is more
powerful or more prescient than he really is, or that the
situation has become more intolerable and inexorable than it
is in fact. We know that this impact can be exploited by an
interrogator to increase the prisoner's cooperation, providing
the interrogator is sufficiently perceptive and appropriately
flexible in his approach. To what extent this fact is known to
the Communists we cannot say. It is likely, however, that so
long as they continue to employ the doctrinaire approach which
seems to characterize the imprisonment-interrogation procedure
described in this report, that they will not be able to exercise
sufficient flexibility to exploit this aspect of drug effects.
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ALA
Another question that recurrently arises is whether
prisoners at the time of police confession are in a state of
hypnosis. No evidence of the use of hypnotists or of hypno-
tism in any of the Communist confession procedures has
been found. At the time of his Gestapo-like experiments,
it is said that Beria experimented with the use of hypnosis
also. Our informers state that the experiments were a
failure and the attempts did not continue.
Although formal hypnotism is not used, the confession
routine as it has been described does create in those exposed
to it an increased degree of pliability and suggestibility. It
is not clear to what extent the Communists are aware of this
and purposefully exploit it.
Conclusions:
The Communist secret police organs have experimented
with hypnosis, drugs and various scientific training techniques,
but they have not exploited their potential operationally. Soviet
and Satellite police officers are biased against the use of psy-
chiatrists and psychologists, and no reliable evidence has been
found of their direct guidance or participation in attempts to
elicit information from prisoners or to produce confessions.
This does not mean that these scientific resources will not be
exploited in the future. For this reason, attention has been
given to types of drugs and techniques which are potential
instruments and aids to Communist interrogation-indoctrination
procedures.
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