The Scharff Technique: On How to Effectively Elicit Intelligence from Human Sources

摘要

The quote setting the stage for this report is from U.S. Army Air Corps Colonel Hubert Zemke, one of the many World War Ⅱ prisoners interrogated by Hanns Joachim Scharff (1907-1992). Scharff worked at the German Luftwaffe's Intelligence and Evaluation Center (Auswertestelle West), where he interrogated over 500 American and British fighter pilots.2 Within today's Intelligence Community, Scharff is often recognized as a constructive-even iconic-role model for interrogators,3 one typically portrayed as uncommonly affable, with almost psychic powers to obtain information from his prisoners.