Enemy spies should be identified, bribed, protected, and converted, because converted spies are the keystone that enables and coordinates all other spy types and must be treated with utmost liberality.

By Sun Tzu, from L'Art de la guerre

Key Arguments

  • Conversion begins with seeking out enemy spies, tempting with bribes, and housing them comfortably.
  • Converted spies provide information that allows recruitment and employment of local and inward spies.
  • They also enable planting false tidings through doomed spies and timing the use of surviving spies.
  • Because all five varieties ultimately depend on the converted spy, he must be rewarded liberally.

Source Quotes

21. The enemy’s spies who have come to spy on us must be sought out, tempted with bribes, led away and comfortably housed. Thus they will become converted spies and available for our service. 22.
22. It is through the information brought by the converted spy that we are able to acquire and employ local and inward spies. 23.
23. It is owing to his information, again, that we can cause the doomed spy to carry false tidings to the enemy. 24.
24. Lastly, it is by his information that the surviving spy can be used on appointed occasions. 25.
25. The end and aim of spying in all its five varieties is knowledge of the enemy; and this knowledge can only be derived, in the first instance, from the converted spy. Hence it is essential that the converted spy be treated with the utmost liberality. 26.

Key Concepts

  • The enemy’s spies who have come to spy on us must be sought out, tempted with bribes, led away and comfortably housed. Thus they will become converted spies and available for our service.
  • It is through the information brought by the converted spy that we are able to acquire and employ local and inward spies.
  • It is owing to his information, again, that we can cause the doomed spy to carry false tidings to the enemy.
  • Lastly, it is by his information that the surviving spy can be used on appointed occasions.
  • the end and aim of spying in all its five varieties is knowledge of the enemy; and this knowledge can only be derived, in the first instance, from the converted spy. Hence it is essential that the converted spy be treated with the utmost liberality.

Context

xiii. The Use of Spies — conversion tradecraft and primacy of the converted spy