
Simple Sabotage Field Manual (1944) [pdf] - Anon84
https://www.cia.gov/news-information/featured-story-archive/2012-featured-story-archive/CleanedUOSSSimpleSabotage_sm.pdf
======
jrockway
I assume that this is actually a cynical guide to how your laziness as an
employee is harming the war effort and not an actual field manual, right? It
has to be.

The section where my mind was changed from "maybe this is actually a strategy"
to "this is just a passive-aggressive list of grievances against anonymous
subordinates" was all the machine shop sabotage suggestions. Nobody read the
employee handbook when it said "sharpen your tools, store them properly, don't
press too hard on your drill, and clean out the oil filters regularly", but
when you say "the enemy never sharpens their tools, they store them so they'll
break, and they're always pressing way too hard on the drill bits costing
their employer PENNIES A DAY in replacement parts", suddenly it's your
patriotic duty to do what Grandpa demands.

Everything reads like this. "Some idiot let the pilot light go out, lit a
candle in the room, and then went home. Our building blew up and my precious
stash of rare cigars was lost forever!" "You dumbasses flushed a sponge down
the toilet AGAIN!? Are you kidding me!? WHY!?!?"

~~~
azernik
Nope, this is actually the kind of thing that e.g. the French Resistance would
coordinate, under the guidance of the British SOE.

The pennies add up, and in the case of precision parts like drill bits
producing endless replacements ate up very limited capacity in certain
sectors.

(Hence why paranoia about sabotage is such a persistent feature of dictatorial
regimes; the subtle stuff is indistinguishable from extreme incompetence or
institutional dysfunction.)

~~~
cabalamat
> Hence why paranoia about sabotage is such a persistent feature of
> dictatorial regimes

Not only that: if simple sabotage increases paranoia, then that paranoia can
harm the enemy's war effort more than the sabotage.

~~~
dredmorbius
Trust is the most effective attack surface.

------
not_buying_it
Most of section 11 is what happens at companies where politics becomes more
important than execution, you can only get away with this shit in such an
environment and you don't need to actually do it there, it just happens
naturally.

~~~
ErikAugust
Man, I wonder if a couple places I’ve worked were loaded with CIA agents.

~~~
cushychicken
I think the same thing every time this pops up on HN. The Quality department
is clearly loaded with spooks. XD

------
dang
A thread from 2017:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15109771](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15109771)

2016:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12253276](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12253276)

2015:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10493881](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10493881)

2012:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4831363](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4831363)

2009:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=833443](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=833443)

~~~
themodelplumber
In other words a CIA sabotage Field Manual has super-impressive staying power
with the subversives here on HN. Got it :D

~~~
ethbro
It's almost as though someone were intentionally slowing down HN by
deliberately and repeatedly getting this on the front page.

But I'm sure it's just forgetfulness.

... or is it?

------
stblack
Plaintext version:
[https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Simple_Sabotage_Field_Manual](https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Simple_Sabotage_Field_Manual)

Quick link to the longest and most interesting and practical section: SPECIFIC
SUGGESTIONS FOR SIMPLE SABOTAGE
[https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Simple_Sabotage_Field_Manual/...](https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Simple_Sabotage_Field_Manual/Specific_Suggestions_for_Simple_Sabotage)

------
ZguideZ
So this one confirms it - social media is a CIA operation -

Spread disturbing rumors that sound like inside dope.

And then this - apparently most of our fellow citizens are operatives: Act
Stupid.

------
selfishgene
Would not be all that surprised if someone were to feel sufficiently inspired
by this document to draft a similar pamphlet for disaffected employees of tech
companies who spy on their employees and/or abuse their customers' privacy.

What would covert acts of "simple sabotage" look like at a company like
Google, Amazon, Microsoft, or Facebook?

~~~
azernik
An Italian Strike (aka Work-to-Rule) is a version of this aimed at minimizing
civil or criminal liability to strikers - pick the most inconvenient and
debilitating safety regs that no one follows, and follow every single one of
them. This is particularly common in countries or workplaces where law or
contract prevents direct strikes.

Unions would have trouble advocating this as a form of strike in a direct
dispute, because a union can only exert negotiating leverage if it publicly
declares its intentions. However, I've heard anecdotal reports of this kind of
sabotage being common in secondary/solidarity strikes - shipments showing up
late or damaged or incorrect, external maintenance being done improperly, etc.

EDIT: With a bit of poking around, I found that the Wobblies were big into
this (and it's even where they got their name!):
[https://www.iww.org/history/icons/sabotage](https://www.iww.org/history/icons/sabotage)

~~~
pontifk8r
Is this similar to “work to rule?”

~~~
azernik
> (aka Work-to-Rule)

Yup! Same thing, different name. "Italian Strike" is what they call it in
European and Middle Eastern labor organizing traditions.

EDIT: With a bit of research: the term seems to have originated with the
Biennio Rosso in Italy in 1919-20, when work-to-rule strikes were practiced on
a large scale.

------
mberning
Section 11 perfectly describes working in any sufficiently large organization.
There are always a handful of people that seem to wield these techniques with
great skill.

~~~
bordercases
It would read like satire, if it weren't.

------
Inu
_Anyone can break up a showing of an enemy propaganda film by putting two or
three dozen large moths in a paper bag. Take the bag to the movies with you,
put it on the floor in an empty section of the theater as you go in and leave
it open. The moths will fly out and climb into the projector beam, so that the
film will be obscured by fluttering shadows._

Does this actually work?

~~~
itronitron
anyone with a ceiling mounted projector in their home theater should be able
to test this out in comfort, maybe they can report back

------
jwilber
My favorite bit is that on trains (6.a.2):

In trains bound for enemy destinations, attendants should make life as
uncomfortable as possible for passengers. See that the food is especially bad,
take up tickets after midnight, call the station stops veey loudly during the
night, handle baggage as noisily as possible.

~~~
m463
Air travel has been sabotaged, but for a few dollars extra, you can get a
direct flight, a better seat, get to take some luggage and even have some
food.

------
maze-le
I once had a project management workshop, where this pdf was disseminated as
an example of why projects fail. The basic questions were: Who are the actors
that enable this failure, what is their motivation, and what are the tools
they wield to enforce failure. I've seen a few projects where one or two of
the more subtle sabotage techniques where employed -- probably unwittingly...

------
peteradio
> Always be profuse in your apologies. Frequently you can "get away" with such
> acts under the cover of pretending stupidity, Ignorance...

I've always despised Hanlon's razor for this exact reason. "Hurr durr guess
it's ok he's just stupid for that instant" gives so much cover just because
there some fuckin "razor". Well this razor in particular is bullshit.

~~~
drdeca
Maybe that is where the "sufficiently advanced stupidity is indistinguishable
from malice" rejoinder is supposed to come in?

~~~
azernik
I would think it's the other way around: "sufficiently sophisticated malice is
indistinguishable from stupidity".

------
jascii
I am mostly just disappointed in the absolute lack of creativity in their
suggestions. Even The Anarchist Cookbook is a better read :(

~~~
CamperBob2
I dunno. The part about bringing a bag full of moths to a theater showing
propaganda films is kind of amusing. I'll admit I would not have thought of
that.

Then again, they also tell you to short out your own electrical outlets so
that nobody else in the apartment building can listen to the radio. I wouldn't
have thought of that, either.

~~~
h2odragon
"bag full of moths"

That sounds good, but... how to catch and transport more than a couple and
keep them viable? they're really delicate critters.

Shorting your outlets (i assume) to take out the building? What? Breakers and
fuses exist to prevent that.

~~~
Teever
Bed bugs. The modern equivalent would be bedbugs. Breeding them would be
comically easy, and distributing them in public places would be extremely hard
to detect.

Buses, doctors offices, libraries, offices, You could cause a lot of damage
with this.

~~~
arh68
Ok, but why??

[https://www.complex.com/life/2020/01/police-investigating-
so...](https://www.complex.com/life/2020/01/police-investigating-someone-
brought-bed-bugs-pennsylvania-walmart)

~~~
TeMPOraL
Sabotage, obviously. Sounds like a cheap way to really screw with morale in an
industrial town that's building the parts for the bombs intended to be dropped
on your homeland.

------
smacktoward
If you’re interested in a guide from the same era on more... _direct_ forms of
resistance, Bert Levy’s 1941 _Guerrilla Warfare_ is a good read:
[https://epdf.pub/guerrilla-
warfare6b67033a7460226f89666685f2...](https://epdf.pub/guerrilla-
warfare6b67033a7460226f89666685f202c06f86619.html)

(And even just Levy’s life story is quite a story all by itself:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yank_Levy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yank_Levy))

------
kiliantics
Reminds me of "The Freedom Fighter's Manual", which the CIA dropped all over
Nicaragua to encourage its citizens to sabotage the government:

[http://www.nostate.com/docs/The-Freedom-Fighters-
Manual.pdf](http://www.nostate.com/docs/The-Freedom-Fighters-Manual.pdf)

------
raincom
CIA can't be criticized for this manual. Sabotage is one of the tools required
in the statecraft; this was even recognized by Chanakya(Kautilya). Best
examples of sabotage: tactics of NIMBYs, anti-housing advocates, and the
politicians who are colluded with them.

~~~
egdod
Not everyone who disagrees with you on a policy question is a saboteur.

