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ing the Korean war, submitted by the Reds to reporters
an interview.
Marlin appeared worn arid strained. In his tense state,
If an hour was all the press could have. He spoke earn-
;ly ancl contritely. He said he hoped the Chinese- anel
irean people would forgive his misdeeds, anel explained
th disarming frankness how he had engaged in germ-
irl'are attacks against the peasantry. His eyes looked
initely sad. The fast flow of his answers remove-el any
cpticism.
VVhat particularly impressed reporters xvas the hank
iy Marlin answered their toughest questions. He showed
i hesitancy. Now they had the final proof that America
d engaged in cowardly and loathsome germ warfare.
ii -x had the details from a man who had done it!
Numerous editors all over the world informed their
xu I its that such disclosures could not be brushed lightly
side. The editors said they were being objective. After all,
■adn't it been a group interview? Sound films had been
Hade of the interview. Thc films were shown to selected
roups at parties given by Red diplomats.
n moTo Outsiders did not know that Marlin had been "pre-
Bred," rigorously and at great length, for that "scoop"
iterview.
ioned-
[-ctical 2. S.\M Dean. An elderly American engineer named
1/ had am Deai., who had been a college teacher in China for
isis of 'any years ancl had had nothing to do with politics, fell
lorror. Ictim to the Communist invaders ancl felt the full weight
i the confession technique.
For months they bombarded him with questions, accusa-
ions, and orders to write, write, and keep on writing
mman verything he had ever known, everything he had ever
appen bne. He was deprived of food and rest. Teams of fresh
xment nterrogators came in relays, hammering at him every
natu- pinute. Then they told him that he had confessed to many
■d the rimes, including that of being a spy. He xxas too dazed
'avlov. 0 have the least idea of what he had said or written.
-ttings [hey said they ought to punish him more but because
ill (he f his age they would let him leave China.
I His wife brought him home to America. For a long
t one:
gantic
aining
e per-
anner.
joined
rompt
ixxash-
nce i'1
lahzed
peace,
actios-
in tin'
gation
ave in
, were
sd the
igainst
S. Kit
■isonei
iine he was practically unconscious of all that went on
pound him. Most distressing was his loss of memory.
roper environment in America, loving care, and steady
■evotion to work gradually restored Sam to mental and
physical health. He says:
"They trap you like a rat. Finally, you have to take
their line."
3. John D. Hayes. Hayes was a highly educated, analytic man, a missionary. He bad studied psychology and
new of Pavlov's theories although, when arrested, he
didn't dream that the physiologist's experiments would
'elate to his case. I met him about hall a year after his
release from a Communist prison in central China, where
he had undergone intense- brainwashing.
He was then able to give only a smattering account of
it. When he searched his mind for details, it hurt. The
agony that brainwashing imposes on its victims was still
'n his eyes.
We met next more than a year later. He was now able
to present an integrated account of how he had been led
by subtle anel brutal pressures to believe and admit what
'lad never taken place. Most important was the fact that
He took all the Beds dealt him, yet beat them in the end.
The Beds we-re- never able to achieve their primary objec-
110 I Pacts Foiu m News, December, 1956
tixe- with him. His mind kept slipping away from them.
His experiences exposed the fatal limitations of brainwashing.
Hayes was constantly hungry. He felt drugged from
lack of sleep. The brainwashing chamber was a downstairs room in the prison, about twelve by eighteen feet,
where he faced from one to seven inquisitors ancl torturers.
Brainwashing victims from East Europe have described
similar courts to me, with hypnotists ancl psychiatrists on
the stalf.
The court informed Hayes he was head spy for all
Southwest China and demanded he fill in the details for
them by confessions. They insisted he reveal his connections with the FBI; they provided what they called proof
ancl spent ten steady days pounding on this. They gave
him thinking assignments on which be had to write and
report. The tension was like a drill piercing his mind,
worse than physical suffering. They gave him Mao's books
to study in his cell; they had him write a long autobiography; they wore him down xxith insane, repetitious
questioning. They would get him all wound up and bewildered over nothing. He realized that there was a devilish
consistency and persistence about all this treatment from
the Reds.
Finally, after three-quarters of a year of uninterrupted,
intensix-e drilling away at his mind, he was in no shape
to reason things out. Hallucination took possession of
him. He became wholly unconcerned over what the Reds
might elo to him. Their objective xvas to "convert" him,
to indoctrinate him into their ideology, actually to win
his loyalty, on the firm conviction that environment, if
the pressure is sufficient, will not only break a man but
remake him. He defeated them at their own tactics. After
that, he felt sure they xvould either release or murder
him. It happened to be, for Hayes, release.
Later, much later, Hayes could analyze his little battle
in the brain warfare that is being waged around the
world. "The more I think of it." he said to me, "the surer
I am that the mind is influenced to a great extent by
environment and training, but that the really decisive,
controlling element is the spirit. You can't crack that if it
is sound."
When Hayes discussed this with medical men in America, a San Francisco psycho-analyst told him:
"Your mind gave way when you had your hallucination.
That saved you. You were intact, only your mind had
cracked. The Reds couldn't do any more to you. Your
spirit had escaped them."
This was a medical man's analysis, uninfluenced by missionary thought. Yet on this field of battle of the mind,
these two men saw eye to eye.
4. The Negro as P.O.W. In the prisoner-of-war camps
in North Korea, the dark-skinned American was put on
his mettle racially because the Communists insisted on
appealing to him as a Negro. Tbe- color ol his skin was
constantly emphasized as his all-important characteristic,
lie- xvas pitted against his country, symbolized in the
person of the white man. But thex- failed to gain the
great propaganda victory thex- hael counted on, to win
the minds of non-white- peoples of the world. Out of thousands of Negroes taken prisoner, only three were among
the cowed ancl upset lads who said they did not want to
return home to America.
I asked a newspaperman just back from the Korean
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