fandomhigh | Spies and Spying: Week 6. Period 1

Aly stood in front of the class looking thoughtful as they came in.

"Over the past five classes, we've talked a lot about different ways to get information," she said. "But we've never talked about what to do once you have the information. In general, that's not the spy's job. The spy simply retrieves the information and passes it up the chain of command. It's the spymaster or the officer or the politician's job. But things are rarely that easy, and none of you are actually spies." She grinned. "That I know of."

"So how do you know when to act? How do you know when to act wisely? When the goal is revolution, the object should only rarely be to just taunt the person in power or draw his attention to you. You need a plan. You need a clear objective, and you need to make sure you have as much information as possible before you act."

She raised an eyebrow. "So take...oh, whatever possibility you wish to discuss and form a plan of action. Decide what information you need, and how - using the techniques we've talked about - you'd go about getting it."

[OOC: ~~Please wait for~~ OCD is up!]

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"How do you know which information is important, and who to trust when you're giving up the information?" Not that Inara had a reason for asking, or anything.

Of course she didn't. It was all purely hypothetical.

Aly considered the question for a long moment. "Those are both questions at the very heart of everything. The first thing to do is remember everything and see what comes of it. You quickly learn to sort out the important information. I don't think you can be in the information business for very long before you realise the information you collected has been used for a purpose you're not proud of. You have to use your instincts on who to trust.

Which led to another problem. "What if you don't have well-developed instincts?"

"Start paying attention. To everything. Everyone has a reason for why they're doing what they're doing. Try to figure it out even it friendly conversations," she said. "Start smaller like that. You'll be surprised how quickly the technique develops and it becomes second nature."

"So...if someone were looking for information to start a revolution, hypothetically," she stressed, "where would you suggest they look for useful information? And what kind of information would be helpful?"

"Hypothetically, I'd start looking for the background of 'head of state' and their intelligence team, and find out their future plans," Aly said. "That gives you enough to start building a plan and will help direct what else you're going to need."

Inara nodded. "And how would someone figure out where to look?"

Spies and Spying: Week 6. Period 1

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Re: [Spying 8/15] - Questions or Comments?

Re: [Spying 8/15] - Questions or Comments?