# In case of capture by the enemy **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 6, 2009, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-case-of-capture-by-the-enemy/495593 "2009-05-06T21:44:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 19\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Harmonious\_Discord](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/74df32/32.png) [@Harmonious\_Discord](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Harmonious_Discord)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2009, 12:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-case-of-capture-by-the-enemy/495593/21 "2009-05-08T12:21:44Z")
[History Detectives poison pin episode.](http://www.pbs.org/opb/historydetectives/investigations/301_suicide.html) This one is a treasure. The man who made poison pins died and the son or grandson found some hollow pins and brought them to the History Detectives. ---
**Author:** ![Attack\_from\_the\_3rd\_dimension](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b38774/32.png) [@Attack\_from\_the\_3rd\_dimension](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Attack_from_the_3rd_dimension)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2009, 4:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-case-of-capture-by-the-enemy/495593/22 "2009-05-08T16:06:51Z")
> [@Lust4Life](#): > > Special Forces radio operator and thats all you’re getting. Stop asking **Lust4Life** questions, or he’ll kill himself with a poison pin. ---
**Author:** ![UncleRojelio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/unclerojelio/32/3160_2.png) [@UncleRojelio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UncleRojelio)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2009, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-case-of-capture-by-the-enemy/495593/23 "2009-05-08T16:14:45Z")
> [@Lust4Life](#): > > Special Forces radio operator and thats all you’re getting. Aww come on. at least give us some service dates to work with. ---
**Author:** ![Lust4Life](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ecc23a/32.png) [@Lust4Life](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lust4Life)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2009, 9:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-case-of-capture-by-the-enemy/495593/24 "2009-05-11T09:48:06Z")
> [@Attack\_from\_the\_3rd\_dimension](#): > > Stop asking **Lust4Life** questions, or he’ll kill himself with a poison pin. No my chosen methods are either sex or drinking(Though obviously it might take a little longer) ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2009, 2:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-case-of-capture-by-the-enemy/495593/25 "2009-05-11T14:40:50Z")
Got a deck of cards? [http://www.snopes.com/horrors/freakish/kogut.asp](http://www.snopes.com/horrors/freakish/kogut.asp) ---
**Author:** ![Rodd\_Hill](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/3ab097/32.png) [@Rodd\_Hill](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rodd_Hill)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2009, 2:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-case-of-capture-by-the-enemy/495593/26 "2009-05-11T14:46:25Z")
The 2009 answer: the enemy will already know everything they need about you from your blog, vlog, twitter, facebook and high school reunion page. The flip side of this is the unthinkable to under 40s: maybe the enemy doesn’t care, and you’re just not that interesting to them. Here’s your shovel, a potato and shoes made of old newspapers. Get cracking on that new Kabardino-Balkaria highway. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2009, 3:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-case-of-capture-by-the-enemy/495593/27 "2009-05-11T15:43:39Z")
> [@JonathanTheRed](#): > > I’m terribly concerned about what might happen if I were to fall into enemy hands. While I like to think that I’m a strong-willed person, we all know that even the fiercest resistance can be broken by brutal torture, powerful drugs, or apparently having one’s head dunked in a bucket of water. > [@](#): > > Spence: lnterrogation. > Skip: What? > Spence: Methods to withstand interrogation. > Gregor: You’ve done that? > Spence: We were taught to hold out indefinitely. > Sam: Nobody can hold out indefinitely. > Spence: Ah, is that so? > Sam: Everybody has a limit. l spent some time in interrogation, once. > Skip: They make it hard on you? > Sam: They don’t make it easy. Yeah, it was unpleasant. l held out as long as l could. All the stuff they tried. You just can’t hold out for ever. lmpossible. > Skip: How’d they finally get to you? > Sam: They gave me a grasshopper. > Skip: What’s a grasshopper? > Sam: Lessee, that’s two part gin, two part brandy, one part crème de menthe… [right]-- _Ronin_[/right] Stranger ---
**Author:** ![sweeteviljesus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/898d66/32.png) [@sweeteviljesus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sweeteviljesus)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2009, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-case-of-capture-by-the-enemy/495593/28 "2009-05-11T16:31:33Z")
> [@Lust4Life](#): > > Special Forces radio operator and thats all you’re getting. Can I at least get your name, rank, serial number and DOB? 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2009, 4:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-case-of-capture-by-the-enemy/495593/29 "2009-05-11T16:50:52Z")
> [@Lust4Life](#): > > We were also told that if the Big Bear came over the hill and we were captured that we would be killed after three days because by then the info of our particular speciality would be out of date and we were considered too dangerous to keep alive.(Or in my case far too good looking) Wait, what does “Big Bear came over the hill” mean? ---
**Author:** ![WormTheRed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/bbe5ce/32.png) [@WormTheRed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WormTheRed)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2009, 4:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-case-of-capture-by-the-enemy/495593/30 "2009-05-11T16:55:26Z")
> [@Dewey\_Finn](#): > > Wait, what does “Big Bear came over the hill” mean? I’m guessing the Russkies (aka Red Bear) going across the East German border. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2009, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-case-of-capture-by-the-enemy/495593/31 "2009-05-11T17:04:11Z")
OK, I take it that the radio codes change every three days, or would be changed immediately in the event of someone being captured, so someone who knew the current codes would be useless after three days. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2009, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-case-of-capture-by-the-enemy/495593/32 "2009-05-11T17:13:23Z")
> [@Dewey\_Finn](#): > > The article is about Gary Powers, who famously crash-landed in the Soviet Union. No wonder he was captured. :rolleyes: Memo to self: If you must crash enemy territory, do it very privately. ---
**Author:** ![engineer\_comp\_geek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/engineer_comp_geek/32/504_2.png) [@engineer\_comp\_geek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/engineer_comp_geek)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2009, 6:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-case-of-capture-by-the-enemy/495593/33 "2009-05-11T18:33:03Z")
I had to google because I couldn’t remember his name, but Doug Hegdahl had an interesting way of avoiding being tortured and forced to give information in the Vietnam war. He just acted like an idiot. After a few days his captors were convinced he was stupid and they stopped torturing him because they were convinced he couldn’t possibly know anything useful. So, forget the cyanide. Act stupid. It worked so well that the Vietnamese called him “the incredibly stupid one” and basically let him roam freely around the camp. He ended up being able to sabotage a lot of things, including five trucks that he completely disabled by putting dirt in their gas tanks. Hegdahl also memorized names and information about everyone he was imprisoned with, using a little song that he made up to remember the names. When he was released, he sang the song to his superiors so that they would know who was in the prison camp. I remember in a TV interview Hegdahl said as he started singing it, they told him to slow down, and he was like I can’t slow down, this is how I memorized it. Hegdahl also convinced his captors that he needed new glasses and memorized the route from the prison into the city of Hanoi. Not bad for an idiot. 🙂 Here’s wikipedia’s page on Hegdahl: > **[Doug Hegdahl](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doug_Hegdahl)** > > Douglas Brent Hegdahl III (born September 3, 1946) is a former United States Navy petty officer second class (E-5) who was held as a prisoner of war during the Vietnam War. After an early release, he was able to provide the names and personal information of about 256 fellow POWs, as well as reveal the conditions of the prisoner-of-war camp. > Hegdahl was born on September 3, 1946, and graduated from Clark High School in Clark, South Dakota on May 24, 1966. > Sometime in the early-morning hours of A... ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2009, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-case-of-capture-by-the-enemy/495593/34 "2009-05-11T19:01:10Z")
> [@engineer\_comp\_geek](#): > > Not bad for an idiot. 🙂 > > Here’s wikipedia’s page on Hegdahl: > [Doug Hegdahl - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doug_Hegdahl) > [@](#): > > After his discharge, Hegdahl was sent to the Paris Peace Talks in 1970 — and confronted the North Vietnamese with his first-hand information about the mistreatment of prisoners. Outstanding! ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2009, 11:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-case-of-capture-by-the-enemy/495593/35 "2009-05-11T23:27:39Z")
> [@Doug\_Bowe](#): > > … > > [Heinrich Himmler - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heinrich_Himmler) > “He had equipped himself with a set of false documents, but someone whose papers were wholly in order was so unusual that it aroused the suspicions of a British Army unit in Bremen…” This seems a peculiarly German way to screw up, and a stereotypically British way of detecting the error. ---
**Author:** ![ricksummon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ricksummon/32/3333_2.png) [@ricksummon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ricksummon)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2009, 12:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-case-of-capture-by-the-enemy/495593/36 "2009-05-12T00:12:25Z")
> [@Doug\_Bowe](#): > > "He had equipped himself with a set of false documents, but someone whose papers were wholly in order was so unusual that it aroused the suspicions of a British Army unit in Bremen. > [@Northern\_Piper](#): > > This seems a peculiarly German way to screw up, and a stereotypically British way of detecting the error. Why do I suddenly imagine Rowan Atkinson playing Heinrich Himmler? British Officer: Are your papers in order, sir? Rowan/Himmler: I think you’ll find they’re rather more than just “in order,” sir. You are looking at the most authentic papers in all of England. ---
**Author:** ![Arnold\_Winkelried](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Arnold\_Winkelried](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arnold_Winkelried)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2009, 12:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-case-of-capture-by-the-enemy/495593/37 "2009-05-12T00:41:20Z")
Another more recent cyanide example: serial killer Leonard Lake killed himself with a cyanide capsule hidden in his shirt upon his 1985 arrest in San Francisco, California. > **[Leonard Lake](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonard_Lake)** > > Leonard Thomas Lake (October 29, 1945 – June 6, 1985), also known as Leonard Hill and a variety of other aliases, was an American serial killer. During the mid-1980s, he and his accomplice, British Hong Kong-born Charles Ng, raped, tortured and murdered an estimated eleven to twenty-five victims at a remote cabin near Wilseyville, California, in the Sierra Nevada foothills, located 150 miles east of San Francisco. After his 1985 arrest on unrelated charges, Lake swallowed cyanide pills that he Le... ---
**Author:** ![Arnold\_Winkelried](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Arnold\_Winkelried](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arnold_Winkelried)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2009, 12:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-case-of-capture-by-the-enemy/495593/38 "2009-05-12T00:46:27Z")
> [@bluezooky](#): > > I was somewhat surprised to see Eddie Stone state in the recent BBC series “SAS Survival Secrets” you would basicly tell then everything one your ovedue date pased and where threatend with real torture. This is of course fiction, but I recently re-read John Le Carre’s _The Honourable Schoolboy_, in which a British banker in Hong Kong, who has helped (under duress) the British Secret Service, is brutally tortured by the criminals whose secret bank account he divulged information on. The banker dies from the torture. In the novel, one of the secret service agents tells the chief (Smiley) that “usually we gave them something to betray, some piece of news they could reveal under torture. The problem with Frost (the banker) is that he didn’t have anything to give them.” ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2009, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-case-of-capture-by-the-enemy/495593/39 "2009-05-12T00:56:38Z")
> [@Lust4Life](#): > > Special Forces radio operator and thats all you’re getting. Lust, if your don’t pony up your Mama’s PIN, I’ll have to smack your pinky with this ruler. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-case-of-capture-by-the-enemy/495593.md?page=1)