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How Hostage Negotiation Works · Stuff You Should Know

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Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.
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Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should know
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Speaker 1: from house Stuff Works dot com. Hey, and welcome to
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Speaker 1: the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. With me is Charles W.
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Speaker 1: Punkin Bryant. Yeah, doing his cheeks. How you know I'm
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Speaker 1: in the heavy That's that's why he's right there? Coolio.
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Speaker 1: This is double good luck. Okay, well good then this
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Speaker 1: should probably be a pretty good podcast, which means we
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Speaker 1: are doomed. Yes, Josh, Before we get going, can I
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Speaker 1: just mentioned a little TV show coming up, uh, the
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Speaker 1: Road to Punkin Chunkin and Punkin Chunking itself naturally? Yeah? Yeah,
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Speaker 1: and that, Josh is Thanksgiving Night your board after your
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Speaker 1: Turkey o on the Science Channel eight Eastern time. Right,
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Speaker 1: So insert clever intro chunck. Have you ever been a hostage? No?
1:03
Speaker 1: Nor have I. I I would remember that, I think, but
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Speaker 1: you would. Have you ever seen Inside Man? Uh? No?
1:09
Speaker 1: Is that which one was at Denzel? No? I didn't
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Speaker 1: see that, Clive Owen, I wanted to dude, that is
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Speaker 1: in my opinion, I haven't seen Dog Day Afternoon, but
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Speaker 1: I think it's the greatest hostage movie ever made. You
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Speaker 1: haven't seen Dog Day Afternoon. No, Chuck, I'm not seventy
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Speaker 1: like you. Oh, I forgot that they burned all the
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Speaker 1: copies in nineteen when you were born in the Great
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Speaker 1: Fire started by a who. Dog Afternoon was gold. You
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Speaker 1: should check it out. I will check it up. You
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Speaker 1: know a hundred year old movie. No, I'm sure it's good.
1:39
Speaker 1: It was Paccino, it is prom sure, yeah, before he
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Speaker 1: just went absolutely nuts. Um, well, okay, neither one of
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Speaker 1: us has been a hostage or seeing each other's movies, right,
1:50
Speaker 1: But no, we must seen war games. But I can
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Speaker 1: imagine that if either one of us were a hostage,
1:59
Speaker 1: there would be a hostage negotiator outside. Right, I would
2:02
Speaker 1: be dead pretty soon. I think if I were a hostage,
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Speaker 1: has a pizza delivery person could have delivered that that
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Speaker 1: segway better than me? Yeah? Yeah, in thirty minutes or less.
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Speaker 1: Yeah uh so, Yeah, Josh, let's talk about hostage and negotiation.
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Speaker 1: I can't say that word negotiations. Yes, Chuck, let's it is.
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Speaker 1: There's a few things going on. Usually the hostage taker
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Speaker 1: is want something, yeah, money, or they want to free
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Speaker 1: their brothers that are political prisoners or um, they want
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Speaker 1: safe passage or something like that, right, or they want
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Speaker 1: you know, some country to stop some policy at and uh,
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Speaker 1: usually the target of the hostage shaker is not the
2:43
Speaker 1: hostage but some other third party. Yeah and yeah, but
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Speaker 1: we'll we'll get to the exception on that. And I was,
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Speaker 1: I was chomping at the bit, right, I know, finally
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Speaker 1: they are hostages are usually only bargaining chips that have
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Speaker 1: symbolic value, right, Like for example, the nineteen seventy two
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Speaker 1: Olympic Games in Munich, the hostages there had some serious
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Speaker 1: symbolic value. They were, um, Israeli athletes and uh what
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Speaker 1: kind of what kind of terrorists? Well, the target was
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Speaker 1: the Israeli government clearly, not the athletes. They were the pawn,
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Speaker 1: the symbolic pawn. Much like in the nineteen seventy two
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Speaker 1: Olympics in Munich, the hostage crisis that happened there over
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Speaker 1: what a twenty four period, Um, a bunch of Palestinian
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Speaker 1: terrorists took some Israeli athletes hostage, and they were targeting Israel.
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Speaker 1: So these were very symbolic pawns. I guess, as you'd
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Speaker 1: put them, right, did you see Munich did you say,
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Speaker 1: my god, it's a good movie. Man, that's a good one. Uh.
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Speaker 1: And so Josh, now we can move on to the
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Speaker 1: phases of a hostage situation. Okay, the initial phase, so Chuck, yes,
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Speaker 1: all right, let's let's dramatize this a little bit. Okay,
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Speaker 1: the initial phase. Yeah, we're just a group of people
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Speaker 1: hanging out and say a bank. Sure, we'll do a bank.
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Speaker 1: And then all of a sudden, a bunch of guys
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Speaker 1: come through the door, kicking off what's known as the
4:06
Speaker 1: initial phase, right, like you said, already, right, And what's
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Speaker 1: the initial phase, Chuck? It is a initial stage of
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Speaker 1: panic and violence where they subdue the hostages and uh,
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Speaker 1: it's it's very um. So during the initial phase they
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Speaker 1: come in, everybody get on the floor, right, right, and
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Speaker 1: then they barred the doors, and uh, the initial phase
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Speaker 1: is very brief. Did he like my machine gun? Yeah?
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Speaker 1: That's good. Then comes the negotiation phase, and that's when
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Speaker 1: Johnny Law comes on the scene, and that's generally called
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Speaker 1: the standoff phase. Right, And this is almost always the
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Speaker 1: longest phase of a hostage situation. This is when all
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Speaker 1: the negotiation is taking place, when they send in pizza
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Speaker 1: boxes with little cameras and people have to pee, and
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Speaker 1: the negotiators saying, if there's a pregnant woman in their
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Speaker 1: letter out stuff just when people have to pee. Yeah,
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Speaker 1: that's a good one. And then the final phases that
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Speaker 1: the ter a nation phase. And uh, you've got a
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Speaker 1: few different results that can happen here. Um, either the
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Speaker 1: hostage takers surrender and they're arrested, or the police uh
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Speaker 1: kind of mountain assault and kill them or arrest them,
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Speaker 1: or their demands are granted and they get away. Uh. Yeah,
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Speaker 1: and the second one is actually what happened. Actually, combination
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Speaker 1: of two and three is what happened in Munich. As
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Speaker 1: anybody who's seen the movie knows. Um, the West German
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Speaker 1: police are like, we can't take these guys that, we
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Speaker 1: need to let them think that they're actually going to
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Speaker 1: escape and get them to the airport. All the hostages
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Speaker 1: were killed, along with a pilot and a police officer.
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Speaker 1: Uh and uh the rest of the um, the hostage takers,
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Speaker 1: the Palestinian terrorists were killed except for three who were
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Speaker 1: captured right there. It was a blood bath, basically, Well,
5:50
Speaker 1: I thought they were hunted down later, didn't that What
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Speaker 1: Munich was about the people who engineered it. Okay, we're
5:56
Speaker 1: supposedly hunted down later by the massad bright Eric Bannah,
6:00
Speaker 1: who is just clearly most solid material the Australian massade. Um.
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Speaker 1: So yeah, those are the three phases. And um during
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Speaker 1: the second phases when the negotiator comes on the scene,
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Speaker 1: right and UM, if you've ever seen the movie Negotiator,
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Speaker 1: the negotiators clearly disappointed. Um. But there was something that
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Speaker 1: is very characteristic of hostage negotiation, and that is it's
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Speaker 1: a very important point that the hostage negotiator not be
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Speaker 1: the league commander on the scene. And why Chuck well
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Speaker 1: because um, Well, for a couple of reasons. One is
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Speaker 1: that the negotiator doesn't need to be multitasking right then,
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Speaker 1: they need to have all their focus on talking to
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Speaker 1: and talking down the hostage taker. This one reason that's
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Speaker 1: part of it. They also, um, one of the one
6:49
Speaker 1: of the great tactics that hostage negotiators use is um
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Speaker 1: to stall and they prolonged the situation. That seems like
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Speaker 1: the main tactic, right, it's just by time. One of
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Speaker 1: the one of the tactics they use to create that tactic,
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Speaker 1: UM is to say, well, I can't make that call
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Speaker 1: I've got to talk to somebody else. Um, And if
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Speaker 1: it's common knowledge that the hostage negotiator actually is commanding
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Speaker 1: the scene, then that doesn't really work. Right. They'll say, well,
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Speaker 1: you can pull the trigger on that because you're the
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Speaker 1: boss exactly, and they're like, no, no, no, don't use
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Speaker 1: that phrase. Right. That's in every movie, every single hostage
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Speaker 1: movie is that scene where they go, well, I just
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Speaker 1: can't give you a seven forty seven full of gold bars, dude.
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Speaker 1: I gotta get clearance from Fort Knox and I'm gonna
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Speaker 1: take at least a day, so you might want to
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Speaker 1: lower your demands, which is actually another reason they stalled
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Speaker 1: to try and chip away at the demands. So the
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Speaker 1: negotiators on the scene and he's trying to prolong the situation.
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Speaker 1: Like you said, um, they're trying to lessen the demands.
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Speaker 1: They're also um, but they also stall and prolong the
7:48
Speaker 1: situation by um, getting the hostage takers to focus on
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Speaker 1: some minute and really unimportant details. Yeah, I like this.
7:56
Speaker 1: They try to derail them, so like the seven forty seven,
7:59
Speaker 1: what kind of seven forty seven do you want? It?
8:02
Speaker 1: Is it okay if it was built before? Because we've
8:05
Speaker 1: got some that are built after that. But then they
8:07
Speaker 1: have this seating arrangement that might be a problem for you,
8:10
Speaker 1: And and all of a sudden, you're distracting the hostage
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Speaker 1: taker from the crisis at hand, and he's thinking about
8:17
Speaker 1: what kind of seven seven he wants? You know, I
8:20
Speaker 1: could just see the guy putting his hand over the
8:22
Speaker 1: thing and going, what kind of plane do we want?
8:25
Speaker 1: He's asking about seek configurations. I have no idea, right exactly.
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Speaker 1: It's also they hang up, and then you've bought some time,
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Speaker 1: right And and not only um, not every hostage taker
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Speaker 1: once a seven forty seven, but this can also be
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Speaker 1: applied to even more minute details, like what do you
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Speaker 1: want on your pizza? You know? Well, I mean, do
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Speaker 1: you really want bell pepper because you're getting onion already
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Speaker 1: and sometimes it's too crunchy. I imagine there's a point
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Speaker 1: where if you're talking to a hostage taker and you
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Speaker 1: try the bell Pepper onion combo, because all they're gonna
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Speaker 1: pick up on what you're doing, or if they've read
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Speaker 1: this article or ever ever seen a hostage movie, be
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Speaker 1: sure that's another good they would probably be wise to
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Speaker 1: say it. It sounds to me like you're trying to
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Speaker 1: buy some time here, bang bang, indeed, which is what
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Speaker 1: the hostage negotiator does not want to happen. No, that's
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Speaker 1: number two on their list. One is to prolong it.
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Speaker 1: And while while they're prolonging it, we should mention that
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Speaker 1: there trying to get information as much information as possible
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Speaker 1: on who the person is, how many there are, what's
9:23
Speaker 1: frame of mind they're in, if they're unstable, if they're violent, um,
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Speaker 1: any kind of clue that can that can help him out, right,
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Speaker 1: Because a hostage negotiator is going to talk differently. They're
9:33
Speaker 1: not going to try that Bell pepper onion thing on
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Speaker 1: like a very cool, calculated Clive Owens type, but they
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Speaker 1: might on somebody who's like just out of his mind
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Speaker 1: crazy because his wife is leaving him. Right, which is
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Speaker 1: actually the most common hostage situation is a domestic dispute
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Speaker 1: that's turned into some guy with the gun barricading he
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Speaker 1: and his family in their home. Yeah, you usually think
9:55
Speaker 1: of the big movie scenario with some foreign enemy taking
9:59
Speaker 1: all these people hot stage, but it's usually just a
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Speaker 1: regular domestic scene. And the worst ones, man, the worst
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Speaker 1: ones of those you see on the news where you
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Speaker 1: see some dudes got a baby acting as a human shield.
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Speaker 1: Who does that? You've never seen that? No, Oh man,
10:15
Speaker 1: it's it's the worst watching those cop shows, that those
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Speaker 1: true crime shows. A baby is a human shield. Guys.
10:22
Speaker 1: It's like the dad is out of his mind and
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Speaker 1: uh on drugs or something and he'll have his baby
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Speaker 1: and it's just it's the worst thing in the world
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Speaker 1: to watch unfold, very disturbing. Well bet in fact, don't
10:32
Speaker 1: go see that, Joshua. That'll keep you up at night.
10:34
Speaker 1: I bet it will. So that is the most common
10:37
Speaker 1: type of things domestic. But back to the safety of
10:40
Speaker 1: the hostages. That's number two on the list of the
10:43
Speaker 1: negotiators to keep everyone in there alive, right, I would
10:46
Speaker 1: think could technically be number one. Well, prolonging the situation
10:49
Speaker 1: I think leads to number one. So it's the kind
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Speaker 1: of tied right. So, um, what you want to do
10:54
Speaker 1: if you're a negotiator and you are chipping away at demands.
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Speaker 1: First of all, you're trying to get the seven forty
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Speaker 1: seven out the window or the gold bars from Fort Knox,
11:02
Speaker 1: But you're really trying to get to the heart of
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Speaker 1: what what does this guy want? He wants the seven
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Speaker 1: forty seven and he wants gold bars. Well, he wants
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Speaker 1: to escape and he wants some money, So maybe it
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Speaker 1: can be dealt with on a lesser level. But first,
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Speaker 1: let's get you some food in there. But to get
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Speaker 1: you some food, I need a hostage. To get as
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Speaker 1: many hostages out as possible. Number one, to ensure the
11:21
Speaker 1: safety of the hostages, as you said, but number two
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Speaker 1: for if when when an assault comes, if it does come,
11:27
Speaker 1: there's a lot fewer hostages in there that the police
11:29
Speaker 1: need to not shoot, you know, Plus the hostage did
11:33
Speaker 1: you just say this, The hostage can turn if they
11:35
Speaker 1: release someone who's like ill or pregnant, they can give
11:37
Speaker 1: them information, insider information, right, like, even to create an
11:41
Speaker 1: even more distinct psychological profile. That kind of right, right, Yeah.
11:44
Speaker 1: I like the fact that you were talking about the
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Speaker 1: lessening the demands, like we can't get your seven forty
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Speaker 1: seven and gold bars, and it really could. I could
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Speaker 1: see that throwing the hostage taker into a tizzy. If
11:54
Speaker 1: all of a sudden there have to decide, well, will
11:58
Speaker 1: you take a helicopter in a cash years chat? That
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Speaker 1: kind of well, actually I hadn't thought it before, but
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Speaker 1: will you endorse it before him right, Yeah, let's go
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Speaker 1: to the bank. Oh I'm in a bank. Awesome, Yes,
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Speaker 1: bring me that cast. Here's check please. So number three
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Speaker 1: on their list is to keep everything calm. You don't
12:16
Speaker 1: want to upset a hostage taker. No, you're gonna keep
12:20
Speaker 1: everything nice and chill, especially following the initial phase, that
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Speaker 1: initial assault. The guys all jacked up on like adrenaline.
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Speaker 1: He's a little crazy. All of a sudden, it's starting
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Speaker 1: to sink in if he accidentally took hostages, starting to
12:33
Speaker 1: sinking like, oh my god, I'm I am a hostage taker.
12:36
Speaker 1: Now this is a little nuts. So you want to
12:39
Speaker 1: keep the guy calm, or the guys or the gals calm,
12:42
Speaker 1: especially if it was a biter mine Hoff experiment. No
12:48
Speaker 1: idea what that is. It's actually the there's a movie
12:51
Speaker 1: out called the Body mine Hoff Complex, I think um.
12:55
Speaker 1: And they actually introduced terrorism to the Western world where
12:58
Speaker 1: was a group of Germans, German radicals, Kevin Space, basically
13:02
Speaker 1: board kids that introduced things like skyjacking and stuff like that.
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Speaker 1: They were crazy crazy, uh so, Josh. The fourth thing,
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Speaker 1: and this was my favorite one. Actually, one of the
13:14
Speaker 1: goals of the hostage negotiator is to um, get the
13:18
Speaker 1: hostage taker and the hostages to work together to give
13:22
Speaker 1: them some task where they have to interact, like delivering
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Speaker 1: the pizza. So send out, um, you're you're most agreeable
13:32
Speaker 1: hostage that you trust the most to get the pizza
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Speaker 1: and bring it in. So all of a sudden, the
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Speaker 1: hostage taker has to talk to the hostages and say, hey,
13:39
Speaker 1: we need you to go and get the pizza because
13:40
Speaker 1: we can't go within the sniper range. And the more
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Speaker 1: you get them interacting, the more chance that the hostage
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Speaker 1: taker sees the hostage as a human instead of just
13:49
Speaker 1: blind phoning them and putting them in the corner right
13:51
Speaker 1: or in shooting them in the head. There was actually
13:55
Speaker 1: a very famous case of that in some hostage takers
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Speaker 1: took over a subway train or a train in Holland
14:03
Speaker 1: and a guy named Robert de Groot was about to
14:06
Speaker 1: be executed Chuck, and apparently they allowed him to pray first,
14:11
Speaker 1: and they heard him praying for his wife and children,
14:14
Speaker 1: and they got them so bad that they just couldn't
14:16
Speaker 1: execute the guy, so they actually fake executed him. Uh,
14:20
Speaker 1: the standoff continued, and when it came time to execute
14:23
Speaker 1: more hostages, they didn't give him a chance to pray
14:25
Speaker 1: and just actually executed him. And I'm sure they pushed
14:27
Speaker 1: him off the train and he rolled down the hill
14:29
Speaker 1: and like faked like he was dead. And I'm sure
14:32
Speaker 1: the rest of the hostages were like, thanks, Bob, you
14:35
Speaker 1: right now we don't even not only can we not pray,
14:39
Speaker 1: but we're getting a bullet in the head. Yeah, And
14:41
Speaker 1: I was thinking about that, like this is you feel
14:44
Speaker 1: so removed from it. The weird thing about being a
14:46
Speaker 1: hostage is like, no one plans on being a hostage.
14:48
Speaker 1: It just happens all of a sudden. And imagine dying
14:52
Speaker 1: on a train on some track in halland by being
14:55
Speaker 1: executed by some hostage taker during a standoff. What a
14:59
Speaker 1: crap way to die. You ride on the money there, brother, Yeah,
15:03
Speaker 1: so Chuck, I think I think it's pretty damn pretentious
15:06
Speaker 1: of us to have not brought up Stockholm syndrome yet,
15:08
Speaker 1: don't you. Yeah, go ahead identifying with your captor. Yeah,
15:12
Speaker 1: it actually came out of a bank robbery and I
15:14
Speaker 1: think nineteen eighty one um in Stockholm appropriately enough, and uh,
15:21
Speaker 1: this this bank robbers plan just kind of went to crap.
15:24
Speaker 1: And I've been like using pseudo bad words all day,
15:29
Speaker 1: stupid and weird. This bank robbers plan kind of went
15:33
Speaker 1: to pot and all of a sudden he was a
15:35
Speaker 1: hostage taker. Right, Well, this standoff continued, and strangely enough,
15:41
Speaker 1: the hostage just started helping him. They were serving his lookouts.
15:44
Speaker 1: They were giving him advice on how to escape and
15:46
Speaker 1: how to deal with the negotiator and all that. And
15:48
Speaker 1: that's kind of odd if you think about it. So
15:51
Speaker 1: why would why would people suffer this what they call
15:55
Speaker 1: Stockholm syndrome. Well, there's a lot of psychological reasons for it. Yeah,
16:00
Speaker 1: defense mechanism, coping, coping type of thing. Well, yeah, if
16:05
Speaker 1: you feel powerless in a situation like that, you go
16:08
Speaker 1: to whoever has the power, and when you're a hostage,
16:10
Speaker 1: your hostage taker has the power. Yeah. And the other
16:13
Speaker 1: thing I mentioned too, is that if you're not killed
16:17
Speaker 1: and there are other hostages are killed, you feel such
16:20
Speaker 1: a sense of relief that can actually morph into sympathy.
16:23
Speaker 1: It's kind of like I remember we did the brainwashing
16:25
Speaker 1: Uh yeah podcast? Yeah, good one. Uh you want to
16:29
Speaker 1: talk about countries and some famous non negotiating countries. Yeah,
16:34
Speaker 1: do you remember the eighties, it was like planes were
16:37
Speaker 1: getting hijacked everywhere all over the body Mine Hoff. Yes,
16:42
Speaker 1: the the United States, Russia, and Israel are all very
16:45
Speaker 1: well known for having a non negotiating policy with hostage
16:50
Speaker 1: takers and terrorists. France had the opposite didn't work out
16:55
Speaker 1: for him, though, No, it didn't. France became very quickly
16:57
Speaker 1: a target um for hostage to a king because France
17:01
Speaker 1: would apparently be like, what do you want? Ha ha ha. Right,
17:05
Speaker 1: And apparently sometimes, and this doesn't surprise me, the countries
17:09
Speaker 1: that refused quote unquote refused to negotiate, there might be
17:12
Speaker 1: some secret negotiations that happened that they never let out
17:16
Speaker 1: because that would destroy their front that they won't negotiate, right.
17:19
Speaker 1: And France also apparently had a little problem with um
17:23
Speaker 1: forming agreements with hostage takers, and then the hostage takers
17:26
Speaker 1: would break the agreements, which is crazy, can you believe it?
17:29
Speaker 1: With a bunch of So there is a there's an equilibrium,
17:33
Speaker 1: Chuck loves equilibrium. But there's an equilibrium between not negotiating
17:37
Speaker 1: at all and over negotiating. And I think that's what
17:40
Speaker 1: you're talking about. It's kind of like negotiating on the
17:42
Speaker 1: download and never talking about it and then hunting the
17:45
Speaker 1: people down who did this and murdering them. Right, So, Chuck,
17:49
Speaker 1: let's talk about what happens when you just absolutely refused
17:52
Speaker 1: to negotiate, as we've seen actually in the twenty one century,
17:55
Speaker 1: sadly enough twice in Russia. Yeah, a couple of famous
17:58
Speaker 1: occurrences there with the Muslim Chechen separatists. In two thousand two,
18:04
Speaker 1: they took over a theater in Russia, threatened to blow
18:07
Speaker 1: it up, and so the Russians go in and wonder
18:11
Speaker 1: who who was it putin? You think the guy who
18:16
Speaker 1: wrestles tigers with his shirt off in front of news cameras,
18:18
Speaker 1: don't you don't bear his hallmark? Yeah, they decided to
18:21
Speaker 1: storm the theater and uh send in some knockout gas
18:25
Speaker 1: instead of negotiating, and they ended up killing all. I
18:28
Speaker 1: don't know if it's all of them, but a hundred
18:30
Speaker 1: and twenty nine hostages died from the knockout knockout gas.
18:34
Speaker 1: That's not knockout, guess that's death gass. I think that's
18:36
Speaker 1: what you mean by knockout. I don't think they just
18:39
Speaker 1: don't want to call it death gass. Maybe. So my
18:41
Speaker 1: eyes are open now because I didn't realize that was
18:43
Speaker 1: a euphemism. The other one, Josh, was really really sad.
18:47
Speaker 1: I remember this one while in oh four when the
18:49
Speaker 1: same Chechen separatists invaded an elementary school with guns and
18:54
Speaker 1: bombs and locked themselves up in a gym and Russia
18:59
Speaker 1: would not Negotia eight and three of the hostages that
19:02
Speaker 1: were killed. Yeah, that was awful. And half of them
19:05
Speaker 1: were kids. When they blew up the gymnasium, it was terrible.
19:09
Speaker 1: Listen up Putin. Yeah, but you maintain your toughness and
19:12
Speaker 1: we're not gonna negotiate. Just kill the kids. Okay, so
19:15
Speaker 1: chuck you you okay there, Yeah, I'm good. I'm good.
19:19
Speaker 1: Let's talk about a hostage situation that actually went relatively well,
19:23
Speaker 1: at least compared to UM Russia. I know what you're
19:27
Speaker 1: gonna talk about. Well, there's a very famous incident at
19:30
Speaker 1: Prince's Gate UH in London in April UM members of
19:35
Speaker 1: the Democratic Revolutionary Movement for the Liberation of Arabistan changed
19:40
Speaker 1: that name. It's a mouthful, isn't it. Basically Arabistan is
19:44
Speaker 1: an Iranian province UH, and the group wanted to liberate
19:48
Speaker 1: it clearly UM. And they were Democrats I guess. But
19:53
Speaker 1: they were. They were I think twenty of them and
19:56
Speaker 1: they took no, there were six of them and they
19:58
Speaker 1: took twenty six hostages at the US Embassy in London
20:01
Speaker 1: at Prince's Gate. So there was a uh standoff that
20:06
Speaker 1: lasted quite a while. Um. The hostage negotiator did this.
20:09
Speaker 1: By the book, UH kept the hostage takers focused on
20:14
Speaker 1: details like what kind of food do you want? That
20:16
Speaker 1: kind of thing. Um, Yeah, I'm in the mood for time.
20:21
Speaker 1: I could go for a nice um curry bunha. Yeah,
20:24
Speaker 1: that sounds good. That's Indian though. That's good stuff, by
20:27
Speaker 1: the way, if you've ever had it. Um. They actually
20:31
Speaker 1: did execute one hostage, but the other hostages apparently reported
20:36
Speaker 1: that this guy UM decided to get into a debate
20:39
Speaker 1: over Islam with Iranian terrorists, which you don't do in
20:44
Speaker 1: a hostage situation if you hostage. The negotiator actually did
20:48
Speaker 1: manage to get the release of two ill hostages. Um.
20:52
Speaker 1: Maybe one of them is pregnant. Sometimes when you replaced
20:54
Speaker 1: ill with pregnant, which I don't understand, And they got
20:56
Speaker 1: info from them. Yeah. And so basically the one thing
21:00
Speaker 1: that really wasn't by the book was that the the
21:03
Speaker 1: s a. Yes, got the which is the Special Forces
21:06
Speaker 1: in Great Britain. They are bad. I have a friend
21:09
Speaker 1: who's in that. Yeah, I can't say his name here, okay. Um,
21:14
Speaker 1: they got the hostage negotiator to talk to the hostage
21:19
Speaker 1: takers on the phone right before the assault, knowing the
21:23
Speaker 1: assault was coming as a distraction. Right. That doesn't happen much,
21:26
Speaker 1: not usually. And why because they don't let the negotiator
21:30
Speaker 1: in on this kind of information, because they think that
21:32
Speaker 1: they would compromise the job just through maybe even inflection
21:37
Speaker 1: or tone of their voice. They would give it away
21:39
Speaker 1: right on purpose. Of course, No, no, certainly not. Very
21:43
Speaker 1: few hostage negotiators experienced Stockholm syndrome negotiation. Definitely just mentally
21:49
Speaker 1: crumble at the first time. But this it actually paid off.
21:53
Speaker 1: The hostage negotiator cut the um lead guy away from
21:57
Speaker 1: the window and the s A S storm the bill
22:00
Speaker 1: boom too tap. I imagine five of the guys and
22:03
Speaker 1: arrest the sixth. Ye not bad. And I think they
22:06
Speaker 1: only lost one other hostage, uh twenty six, which is
22:09
Speaker 1: not bad. No, but I mean if your storm of
22:12
Speaker 1: building in the hostage situation, it's like, well, yeah, that
22:15
Speaker 1: guy lost his life and another guy lost his life.
22:17
Speaker 1: But it's like, yeah, but that's actually really good percentage,
22:22
Speaker 1: I would image. I mean, I wonder what well I
22:25
Speaker 1: would guess the two thousand four Russian standoff is probably
22:28
Speaker 1: a bit as bad as it can get. Yeah, I
22:29
Speaker 1: would say so. One thing we mentioned there that I
22:31
Speaker 1: thought was pretty interesting was you mentioned the Stockholm syndrome.
22:35
Speaker 1: But that is actually a tactic that the negotiator will use,
22:38
Speaker 1: sort of sort of a good cop bad cop thing. Uh.
22:41
Speaker 1: They'll get on the phone or what however they're communicating
22:44
Speaker 1: and say, yeah, you know I actually they'll try and
22:47
Speaker 1: relate to them. I kind of see where you're coming from.
22:49
Speaker 1: I understand this police captain does not understand where you're
22:52
Speaker 1: coming from, and he wants to mow you down. To
22:55
Speaker 1: talk to me, man, and we'll work it out between us. Chuck,
22:58
Speaker 1: you would make it excellent hostage negotiated. I just realized
23:01
Speaker 1: I wish I had a hostage I could give to
23:03
Speaker 1: you right now. That was good. Oh, I just offer
23:05
Speaker 1: you a six pack and you throw it down, your
23:07
Speaker 1: gun all over pretty much and some smokes. But that's
23:10
Speaker 1: a pretty cool trick there. I like that. Of course, again,
23:13
Speaker 1: this is straight out of the movie. So if any
23:16
Speaker 1: Hotches Staker has ever seen any of these films and
23:18
Speaker 1: they should be one step ahead of the negotiator, I
23:20
Speaker 1: would think so. Um there's another um example of not
23:25
Speaker 1: going by the book that I wanted to mention. Uh
23:28
Speaker 1: in in nineteen seventy five of the U. S Consulate
23:31
Speaker 1: and Kuala Lumpoor, Malaysia, UM, there was there was a
23:35
Speaker 1: hostage situation and uh apparently the Japanese Red Army, members
23:40
Speaker 1: of the Japanese Red Army UM attacked the consulate and
23:44
Speaker 1: took hostages. So the terrorists actually called the the authorities
23:49
Speaker 1: to tell them that they had the hostages, and some
23:52
Speaker 1: junior officer at the at the embassy elsewhere in the
23:56
Speaker 1: embassy picked up the phone and from that point on,
23:59
Speaker 1: for the rest of the standoff, they wouldn't talk to
24:01
Speaker 1: anybody else but this junior officer. Wow, yeah, who was
24:04
Speaker 1: not a trained hostage to negotiate it. And it's just like, oh, god,
24:08
Speaker 1: well he probably has an eating Well, no, there was
24:12
Speaker 1: a negotiator on the scene, like coaching, coaching the junior officer.
24:16
Speaker 1: But yeah, yeah. I also saw in the article where
24:18
Speaker 1: there's um, there's always a second, a secondary negotiator on
24:21
Speaker 1: the hand, because sometimes, because you're basically improving, you gotta
24:26
Speaker 1: be quick on your feet, and if all of a
24:28
Speaker 1: sudden you're going ah, had that, you need someone to
24:33
Speaker 1: step in and say tell them that will send them pizza.
24:36
Speaker 1: That first one sounded exactly like Kevin Spacey in The Negotiator.
24:39
Speaker 1: I didn't see that. When there's some stupid twist where
24:42
Speaker 1: he was in fact the in on it or something
24:44
Speaker 1: who I don't remember. I blocked it out of my memory.
24:47
Speaker 1: That might have been spoiler. Of course you're supposed to
24:49
Speaker 1: say spoiler beforehand. But whatever. Yeah, well, we are pretty
24:53
Speaker 1: much done here with hostage negotiation. We're gonna leave a
24:56
Speaker 1: whole section untouched on becoming a hostage negotiator. You can
25:00
Speaker 1: find that in the article how hostage Negotiation Works. You
25:04
Speaker 1: can type in hostage I imagine on the handy search
25:07
Speaker 1: bar at how stuffworks dot com, which means it's time
25:10
Speaker 1: for listener mail. No, no, Josh, not today, Okay, no
25:16
Speaker 1: listener mail. We're gonna do a little Kiva update like
25:19
Speaker 1: we are wont to do. Okay, so you want to
25:22
Speaker 1: go ahead and give the plug? Yeah, man, we started
25:24
Speaker 1: a Kiva team Keeva dot org k I v A.
25:27
Speaker 1: Dot org is a micro lending website, socially responsible one
25:31
Speaker 1: which means you don't make any interest on your loans.
25:34
Speaker 1: You can loan as little as twenty five bucks to
25:36
Speaker 1: people in developing countries and now the US um entrepreneurs
25:42
Speaker 1: who are trying to become self sufficient through their businesses.
25:44
Speaker 1: They're little, tiny loans that make a huge difference elsewhere
25:47
Speaker 1: in the in the world. Indeed, uh, and we are
25:50
Speaker 1: kicking bottom on this. We are man, and I'm proud
25:54
Speaker 1: of the stuff you should know Army, because you guys
25:55
Speaker 1: are responding and this is really really cool. We challenge
25:58
Speaker 1: the Colbert Rapport or I like to call it the
26:01
Speaker 1: Colbert Report, and we actually made a video where we
26:05
Speaker 1: chastised him. Yeah, what you probably never see, but just
26:10
Speaker 1: if you watch the Colbert Report, scoff while you watch
26:14
Speaker 1: it thinking of Chuck and I and the stuff you
26:16
Speaker 1: should know Army. People are responding in a big way
26:19
Speaker 1: and it's going great. And hopefully the Colbert Report will
26:21
Speaker 1: take notice because that will make even more money for
26:24
Speaker 1: Kiva and it might get us on his show. Chuck
26:27
Speaker 1: is just chomping at the bit again on the show,
26:29
Speaker 1: so well, if you want to join the Stuff you
26:31
Speaker 1: Should Know, keep the team, please do, please do. Um.
26:34
Speaker 1: You can go to www dot kiva dot org slash
26:39
Speaker 1: team slash Stuff you Should Know, and that will take
26:42
Speaker 1: you right there. A plus, there's a pretty picture chuck
26:45
Speaker 1: on there. Yeah, me and Emily. Actually it's a picture
26:49
Speaker 1: of U. We have you know, she's on my team.
26:51
Speaker 1: I was talking about our picture. Oh no, no, no.
26:54
Speaker 1: On the member page though. If you're curious of what
26:56
Speaker 1: my wife and I look like together, then you can
27:00
Speaker 1: surf through the member page. And is that the one
27:02
Speaker 1: that's your screensaver in your iPhone too? Yeah, it's It's
27:05
Speaker 1: one of the best pictures I heard of us. It's
27:07
Speaker 1: very nice. Thank you. Uh and how about the blogs?
27:09
Speaker 1: Real quick? Yeah, we both run a blog, and I'm
27:12
Speaker 1: gonna I've been lazy with it lately. I'm gonna get
27:14
Speaker 1: back on off the schneid Um. You can access the
27:16
Speaker 1: blog on the blogs page on which you can find
27:19
Speaker 1: on the right side of the house Stuff Works dot
27:22
Speaker 1: dot com home page. I just barely split that out,
27:26
Speaker 1: so that's where you can find it. Yeah. Go interact, Yes,
27:29
Speaker 1: go interact. That's a pretty cool blog. We like it
27:31
Speaker 1: a lot. If you have an email, or if your
27:34
Speaker 1: name is Aisha Tyler and you have never listened this
27:36
Speaker 1: far before in a podcast, you can send us an
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Speaker 1: email to Stuff Podcast at how stuff works dot com.
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