Kidnapping: An Efficient Business
nybooks.com
nybooks.com
You could feel they had a script for how things had to go. First they scare you to try to get you to say things from which they can get a feel for how much you're worth, then they throw a high number (I guess based on the previous step), negotiation starts, the ransom delivery and finally release.
I imagine someone has to be quite psychopathic (or extremely greedy) to do kidnapping. I would imagine it is usually very traumatising for the victims, regardless of how friendly the kidnappers might seem.
It was quite surreal, I was even lectured by one of them about being out at night, that I should be more careful since there's "bad people" out there and I was lucky to get caught by some good ones (!). I guess that shows what their frame of mind is, or how they excuse the whole thing to themselves.
It reminded me of a book called "Never Split the Difference" by Chris Voss where he talks about his approach to negotiating hostage releases. The basic strategy is instead of saying "no" to the price, say some version of "How am I supposed to do that?" which communicates a willingness to negotiate but an inability to accept the price. The side effect is that it builds empathy as it sounds like you'd accept the price if there was any possible way of doing so.
The final move is to throw out a precise, random low ball offer like "$5,470" where it sounds like you've scrounged up all the money you can. The idea is that with kidnappers, time is money. If after a few days or weeks they don't get paid, the low ball offer sounds like better than nothing.
In some negotiations, he kept talking to them for months elegantly saying these empathetic "no" statements until they actually gave up and stopped guarding the captive.
It's a fascinating read that goes into other forms of negotiation too like salary discussions.
Drug trafficking, robberies, kidnapping. Counterfeit products and human trafficking are also two more standard 'revenue streams'. In the case of ISIS apparently it was stealing and selling Oil. Depending on the country you live in, bank robberies either contribute to a gangs' income, or if funds local or international terrorism. This is the main reason police does its best to arrest them. The loss of a bank's £€¥$ is bad, threatening some bank employees and customers is bad, funding the next 'Sri Lanka' is far worse (I am NOT pointing fingers or taking sides - just using this example as it was the most recent).
Edit: Of course, illegal activities help to both supplement state funds and hide their source.
We made a sale to the government of a large third world country. They made their first payment and we began to deploy, but obstacles kept arising and nothing more came from it. The subsequent payments weren't made, the product might have disappeared from their warehouse, etc., so we fled the deal.
As it turns out, half the government wanted to end kidnappings, while the other half was perpetrating them. Either side was quick to pocket any lose budget on its way to unwary vendors.
Kidnapping in the US is extremely high risk and low reward.
Kidnapping in the developing world is a different story.
In some places, kidnappings are now being conducted further down the wealth food chain targeting middle class victims at the maximum daily withdraw cash limit in ATMs.
Transactional, high velocity kidnapping,
Unlikely to be investigated and followed up by overwhelmed local law enforcement.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%27Ndrangheta#Modern_history
https://www.fabioitri.com/scomparsi_their_bodies_will_never_...
These numbers are wild. Why doesn't this happen more often in the US?
Not sure if it was just cash or "we know where your mum lives be terrible if anything happed to that street".
I was totally expecting that line to be:
> we know where your mum lives and she'll be very angry when we tell her what you're up to
"Four Soviet diplomats were kidnapped in September 1985 by a fundamentalist group called the Islamic Liberation Organization. Russia quickly dispatched its Alpha group, tasked with counter-terrorism hostage-rescue operations, to Beirut. Once the team learned that Arkady Katkov, a consular attaché and one of the four hostages, was killed, they responded quickly by tracking down and locating one of the kidnappers’ leaders (or relative it’s not clear). In order to send a clear message to the terrorists, Alpha group members castrated the hostage, cut him down into pieces and sent him to the hostage takers. They also threatened to kill more of the kidnappers’ relatives if the Soviet diplomats were not free."
https://blogbaladi.com/how-russia-responded-to-the-kidnappin...
And that's a good thing.
Among other things this destroys the infrastructure and well of expertise that sophisticated businesses require to function. If you could get a billion in cash, what would you DO with it? Your infinitely resourced adversary has every financial institution and bank teller in the country trained to detect you. If you are a sophisticated criminal organization and can launder millions, why sell the laundry to a kidnapper? Sell it to someone who will not get everyone involved burned to the ground.