4. Definition of Unperceived Ideological Transshipment: Its Artifices

Essentially, the process of unperceived ideological transshipment consists in acting upon someone's mind to make him change his ideology without perceiving it.

Several different artifices can be used to obtain this result.

Usually, these artifices are:

a) Finding, in the ideological system the patient currently accepts, points of affinity with the desired ideological system;

b) Over‑emphasizing those points of affinity, from the standpoint of doctrine and emotion, so that the patient puts them above all the other ideological values he accepts;

c) De‑emphasizing as much as possible the patient's adhesion to doctrinal principles which might be irreconcilable with the ideology to which he is being transshiped;

d) Attracting the patient's sympathy for the militants and leaders of the desired ideological movement, making him see them as soldiers of the over‑emphasized principles in item "b";

e) To go from this sympathy to cooperation in achieving goals common to the patient and his former doctrinal adversaries, or to fight an ideology or a current of opinion inimical to both;

f) Thence giving the patient the conviction that the over‑emphasized principles are more consistent with the ideology of his new friends and brothers in the struggle than with his former ideology;

g) At this point, the patient's mentality will have been changed, and his assimilation by the new ideology will only encounter secondary obstacles.

During nearly this whole process, the patient:

‑ will not realize that his ideas are changing, and when he finally does realize it, he won't be frightened;

‑ imagines that he is acting on his own from start to finish, unconscious that he is being maneuvered.

Thus, he is gradually transformed from an adversary into a sympathizer and finally a follower.