Field Notes: The Human Side of Intel

The Course

When I got the nod for advanced HUMINT training, I honestly did not know what to expect. The Bureau does not send many people, so I was proud, but nervous too. I traveled to a compound in eastern Virginia. From the road it looked like a summer camp, nothing that would make you look twice. Inside it was different.

Each of us was paired up with a partner, and each pair got a mentor. Ours was Bill. He was a veteran intelligence officer, former Army Ranger, and one of the most eccentric people I have ever met. Bill rode a vintage Indian motorcycle, lived out in the Pacific Northwest, and only really lit up when he was outside. On the rare days off he would pull me and my partner away from the classroom and take us kayaking or mountain biking. Those trips were where we actually got to know him. A lot of the lessons stuck more from those conversations than from any lecture.

The Training

The course ran us through the whole source cycle: spotting, assessing, developing, handling, and eventually closing. You can read that in a manual but running it start to finish with pushback at every step is another thing entirely.

We spent hours on surveillance detection routes. Walking, riding buses and trains, driving cars through traffic. The point was to move without being predictable, and to know if someone was on you without looking like you were checking.

They added in the tradecraft that most people never think about. How to set up a dead drop. How to communicate without being obvious, both on paper and digitally. None of it was flashy. The point was discipline. Keeping your source safe while still moving information.

And then there were the paramilitary skills. Evasive driving, counter-surveillance, situational awareness. I remember one afternoon when I cut a corner too sharp during a driving drill and nearly jumped the curb. Bill sat there with his coffee, completely unfazed, and said, “If I spill this, you fail.” That was Bill. Deadpan, cutting, and somehow it stuck more than any handout ever could.

The Immersive Week

The capstone was a multi-week long exercise, in the wild, in a small town in northern Virginia. They dropped us at a hotel, provided a cover story, and a network of professional role players posing as extremists. None of it was scripted. The role players pushed back hard, just like the real thing.

My partner and I started simple. We showed up at the right bars, bought gas at the right stations, made small talk where we thought it might count. Slowly one of the role players let us in. From there it was up to us whether to push for recruitment or wait. We decided to push, and the role player pushed right back. It was messy, tense, and nothing about it felt safe. Which was exactly the point.

By the end of the exercise we were fried, living off takeout in the hotel, piecing together reports on too little sleep. But we had taken a contact from first meeting to a working relationship without losing our cover. It felt real, which was the goal.

Back in the Field

Not many agents get this course. When I got back to my squad, they made sure to put me to work. I was running my own sources, but also helping agents from other squads recruit and manage theirs. The training made me sharper and more confident, but more than that it made me useful. That was the point of the course.

What Stuck With Me

Two things stayed with me. First, human intelligence is about people, not tricks. Patience, trust, listening, and knowing when to move. Second, all the tradecraft, from the dead drops to the routes to the discipline, is really just about protecting people. Without that, nothing else works.

That has carried straight into what I do now. Most private investigations come down to people. Vetting a nanny. Talking to a witness who does not want to be involved. Digging into a business partner who keeps moving the goalposts. The setting is different, but the principle is the same. Pay attention, stay patient, and understand the person in front of you. That is where the clarity comes from.

Closing Thought

That course gave me instincts I still lean on today. How to slow down when everything feels rushed. How to listen when you want to talk. How to move when the window is small. At the time it just felt like training, but looking back, those habits changed how I work. They are the reason I approach people the way I do, whether it is in an interview, a conversation, or a case. The lesson was simple: if you pay attention and stay patient, people will show you who they really are.