Major William E. Mayer Theory Summary

This theory began when Clifton began studying what was right with people after reviewing one specific case study. This case study was conducted by Major William E. Mayer, who later became the U.S. Army’s chief psychiatrist. Dr. Mayer studied one-thousand American prisoners from the Korean War who had been detained in a North Korean POW camp. He was interested in this case due to the extremely devastating effects psychological warfare had on the prisoners. Mayer discovered a new disease in the North Korean prisoners-of-war camps- a disease of extreme hopelessness. It was very common for soldiers to return to their huts, sit in the corner with a blanket over their heads, and die after a couple of days. The soldiers had given up every ounce
of hope and determination to survive. The doctors labeled it “mirasmus” meaning lack of resistance. If the soldiers had received some type of negative attention it would have made them angry. Their anger would have motivated them to survive, but since the motivation was absent, they simply died. The lack of resistance raised the overall death rate in the North Korean POW camps to thirty-eight percent. That is the highest POW death rate in United States military history. More than half of those soldiers died simply because they completely surrendered, both mentally and physically. Mayer stated this happened because the North Koreans used the “ultimate weapon” of war.
The soldiers were denied emotional support from their captors, which ultimately killed them. The North Koreans used four primary tactics on the prisoners of war: informing, self-criticism, breaking loyalty to leadership and country, and withholding all positive emotional support. Informing was the first tactic the North Koreans used which simply meant they would reward the prisoners for snitching on one another. Ultimately, the captors knew this would break relationships and turn the soldiers against each other. The second tactic used was self-criticism. The captors would make the prisoners stand in front of a group, and confess all the bad things they had done. The captors would also make them say all of the good things they could have done, but failed to do. By doing this the caring, trust, respect, and social acceptance among the American soldiers complete disappeared. This created an environment where buckets of goodwill were continuously and heartlessly being drained. The third tactic used was breaking loyalty to leadership and country. The primary way they would do this was by slowly undermining the soldiers’ allegiance to his superiors which caused relationships to break. The fourth and final tactic used was withholding all positive emotional support. This tactic was ultimately bucket dipping in the worst way possible. The soldiers did not receive any positive reinforcement, only
negative reinforcement. The North Koreans had put the American soldiers into an emotional and psychological isolation.