ABSTRACT
Sloth or complacency or greed or arrogance lead to self-deception, which is a universal characteristic of man and one that makes counterdeception, the thwarting of cheating, so difficult. Too often the prepared mind is prepared to be cheated. Visibility and the violation of public trust made cheating in politics seem more intolerable than cheating in, say, business. When a country decides that it would like more knowledge than can be conventionally acquired, cheating becomes institutionalized as espionage. In matters leading to war, the contemporary cheater for the state must contemplate not simply the traditional ruses of the battlefield commanders but also the potential for deceit on the technological battlefield. An Israeli Phantom pilot may cheat a Soviet SAM-7 by taking swift evasive action or all Israeli pilots may benefit from sophisticated jamming techniques that mask the planes from the missiles' sensors.
