Editing Arthashastra (section)

===On spying, propaganda and information===
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|quote='''[[Femme fatale]] as a secret agent'''
<poem>
To undermine a ruling oligarchy, make chiefs of the [enemy's] ruling council infatuated with women possessed of great beauty and youth. When passion is roused in them, they should start quarrels by creating belief (about their love) in one and by going to another.
</poem>
|source =— Arthashastra 11.1<ref name=boeschejmh9/><ref>Sanskrit Original: [http://sanskritdocuments.org/pdfjs/web/viewer.html?file=http://sanskritdocuments.org/doc_z_misc_sociology_astrology/artha.pdf#zoom=auto&pagemode=thumbs कौिटलीय अर्थशास्त्र, Arthashastra] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170209052501/http://sanskritdocuments.org/pdfjs/web/viewer.html?file=http%3A%2F%2Fsanskritdocuments.org%2Fdoc_z_misc_sociology_astrology%2Fartha.pdf#zoom=auto&pagemode=thumbs |date=9 February 2017 }} Book 11, Kautilya, pages 206-208</ref>}}
The Arthashastra dedicates many chapters on the need, methods and goals of secret service, and how to build then use a network of spies that work for the state. The spies should be trained to adopt roles and guises, to use coded language to transmit information, and be rewarded by their performance and the results they achieve, states the text.{{sfn|Olivelle|2013|pp=42-47, 78-80, 98, 112-117, 231-234, 261-263, 407-414, 476-483}}{{efn-la|According to Shoham and Liebig, this was a  'textbook of Statecraft and Political Economy' that provides a detailed account of intelligence collection, processing, consumption, and covert operations, as indispensable means for maintaining and expanding the security and power of the state.<ref>Dany Shoham and Michael Liebig. "The intelligence dimension of Kautilyan statecraft and its implications for the present." ''Journal of Intelligence History'' 15.2 (2016): 119-138.</ref>}}

The roles and guises recommended for ''Vyanjana'' (appearance) agents by the Arthashastra include ascetics, forest hermits, mendicants, cooks, merchants, doctors, astrologers, householders, entertainers, dancers, female agents and others.{{sfn|Olivelle|2013|pp=xv-xvi, 42-43, 78-82, 98, 260}} It suggests that members from these professions should be sought to serve for the secret service.{{sfn|Olivelle|2013|pp=42-43}} A prudent state, states the text, must expect that its enemies seek information and are spying inside its territory and spreading propaganda, and therefore it must train and reward double agents to gain identity about such hostile intelligence operations.{{sfn|Olivelle|2013|pp=78-83}}

The goals of the secret service, in Arthashastra, was to test the integrity of government officials, spy on cartels and population for conspiracy, to monitor hostile kingdoms suspected of preparing for war or in war against the state, to check spying and propaganda wars by hostile states, to destabilize enemy states, to get rid of troublesome powerful people who could not be challenged openly.{{sfn|Olivelle|2013|pp=42–47, 78–83, 260–261}}<ref name=boeschejmh9>Roger Boesche (2003), Kautilya's Arthaśāstra on War and Diplomacy in Ancient India, The Journal of Military History, Volume 67, Number 1, pages 9-37</ref> The spy operations and its targets, states verse 5.2.69 of Arthashastra, should be pursued "with respect to traitors and unrighteous people, not with respect to others".{{sfn|Olivelle|2013|p=261}}