Simple Sabotage Field Manual
The website 404 Media hosts a popular, more legible PDF version of the “Simple Sabotage Field Manual,” a World War II era guide originally created by the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) to train ordinary citizens in acts of simple sabotage against fascist regimes. This manual was declassified by the CIA in 2008 and describes ways to annoy and disrupt enemy operations through everyday acts that do not require special equipment or training.
The manual surged in popularity recently, becoming one of the most accessed books on Project Gutenberg, with over 230,000 downloads in 30 days, reflecting renewed interest in its tactics for resistance and sabotage. The PDF version shared by 404 Media was reformatted by a reader to be more readable and searchable, improving on an older, blurry CIA release.
The guide includes tactics for disrupting bureaucratic work, lowering morale, creating confusion, and more direct acts of physical sabotage, targeting roles like telephone operators, train conductors, managers, employees, and even movie theater patrons. The guide emphasizes simple, low-risk actions that ordinary people can take to resist oppressive systems or administrations.
You can find the reformatted PDF through 404 Media, which shares it openly to allow wider access and use. The manual's resurgence has been linked to current sentiments about organizational and governmental frustrations, inspiring some to explore these historical sabotage tactics as subtle acts of resistance.[4][6][8]