Why didn't Picard ask to see Crusher when Lemec had him?

Question

Morbid question. In Chain of Command part 2, when Gul Lemec was torturing Picard, he pretended to give up and told Picard he can go. Just before he went through the door Lemec said he will try to get the information from "the female" Dr. Crusher (this of course was a lie as Dr. Crusher escaped). Picard then said he would stay. I always found it daft of Picard :

1) He did not know if Lemec had indeed captured her, and if he did, that she was still alive.

2) Technically Lemec never said he would release her if Picard stayed (given Picard's negotiation skills I could perfectly see him saying "let her go and I'll stay").

Even given Picard's weakened state, this did seem like a big oversight. If Picard requested to see Crusher I can't possibly imagine how Lemec could trick him.

Furthermore, I don't see why Picard thought that him staying there would prevent Lemec from torturing Dr.Crusher.

Answer 1

As to why he did not ask to see Dr. Crusher, presumably either it did not occur to him (he was not exactly in the best of mental states) or because he assumed (rightly) that Lemec would simply refuse him (if Lemec did have Crusher, he would want to avoid anything that might give Picard hope, allowing him to better resist torture. And, of course, Lemec wouldn't want to show Picard a false show for fear that Picard would recognize it and similarly be fortified against further torture). As to why he did not bargain, that would likely be because it would open up a crack in his resistance.

Ideally, I'd quote from a manual discussing proper military RTI here, but they don't typically publish those. Nevertheless, one of the principles is to not bargain with your captors, but rather to continue to resist and only provide the standard name, rank, and ID number. If Picard had tried to negotiate with them for Crusher's release, he would be indicating to them (and to himself) that he has a point of compromise that they can exploit.