"Challenges Facing the CIA"
Michael V. Hayden, Director of the CIA
September 17, 2008

Today, we routinely use kinetic force not just for its own effect, but to create a response that will allow us to collect more intelligence. We use military operations to excite the enemy, prompting him to respond. We create and benefit from a highly virtuous cycle: Operations generate opportunities to learn more about the enemy, the intelligence gained creates opportunities for follow-on operations, and so on.

Note that the man did not use the word "tickle". That, evidently, is a media fabrication. The mainstream media is, in fact, so full of such fabrications as to severely limit its value as a source of intelligence.