The American Alphabet Intel Agencies have exceeded their mandate
(as in their purpose to exist on the taxpayer dime). For me this
is disturbing because most of the Alphabets are authorized to use lethal force in
the execution of their various agendas. When an Alphabet Agenda is not
compliant to the Constitutional Rights of American citizens or is resistant to
the duly elected President, there is a HUGE bureaucratic Deep State problem for
American citizens whose taxes support these Alphabet Agencies.
Frankly, ending the American Alphabet Intel agencies would
not benefit American National Interests. WHY? Because ALL foreign nations have
their own Intel Services and the more powerful foreign nations spy on the USA
as much if not more than the USA spies on them.
What is needed in the USA is a top-down purge of
anti-Constitution criminals and anti-American Leftists-Globalists. THEN a
reform that replaces the purged with those who honor and follow the
Constitution and the WE-THE-PEOPLE governed taxpayers.
I’m going to share three posts the focus on the nefarious
actions of the CIA in particular. The history of CIA human experimentation in
the name of Intelligence and a creepy version of National Security is
disturbing.
Some of these shares are critical CIA actions on foreign
soil. I on the other hand think twice about foreign Intel operations such as
influencing foreign elections that benefit the USA or getting rid of bad actors
that are proven enemies of America and Americans. HOWEVER, conducting human
experiments on foreign citizens for whatever crazy reasoning is a dark-spot on
the American Republic that reflects ill on the American People. Such CIA (or
American Intel) human experimentation should be exposed, terminated and
possibly criminally prosecuted.
The third share is worth reading because there is an
insinuated connection between the Alphabet Intels and the progression of a
world-wide COVID as well as mandating the mRNA injection as a part of human
experimentation.
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A declassified, seven page document titled “Special
Research for Artichoke” has been making waves. For those unfamiliar
with Project Artichoke, it began in 1951, during the tenure of CIA director
Walter Bedell Smith and Scientific Director, Dr. H. Marshall Chadwell. The code
name “Artichoke” was inspired by New York City gangster Ciro Terranova, AKA
“the Artichoke King.”
The project was directed by Paul F. Gaynor, a former Army
Brigadier General. Gaynor kept a file of federal employees and Congressmen
suspected of being homosexuals. In 1953, John C. Montgomery, who worked for the
State Department, with access to classified information, hanged himself in his
Georgetown residence after he was informed he was on Gaynor’s list.
Under Gaynor’s direction, Project Artichoke became a vast
research project. Researchers have long suspected that the Church Committee’s
revelation of the CIA’s notorious Project MKUltra mind control experiments,
mostly using LSD, had the effect of obscuring the Agency’s much larger Project
Artichoke.
The 1951 Pont-Saint-Esprit, France mass poisoning, in which
250 residents were afflicted with severe hallucinations, was officially
attributed to ergot poisoning of bread produced in a local bakery.
Investigative journalist Hank P. Albarelli Jr. has presented evidence that the
poisoning was a Project Artichoke experiment.
The recently published document titled “Special Research for
Artichoke” is consistent with the suspicion that the CIA was seeking to
discover mind control methods for even large populations. Especially chilling
is the document’s assertion, “This type of [mind control] drug should also be
capable of use in standard medical treatments such as vaccinations, shots,
etc.”
Equally disturbing was the Project’s investigation of using
viruses, including dengue fever, as incapacitating agents, both short-term and
long-term, for individuals or populations.
As I discuss in my forthcoming book, Mind
Viruses: America’s Irrational Obsessions, it far from clear
that the Church Committee hearings of 1975 put a complete end to CIA covert
programs such as Mockingbird (for using American journalists as propagandists)
and Artichoke (for chemical and biological mind control). The laboratory
creation of SARS-CoV-2, with Gain-of-Function techniques developed at UNC
Chapel Hill, and the US military’s involvement in developing and distributing
of mRNA COVID-19 vaccines, should therefore be regarded as possible
outgrowths or even continuations of Project Artichoke. [Blog Editor Bold Text
Emphasis]
Though I have no evidence, I would not be surprised if
Project Artichoke explored ways to lower testosterone among American males,
which has happened at an alarming rate over the last few decades. A 2020 study
published by Patel, Fantus, et al. found that testosterone levels have markedly
declined—not only among older males, but also among adolescent and young adult
men (AYA), with a deficiency prevalence of 10%-40% among adult males, and 20%
among AYA men aged 15-39 years.
Lowering testosterone would be be an effective way for the
government and its creepy intelligence agency to make American men more docile,
lethargic, and less able to think clearly.
List of 15 CIA-related conspiracy theories that were once
dismissed as paranoid speculation but later confirmed through declassified
documents, Church Committee (1975) hearings, Rockefeller Commission reports,
FOIA releases, the CIA’s own “Family Jewels” compilation (declassified in
2007), inspector general investigations, or official admissions. These
represent programs or operations where substantial evidence shows they
occurred, often illegally or unethically.I’ve expanded beyond the initial
examples, drawing from primary sources like CIA FOIA records, congressional
reports, and historical analyses. Many involved violations of the CIA’s charter
(prohibiting domestic activities) or international law.
1. Project MKUltra (and Subprojects like
ARTICHOKE, BLUEBIRD)
Secret mind-control experiments using LSD, hypnosis, sensory deprivation,
electroshock, and other methods on unwitting subjects (including U.S. and
Canadian citizens, prisoners, and mental patients).
Evidence: Declassified in the 1970s via Church Committee hearings; surviving
documents (after most were destroyed in 1973) detail over 149 subprojects at
universities, hospitals, and prisons. Confirmed non-consensual dosing,
including on CIA employees and the public.
2.MKNAOMI (Biological/Chemical Weapons
Stockpiling)
Joint CIA-Army program to develop, store, and weaponize biological agents
(toxins, incapacitants) and delivery devices for covert use.
Evidence: Declassified documents
from Church Committee and FOIA show stockpiles at Fort Detrick; included
shellfish toxin for assassinations. Program ran 1950s–1970s until Nixon banned
biological weapons in 1969.
3.Operation CHAOS (MHCHAOS)
Domestic surveillance of anti-war activists, dissidents, and U.S. citizens to
find foreign influence links (e.g., Vietnam protesters, civil rights groups).
Evidence: Exposed by Seymour
Hersh (1974 NYT article); confirmed in Church Committee reports. CIA compiled
files on over 300,000 Americans, wiretapped journalists, and infiltrated
groups—violating its charter.
4.Operation Mockingbird
CIA recruitment of journalists and infiltration of media to plant propaganda
and influence U.S. public opinion.
Evidence: Church Committee confirmed relationships with reporters at major
outlets (e.g., CBS, Washington Post); used for domestic propaganda during Cold
War.
5.Assassination Plots Against Foreign
Leaders
Multiple attempts on Fidel Castro (poisoned cigars, exploding devices), Patrice
Lumumba, Rafael Trujillo, Ngo Dinh Diem, and others.
Evidence: Church Committee
detailed plots; “Family Jewels” and declassified memos confirm “executive
action” capabilities, including the “heart attack gun” demonstrated in 1975
hearings.
6.Operation Paperclip
Recruiting Nazi scientists and war criminals for U.S. intelligence, rocketry,
and other programs post-WWII.
Evidence: Declassified State Department/CIA files show ~1,600 Germans (e.g.,
Wernher von Braun) brought in with records sanitized.
7.1953 Iranian Coup (Operation Ajax)
Overthrow of Prime Minister Mossadegh to install the Shah.
Evidence: CIA declassified its own history in 2013 (after earlier admissions);
involved propaganda, bribes, and engineered riots.
8.1954 Guatemalan Coup (Operation PBSuccess)
Overthrow of President Arbenz.
Evidence: Declassified CIA files detail psychological warfare, radio
propaganda, and paramilitary support.
9.Operation Condor
CIA-backed coordination among South American dictatorships for assassinations
and disappearances of leftists (1970s–1980s).
Evidence: Declassified cables
and Church Committee follow-ups; U.S. provided intelligence and training.
10.Phoenix Program (Vietnam)
Counterinsurgency involving infiltration, torture, and assassination of
suspected Viet Cong.
Evidence: Declassified records and congressional testimony; “neutralized” tens
of thousands.
11.Operation Popeye (Weather Modification)
Cloud seeding to extend monsoons and disrupt North Vietnamese supply lines.
Evidence: Declassified
Pentagon/CIA documents; banned by international treaty in 1977.
12.Funding Tibetan Resistance and Dalai Lama
CIA payments and training for anti-China guerrillas.
Evidence: Declassified budgets show ~$180,000/year to Dalai Lama in 1960s.
13.Family Jewels Compilation
Internal 1973 CIA dossier admitting illegal activities (e.g., wiretapping
journalists, domestic surveillance, confinement of defector Yuri Nosenko).
Evidence: Fully declassified in
2007; includes plots against Castro and media manipulation.
14.Project Stargate (Remote Viewing/Psychic
Spying)
Experiments in psychic phenomena for intelligence (less “conspiratorial” but
once fringe-sounding).
Evidence: Declassified in 1995;
ran 1970s–1990s.
15.Acoustic Kitty (Spy Cat Project)
Implanting microphones in cats for surveillance.
Evidence: Declassified “Family
Jewels” and CIA memos; project failed but existed.
These are among the most solidly documented cases—many
exposed only after leaks, whistleblowers, or mandatory declassifications
decades later. The CIA’s destruction of records (e.g., most MKUltra files)
means some details remain incomplete, but the core existence and scope are
confirmed by official U.S. government sources.
The U.S. government secretly pumped “mind control drugs”
into millions of vaccines taken by members of the public, according to a newly
leaked CIA document.
The seven-page document, “Special Research for Artichoke,” is dated April 23,
1952. It describes a series of ideas for how to develop chemicals designed to
alter human behavior and thought.
Infowars.com reports: The proposals contained in
the document were part of the CIA’s top-secret Project
Artichoke, which ran from 1951 to 1956, according to The
Daily Mail.
The document, declassified in 1983, recently circulated on
social media. However, it was not published in the CIA’s online reading room
until last year.
“Some of the suggestions are controversial,” the document
states. The proposals included administering drugs in secret as part of a
“long-range approach to subjects.”
According to the document:
“This study should include chemicals or drugs that can
effectively be concealed in common items such as food, water, coca cola, beer,
liquor, cigarettes, etc.
“This type of drug should also be capable of use in standard
medical treatments such as vaccinations, shots, etc.”
CIA experimented on humans as part of Project Artichoke
The document also included a special field of research for
“bacteria, plant cultures, fungi, poisons of various types, etc.,” that are
“capable of producing illnesses which in turn would produce high fevers,
delirium, etc.”
This included “species of the mushroom” that “produce a
certain type of intoxication and mental derangement.”
Also among the proposals was a suggestion to research “diet”
or “dietary deficiencies” on prisoners and on people undergoing interrogation,
including using “specially canned foods having elements removed.”
The document included proposals for both short-term and
long-term use on humans. Drugs deemed most suitable for long-term use would be
designed to produce an “agitating effect (producing anxiety, nervousness,
tension, etc.) or a depressing effect (creating a feeling of despondency,
hopelessness, lethargy, etc.).”
According to The Daily Mail, the CIA experimented on humans
as part of Project Artichoke. The experiments often involved “vulnerable
subjects, including prisoners, military personnel and psychiatric patients.”
The experiments were usually performed “without informed consent.”
According to Ben Tapper, a Nebraska chiropractor who was
included in the “Disinformation
Dozen” list in 2021 for questioning vaccine safety, the document
exposes “a disturbing reality that government agencies have historically
explored ways to manipulate human behavior through chemical and biological
means, including concepts involving food and medical interventions.”
“This is not speculation or conspiracy, and it should deeply
concern every American who values bodily autonomy and informed consent,” Tapper
said.
Precursor to the CIA’s MK-Ultra mind control experiments?
The Daily Mail cited CIA
documents suggesting that U.S. intelligence agencies were
concerned that enemy nations had developed their own mind and behavioral
control techniques. This led the agency to prioritize the development of its
own methods.
Project Artichoke “served as a precursor” to the MK-Ultra program,
which the CIA launched in 1953. That program “broadened mind-altering
experiments on a larger scale,” The Daily Mail reported.
Many of the documents related to this type of
experimentation were destroyed in 1973, “leaving the full extent of the
research and how far it progressed unknown.”
Naomi Wolf, Ph.D., CEO of Daily Clout and author of “The
Pfizer Papers: Pfizer’s Crimes Against Humanity,” told The Defender that
the documents further confirm a long history of intelligence agency research
targeting human thought and behavior.
“Sadly, it’s long been established that our intelligence
agencies, and those of our enemies, have sought to alter human consciousness
and behavior, often without the subjects’ consent. The existence of MK-Ultra,
the clandestine project into which Project Artichoke evolved, is well
documented,” Wolf said.
John
Leake, vice president of the McCullough Foundation and author of
the forthcoming book, “Mind Viruses: America’s Irrational Obsessions,”
said, “Researchers have long suspected that the Church
Committee’s revelation of the CIA’s notorious MK-Ultra mind control
experiments, mostly using LSD, had the effect of obscuring the agency’s much
larger Project Artichoke.”
Leake cited evidence suggesting that a 1951 mass poisoning in
Pont-Saint-Esprit, France, in which 250 residents experienced
severe hallucinations and seven people died, was a Project Artichoke
experiment. The outbreak was officially attributed to contaminated bread from a
local bakery.
Leake said the 1952 document is “consistent with the
suspicion that the CIA was seeking to discover mind control methods for even
large populations.”
In 2024, a Reuters
investigation revealed that the CIA operated a secret
propaganda campaign involving vaccines in
the Philippines. The campaign attacked what the agency perceived as China’s
“growing influence” in the country by targeting the Chinese-made Sinovac
COVID-19 vaccine through the use of phony online accounts spreading “anti-vax”
messaging.
Michael
Rectenwald, Ph.D., author of “The Great Reset and the Struggle
for Liberty: Unraveling the Global Agenda,” said the
Project Artichoke revelations “make it clear that the CIA has posed an enormous
threat to U.S. citizens, in addition to the horrors it unleashes on non-U.S.
target governments and populations.”
Project Artichoke wanted to enlist help from Army’s
Chemical Warfare Service
The 1952 Project Artichoke document also included a
recommendation to involve the U.S. Army Chemical Warfare Service in the
project’s efforts, citing its experience with “exhaustive studies along these
lines.”
This proposal bears a resemblance to recent suggestions
that COVID-19 —
and the response to the pandemic — were coordinated at high levels of
government, military and
intelligence agencies.
Last year, former pharmaceutical research and development
executive Sasha
Latypova and retired science writer Debbie Lerman released
the “Covid
Dossier,” presenting evidence of the “military/intelligence
coordination of the Covid biodefense response in the US, UK,
Australia, Canada, the Netherlands, Germany, and Italy.”
According to Latypova and Lerman, “Covid was not a public
health event” but “a global operation,
coordinated through public-private intelligence and military alliances and
invoking laws designed for CBRN (chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear)
weapons attacks.”
Leake said “it is far from clear” that the Church Committee
hearings of 1975 “put a complete end to CIA covert programs.” He cited the
possible laboratory
development of the SARS-CoV-2 virus as an example.
Experts question similarities between Project Artichoke,
COVID vaccines
In a Substack post today, epidemiologist Nicolas
Hulscher drew a potential connection between Project Artichoke
and the development of COVID-19 vaccines. Hulscher cited recent peer-reviewed
studies that identified the vaccines’ adverse impact on neurological health and
“surging
rates of cognitive decline.”
Hulscher wrote:
“Disturbingly, since 2021, over 70% of humanity received a
neurotoxic agent masquerading as a ‘vaccine.’ The same goals outlined in the
CIA document (vaccines/drugs capable of covertly inducing anxiety, depression,
and lethargy) are now being observed in COVID-19 vaccinated populations. …
“… If the CIA was secretly discussing covert methods to
alter human behavior in the 1950s, it would be no surprise if similar
classified projects emerged in the decades that followed.”
A 2024 paper published in the journal Molecular Psychiatry investigated
psychiatric adverse events among over 2 million people in South Korea. The
study found that “COVID-19 vaccination increased the risks of depression,
anxiety, dissociative, stress-related, and somatoform disorders, and sleep
disorders while reducing the risk of schizophrenia and bipolar disorder.”
A 2025 study published in the International
Journal of Innovative Research in Medical Science found
“alarming safety signals regarding neuropsychiatric conditions following
COVID-19 vaccination, compared to the influenza vaccinations and to all other
vaccinations combined.”
This included increases in schizophrenia, depression,
cognitive decline, delusions, violent behavior, suicidal thoughts and homicidal
ideation.
“The fact that mRNA vaccines were designed to cross the
blood-brain barrier and inflame the brain — or at least, they were known to do
so, during their manufacture and distribution — should give us pause in light
of this news,” Wolf said.
Wolf said the latest revelations, “while shocking, provide
all the more reason for us to be critical of opaque, coercive or untested vaccination programs,
additives in food and water, and toxic or opaque geoengineering programs.”
Tapper said the revelations reinforce “the urgent need to
protect individual liberty, medical freedom, and ethical boundaries in science
and public health.”
“The lesson here is simple: vigilance is necessary when
governments claim authority over the human body and mind,” Tapper said.
[Blog Editor: At this point The People’s Voice
inserts a 16-Minute video which to me seems unrelated to the CIA-Project
Artichoke subject matter. YET my readers might find the video of interest so I’m
sharing the video title with the embedded link below.]
Having cut his
teeth in the mainstream media, including stints at the BBC, Sean witnessed the
corruption within the system and developed a burning desire to expose the
secrets that protect the elite and allow them to continue waging war on
humanity. Disturbed by the agenda of the elites and dissatisfied with the
alternative media, Sean decided it was time to shake things up. Knight of
Joseon (https://joseon.com)
I actually ran into this information from the Telegram
Channel American Thinker
posted there on 12/28/25.
The Telegram Channel essentially cross posted the first page of a Google Site
that posted Chapter 4 (“BLUEBIRD and ARTICHOKE”) of the book by Colin A. Ross, M.D. entitled “BLUEBIRD: Deliberate
Creation of Multiple Personality by Psychiatrists”.
“In BLUEBIRD: Deliberate
Creation of Multiple Personality by Psychiatrists, Dr. Ross provides proof,
based on 15,000 pages of documents obtained from the CIA under the Freedom of
Information Act, that the Manchurian Candidate is fact, not fiction. He
describes the experiments conducted by psychiatrists to create amnesia, new
identities, hypnotic access codes, and new memories in the minds of
experimental subjects.
The funding of the experiments
by the CIA, Army, Navy, and Air Force is proven from CIA documents and the
doctors' own publications. BLUEBIRD proves that there was extensive political
abuse of psychiatry in North America throughout the second half of the
twentieth century, perpetrated not by a few renegade doctors, but by leading
psychiatrists, psychologists, pharmacologists, neurosurgeons and medical
schools.”
“Colin A. Ross, M.D. received
his degree from the University of Alberta in 1981 and completed his psychiatry
training at the University of Manitoba in 1985. Dr. Ross is an internationally
renowned clinician, researcher, author and lecturer in the field of traumatic
stress and trauma related disorders. He is the founder and President of The
Colin A. Ross Institute for Psychological Trauma. Besides his work at UBH
Hospital in Denton, Texas, Dr. Ross consults to Trauma Programs at Forest View
Hospital in Grand Rapids, Michigan and Del Amo Hospital in Torrance California.
He has authored over 200 professional papers and 28 books. He has reviewed for
numerous professional journals and is a Past President of the International
Society for the Study of Trauma and Dissociation. In addition, Dr. Ross has
served as expert witness in over 50 court cases, consulted on several cable,
movie and video productions and has produced six educational DVD's and CD's for
mental health professionals on the treatment of trauma based disorders. Visit
his web site at https://www.rossinst.com/.
The video posted on this page is
the first five minutes of a 56-minute film produced by Dr. Ross, which is
narrated by Chris Costner Sizemore, the Real Eve of The Three Faces of Eve. Dr.
Ross has just released an updated version of his biography of Chris Sizemore
under a new title, The Control of Eve.”
I tried to locate the 56-Minute video mentioned in the Dr.
Ross bio but a cursory search turned up empty. The actual “Eve” was revealed as
Chris Costner Sizemore who passed away in 2016. Dr. Ross posted a 2017
Youtube video (5:06-Minutes) in her memory:
In Memoriam Chris Costner
Sizemore The Real Eve of "The Three Faces of Eve" April 4, 1927 -
July 24, 2016.
Dr. Ross has posted this video
in memory of Chris Costner Sizemore, the real Eve of The Three Faces of Eve,
who died on July 24, 2016. Chris Sizemore was a highly gifted painter, had been
integrated for four decades, and made many contributions to the mental health
field as a speaker.
As Chapter 4 of “Bluebird” demonstrates, Psychiatrists and Physicians
fully cooperated with elements of the CIA with human experimentation to
brainwash and brain-wipe individuals to manufacture there own versions of
Communist Manchurian Candidates to compete with then Communist Soviet Union and
still around Chinese Communist Party (CCP) controlled China. The timeframe of
Chapter 4 ranges from the 1950s through the 1970s. A period of time when a
majority of Americans typically trusted their government, the medical
profession and news media.
The recent COVID Plandemic should prove variations of past
CIA and American Intelligence agencies are still manipulating Americans beyond
their Congressional mandates and especially contrary to the U.S. Constitution.
SO, READ “BLUEBIRD” CHAPTER FOUR and be wary of who and what
to believe when it comes to your Individual Liberty.
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BLUEBIRD is the cryptonym for a CIA mind control program
that ran from 1951 to 1953. Other mind control programs include ARTICHOKE,
MKULTRA, and MKSEARCH. The purpose of the book BLUEBIRDis to
prove that the military and the CIA have been creating “Manchurian Candidates”
for operational use since the second world war. This fact is described
repeatedly by G.H. Estabrooks and in CIA documents on BLUEBIRD and ARTICHOKE
obtained through the Freedom of Information Act.
By research at the medical school library, ordering
out-of-print books, and requests filed through the Freedom of Information Act,
Dr. Ross has built up compelling documentation of the fact that
the CIA and military intelligence agencies have been creating multiple
personality experimentally, and using these subjects in courier and
infiltration operations.
The Appendices to BLUEBIRD provide full proof of the
fact that the “Manchurian Candidate” is real, and has been created by the CIA
and military. The documented mind control research includes putting brain
electrodes in children as young as 11 years old and controlling their behavior
from remote transmitters; giving 150 mcg of LSD per day to children age 7-11
for weeks and months at a time; building safe houses where CIA personnel
watched prostitutes turn tricks with customers — the prostitutes gave their
customers LSD without the customers’ knowledge; wiping out memories with
electric shock, and using animals with implanted brain electrodes as delivery
systems for chemical and biological weapons.
A complete listing of MKULTRA Subprojects, correspondence
between Estabrooks and J. Edgar Hoover and other documents are included in the
Appendices to BLUEBIRD.[Note:1]
Synopsis
In BLUEBIRD: Deliberate Creation of Multiple Personality
by Psychiatrists, Dr. Ross provides proof, based on 15,000 pages of
documents obtained from the CIA under the Freedom of Information Act, that the
“Manchurian Candidate” is fact, not fiction. He describes the experiments
conducted by psychiatrists to create amnesia, new identities, hypnotic access
codes, and new memories in the minds of experimental subjects.
The funding of the experiments by the CIA, Army, Navy, and
Air Force is proven from CIA documents and the doctors’ own publications. BLUEBIRD
proves that there was extensive political abuse of psychiatry in North America
throughout the second half of the twentieth century, perpetrated not by a few
renegade doctors, but by leading psychiatrists, psychologists, pharmacologists,
neurosurgeons and medical schools.[Note:2]
BLUEBIRD was approved by Roscoe Hillenkoetter, Director of
the CIA, on April 20, 1950. In August 1951, the Project was renamed ARTICHOKE.
The Korean War began in June, 1950. The CIA already had mind control programs
in operation prior to the Korean War, therefore such programs were not a
defensive reaction to the activities of the North Koreans, Russians, or
Communist Chinese during the Korean War, as claimed by CIA career officer
Edward Hunter.136 BLUEBIRD and ARTICHOKE included a great deal of work on the
creation of amnesia, hypnotic couriers and the Manchurian Candidate.66 184
The Manchurian Candidate is generally regarded as fiction.
However, ARTICHOKE documents prove that hypnotic couriers functioned
effectively in real-life simulations conducted by the CIA in the early 1950’s.
The degree to which such individuals were used in actual operations is still
classified. Physicians were an integral part of the ARTICHOKE Team that
conducted interrogations on U.S. soil. These interrogations were in part
designed to detect mind-controlled agents of other Agencies and governments. The
documents establish that Manchurian Candidate-related methods were part of CIA
counter-intelligence work in the 1950’s.
The basic premise of the book The Manchurian Candidate66
is that a group of American POWs in the Korean War is brainwashed while
crossing through Manchuria to freedom. They arrive back in the U.S. amnesic for
the period of brainwashing and one of them has been programmed to be an
assassin. His target is a candidate for President of the United States. His
handlers at home control him with a hypnotically implanted trigger, a
particular playing card.
A MEMORANDUM dated 15 July 1953 from the Chief,
Bio-Chemistry & Pharmacology Branch, Medicine Division OSI [Office of
Scientific Intelligence] to the Chief, Technical Branch, SO [Special
Operations] includes a paragraph summarizing discussions about recently
returned Korean War POWs who had been brainwashed:
Following this [whited out] commented
on the very interesting angle that interrogations of the individuals who had
come out of North Korea across the Soviet Union to freedom recently had
apparently had a “blank” period or period of disorientation while passing
through a special zone in Manchuria. [Whited out] pointed out that this had
occurred in all individuals in the party after they had had their first full
meal and their first coffee on the way to freedom. [Whited out] pointed out
that [whited out] was attempting to secure further confirmatory facts in this
matter since drugging was indicated.
In another memo dated 17 September 1953 the Scientific
Adviser, Scientific Intelligence states that, “Detailed and valuable
information has been obtained by [whited out] on “Big Switch” as a result of
his interrogations of POW’s on the return voyage from Korea.” “Big Switch” was
the code name for a prisoner exchange program during the Korean War;
repatriated American prisoners of war released in Big Switch were interviewed
by American psychiatrists including Robert Lifton,163 Lifton writes:
... I arrived in Hong Kong in
late January, 1954. Just a few months before, I had taken part in the
psychiatric evaluation of repatriated American prisoners of war during the
exchange operations in Korea known as BigSwitch: I had then
accompanied a group of these men on the troopship back to the United States.
It appears that American psychiatrists including or known to
Robert Lifton, Louis Jolyon West and Margaret Singer must have been
knowledgeable about the Chinese Manchurian Candidate program by 1953.
According to my definition, the Manchurian Candidate is an
experimentally created dissociative identity disorder that meets the following
four criteria:
●Created deliberately
●A new identity is implanted
●Amnesia barriers are created
●Used in simulated or actual operations
BLUEBIRD and ARTICHOKE were administered in a compartmented
fashion. The details of the Programs were kept secret even from other
personnel within the CIA. When asked why LSD research done under ARTICHOKE was
hidden from the CIA Committee in charge of ARTICHOKE, Sydney Gottlieb, 1977,
(page 410), Chief, Medical Staff, Technical Services Division, CIA responded,
“I imagine the only reason would have been concern for broadening awareness of
its existence.”
The creation of Manchurian Candidates by the CIA was
probably not subject to the usual chain of operational command. Such breaches
in the chain of command are an inherent structural risk of the compartmented
nature of intelligence agencies. For security reasons, CIA operations
including internal counter-intelligence investigations182 are routinely kept
secret from other divisions of the CIA. Although effective intelligence work
could not be carried out without compartmentation, the structure makes it
easier for CIA officers in charge of mind control to contract with unethical
doctors.
Loss of central control occurred in the CIA’s OPERATION
CHAOS and probably in BLUEBIRD and ARTICHOKE. OPERATION CHAOS was a CIA program
designed to collect information on foreign influence on student and civil
unrest in the United States. It was created by the Director of the CIA in 1967
and ran until 1974. CHAOS developed files on 7,200 American citizens, and the
files included mention of a total of 300,000 named U.S. citizens and
organizations, all of which were entered into a computerized index (Rockefeller,
1975).
CHAOS intelligence generated 3,500 internal CIA memoranda,
3,000 memoranda for the FBI, and 37 for distribution to the White House and
other top levels of government. The maximum CHAOS staff was 52 persons in 1971.
Informants were recruited from student and dissident groups, and were
instructed to infiltrate such groups in the United States.
According to the Report to the President by the
Commission on CIA Activities (Rockefeller, 1975):
The isolation ofOperation
CHAOS within the CIA and its independence from supervision by the regular chain
ofcommand within the clandestine services made it possible for the
activities ofthe Operation to stray over the bounds ofthe
Agency’s authority without the knowledge of senior officials. The absence of
any regular review of these activities prevented timely correction ofsuch
missteps as did occur.
In other instances, senior administrators within the CIA
participated in plausible denial and other disinformation and cover-up
strategies concerning CIA operations run on U.S. soil. Like the activities of
the ARTICHOKE Team within the United States, such operations had to be kept
secret because the CIA was prohibited by its Charter from carrying out
operations in the United States.
In 1952, the CIA began to survey mail between the U.S. and
the Soviet Union at a New York postal facility. In 1953 it began to open and
read mail (Rockefeller, 1975). The Program was approved by the Director of the
CIA and at least three Postmasters General, Summerfield, Day, and Blount, as
well as by Attorney General Mitchell. From 1958 to 1973, the FBI received
57,000 pieces of mail from the CIA in this Program. In the final year of the
operation, out of 4,350,000 pieces of mail between the U.S. and Soviet Union,
the CIA examined the outside of 2,300,000 pieces, photographed 33,000 and
opened 8,700.
Smaller mail intercept operations were run in San Francisco
from 1969 to 1971, in Hawaii from 1954 to 1955, and in New Orleans in 1957. The
CIA’s strategy for dealing with leaks about the Program is described in a
February 1, 1962 memo sent from the Deputy Chief of Counterintelligence to the
Director of Security:
Unless the charge is supported
by the presentation of interior items from the project, it should be relatively
easy to “hush up” the entire affair; or to explain that it consists of legal
mail cover activities conducted by the Post Office at the request of authorized
Federal Agencies. Under the most unfavorable circumstances, including the
support of charges with interior items from the project it might become
necessary, after the matter has cooled off during an extended period of
investigation, to find a scapegoat to blame for unauthorized tampering with the
mails.
The BLUEBIRD and ARTICHOKE documents available through the
Freedom of Information Act, like all such documents, are heavily redacted. A
great deal of text has been whited out, and other documents must still be
entirely classified. Nevertheless, the available documents prove that ARTICHOKE
operations involving physicians were carried out on U.S. soil at least until
the mid-1950’s.
A memo to the Director of Security of the CIA is entitled a
“report of ARTICHOKE Operations, 20 to 23 January, 1955” (see Appendix B).
Paragraph two of the memo states that “these operations were the first
ARTICHOKE operations undertaken in the United States.”
The operation described in the memo involved the
interrogation of a foreign national CIA agent who “speaks and understands
English quite well.” The Subject had previously provided high quality
intelligence through penetration actions carried out in an unspecified country.
The purpose of the ARTICHOKE Team’s interrogation was to provide confirmation
that the Subject was not a double agent.
The ARTICHOKE Team must have been under the command of James
Angleton, who was Chief of the CIA Counterintelligence Staff from December
1954, until 1974. Angleton was also involved in MKULTRA, as described in an
article in the February 18, 1979 Wilmington Sunday News Journal entitled
“UD prof helps concoct ‘mind control’ potions.” The article focuses on MKULTRA
Subproject 51 contractor James Moore, a chemistry professor at the University
of Delaware, but mentions Angleton’s involvement in MKULTRA. Angleton’s name
appears in “a list of all persons who have been briefed on “Bluebird”,” in a 2
July 1951 MEMORANDUM; the list also identifies three future Directors of the
CIA, Allen Dulles, Richard Helms and William Webster.
The ARTICHOKE interrogation was conducted in a safe house in
the remote countryside staffed by security-cleared personnel. It was conducted
under medical cover of a routine physical and psychological assessment. The
Subject was transported to the safe house in a “covert car” which picked him up
at a secure location. At the safe house he was given a conventional
interrogation and then some whiskey. This was followed by two grams of
phenobarbital, which put him to sleep.
The next day a lie detector test was given, and the Subject
was given intravenous chemicals. Following the chemically-assisted
interrogation, according to CIA terminology, the “ARTICHOKE techniques were
applied” in three stages:
A false memory was introduced
into the Subject’s mind without his conscious control of the process, which
took 15 to 20 minutes. The procedure was repeated, this time taking 40 to 45
minutes. The procedure was repeated again with interrogation added.
The ARTICHOKE Team used medications including barbiturates,
amphetamines and scopolamine, hypnosis, interrogation, and the deliberate
introduction of false memories of the procedure. The Subject was told that part
of what he remembered was actually a dream. The ARTICHOKE Team concluded that
the procedure was successful; “the subject, although not having specific
amnesia for the ARTICHOKE treatment, nevertheless was completely confused and
memory was vague and faulty.”
CIA career officer Edward Hunter136 described the
implantation of false memories by Chinese intelligence agencies in his book Brain-Washing
in Red China. He wrote (page 11):
The Chinese masses were right in
coining the phrases brain-washing and brain-changing. There is a difference
between the two. Brain-washing is indoctrination, a comparatively simple
procedure, but brain-changing is immeasurably more sinister and complicated.
Whereas you merely have to undergo a brain-cleansing to rid yourself of“imperialist
poisons,” in order to have a brain changing you must empty your mind ofold
ideas and recollections... in a brain-changing, a person’sspecific
recollections of some past period in his life are wiped away, as completely as
if they never happened. Then, to fill these gaps in memory, the ideas which the
authorities want this person to “remember” are put into his brain. Hypnotism
and drugs and cunning pressures that plague the body and do not necessarily
require marked physical violence are required for a brain-changing. China
evidently was not so “advanced” as yet. She was using brain-washing, and when
that didn’t work, resorted to the simpler purge system. But in time she will
use the brain-changing system too.
Since, according to Hunter, the Communist Chinese had not
yet perfected the methods used by the CIA’s ARTICHOKE Team, it is evident that
his knowledge of these methods was derived from their use by American doctors.
An interrogation involving ARTICHOKE techniques and
physicians was conducted on Russian defector Yuriy Nosenko under James
Angleton’s administration.182 Angleton suspected Nosenko of being a triple
agent. A triple agent is someone who pretends to be a defector or double agent
but is actually working for his original, native country.
Nosenko was born in Nikolayev, Ukraine in 1927. He was
trained by Russian Naval Intelligence before being transferred to MVD, the
precursor of the KGB, in 1953. On June 5, 1962 Nosenko made secret contact with
a U.S. State Department official in Geneva, a meeting which resulted in his
being recruited by the CIA as a mole. Nosenko provided a rich fund of
intelligence information to the CIA until he defected in February, 1964.
Angleton thought that Nosenko had been feeding the CIA a
little bit of real information in order to cover up the fact that he was a
triple agent. In late March, 1964 a decision was made to apply ARTICHOKE-like
techniques to him. Whether these were administered under ARTICHOKE or some
other still-classified cryptonym is unknown.
Nosenko was strip-searched, given a lie detector test and
then placed in solitary confinement in a 10 foot by 10 foot cell in a safe
house in Washington for sixteen months. One of his interrogators was Dr. John
Gittinger, the lead psychologist for MKULTRA, who describes taking LSD himself
in a documentary film.210 From April 4, 1964 to August 13, 1965, Nosenko was
held at the safe house and subjected to repeated interrogations.
From August 14, 1965 to October 28, 1967 Nosenko was held in
solitary confinement in a tiny, windowless concrete cell at the CIA’s training
facility at Camp Peary, Virginia. He was subjected to sleep and food
deprivation and there was neither heat nor air conditioning in his cell. He was
monitored by closed-circuit television 24 hours a day.
In an interview with Tom Mangold177 on June 12, 1990, John
Gittinger described being asked by CIA personnel to administer LSD to Nosenko.
Gittinger claimed he did not do so. Nosenko, however, described being drugged
on a number of occasions at Camp Peary. Due to administrative changes inside
the CIA, Nosenko was released from confinement in 1967 and later became a U.S.
citizen.
Whoever the Nosenko interrogators were, and whatever
cryptonym they worked under, it is clear that physicians and mind control
specialists were directly involved. It is also clear that the actions of these
physicians were unethical and inhumane. The BLUEBIRD and ARTICHOKE documents
prove that the Nosenko interrogation was not an isolated incident. If such an
interrogation was conducted by physicians in a third world country it would be
decried as a human rights violation and a political abuse of psychiatry. We
have been lax as a medical profession in applying the same standards at home.
The need for applying the ARTICHOKE technique to Nosenko can
be inferred from an undated document entitled, “IMPLICATIONS OF SOVIET
SUPPLEMENTS TO STANDARD PSYCHIATRIC INTERROGATION”, which includes the
statement that:
Hypnotism appears to have
been used in some cases by the Soviets. It has the possibilities of (a)
lowering resistance against telling the truth and (b) inducing specific action
or behavior in the subject. In certain cases it would be possible for a skilled
Russian operator to bring about condition (a) yet leave the subject with no
specific recollection of having been interrogated. Under condition (b) it would
be possible to brief an American, other prisoner or person, subsequently
dispatch him on a mission, and successfully debrief him upon return home
without his recollection of the briefing or debriefing.
Another undated document entitled, “DEFENSE AGAINST SOVIET
MEDICAL INTERROGATION AND ESPIONAGE TECHNIQUES” echoes this point:
This proposed investigation
appears to be more essential when documentary evidence leads to the belief that
Russia has been conducting medical research on the subject, has actually used
various techniques, and has made provision for large scale production of
uncommon special drugs for their speech-producing effects on prisoners of war.
Adequate evidence is available
to indicate that the Soviet has used physical duress and/or a large number of
different drugs in their attempts to enhance results of standard psychiatric
interrogation.
Evidence of subconscious
isolation, amnesia, and destruction of mental function have been noted in some
of the victims of Soviet methods.
All of these methods were also employed in experiments
conducted under BLUEBIRD, ARTICHOKE, MKULTRA, MKSEARCH, MKNAOMI and other
Programs.
ARTICHOKE operations involved detailed, systematic creation
of specific amnesia barriers, new identities and hypnotically implanted codes
and triggers. An untitled ARTICHOKE document dated 7 January 1953 with a
section heading Outline of Special H Cases describes the experimental
creation of multiple personality in two nineteen-year old girls by the CIA, in
an extended series of hypnotic sessions beginning on January 9, 1952. “H” is
used as shorthand for hypnotic, hypnotized or hypnotism in these documents:
In all of these cases, these
subjects have clearly demonstrated that they can pass from a fully awake state
to a deep H controlled state via the telephone, via some very subtle signal
that cannot be detected by other persons in the room and without the other
individual being able to note the change. It has been clearly shown that
physically individuals can be induced into H by telephone, by receiving written
matter, or by the use of code, signal, or words and that control of those
hypnotized can be passed from one individual to another without great
difficulty. It has also been shown by experimentation with these girls that
they can act as unwilling couriers for information purposes and that they can
be conditioned to a point where they believe a change in identity on their part
even on the polygraph.
Another untitled ARTICHOKE document describes a series of
cases of which the following, called “Analogous Case #3,” is most compelling:
A CIA Security Office employee
was hypnotized and given a false identity. She defended it hotly, denying her
true name and rationalizing with conviction the possession of identity cards
made out to her real self. Later, having had the false identity erased by
suggestion, she was asked if she had ever heard of the name she had been
defending as her own five minutes before. She thought, shook her head and said,
“That’s a pseudo if I ever heard one.” Apparently she had a true amnesia for
the entire episode.
The creation of new identities and the detection of foreign
agents with hypnotically programmed new identities is mentioned in various
locations in the BLUEBIRD and ARTICHOKE documents. As well, deconditioning of
subjects is addressed. For instance, one document entitled, “CONDITIONING
(& Deconditioning)” states:
Jones learns to respond to
stimuli intended for a Smith, as though he were that Smith. He has been
“conditioned” to Smith, “deconditioned” to Jones.
Such trainings are integrated on
all levels, conscious and subconscious. Hypnosis can assist in
establishing the desired conditioned responses.
A C.R. (condit. resp.) is meant
to stick. It can be interfered with, or abolished, by new training in another
direction, or back to the earlier state.
Deconditioning can probably be
expedited by hypnotizing procedures. Also, a C.R. can be interfered with or
abolished by violent physical shocks (e.g., electric shocks to the brain)
although this reporter has not found a specific electric-shock procedure that
would assuredly decondition any particular kind or number of C.R.’s.
Still problematic is the use of
drugs for deconditioning. Chlorpromazine ought theoretically to have some
value, and some deconditioning effect has been produced in laboratory animals.
However, hospitalized patients taking daily doses of this drug seem to have
been deconditioned only selectively; against certain psychotic behavior. It may
be that this property is exactly what we are looking for; perhaps it could
decondition an enemy agent out of his simulated personality and back to his
real one.
It is evident from this passage that the CIA was seeking to
improve its techniques for detecting and successfully penetrating the amnesia
barriers of enemy Manchurian Candidates over five years before the book The
Manchurian Candidate66 was written.
A MEMORANDUM dated 25 January 1952 describes another case in
which problems of reconditioning and the disposal of subjects arose:
On Friday, 25 January 1952, the
writer was called to the office [whited out] for the purpose of a conference
with one [whited out] concerning the instant case.
[Whited out] explained in
substance the [whited out] case as follows: [whited out] (whose real name is [whited
out], is a 29-year old [whited out] and was the head of a small political party
based in [whited out] and ostensively working for [whited out] independence. [Whited
out] was described by [whited out] as being young, ambitious, bright
(elementary college education), a sort of “man-on-a-horse” type but a typical [whited
out] politician. According to [whited out] our people discovered that [whited
out] Intelligence Service were attempting to bribe [whited out] and make him a
double agent and [whited out] was looking with favor upon the [whited out]
offers. Accordingly, a plot was rigged in which [whited out] was told he was
going to be assassinated and as a “protection”, he was placed in custody of the
[whited out] Police who threw [whited out] into a [whited out] prison. [Whited
out] was held in the [whited out] prison for six months until the [whited out]
authorities decided that [whited out] was a nuisance and they told our people
to take him back. Since our people were unable to dispose of [whited out] they
flew him to [whited out] where, through arrangement, he was placed in a [whited
out] as a psychopathic patient. [Whited out] now has been in the [whited out]
hospital for several months and the hospital authorities now want to get him
out since he is causing a considerable trouble, bothering other patients, etc. [Whited
out] is not a psychopathic personality.
[Whited out] explained that they
can dispose of [whited out] by the simple process of sending him to a friend of
his in [whited out], and as far as they are concerned, that type of disposal is
perfectly o.k. However, because of his confinement in [whited out] prison and
his stay in [whited out] hospital, [whited out] has become very hostile toward
the [whited out] and our intelligence operations in particular. Hence [whited
out] considering an “Artichoke” approach to [whited out] to see if it would be
possible to reorient [whited out] favorably toward us. This operation, which
will necessarily involve the use of drugs is being considered by [whited out]
with a possibility that [whited out] will carry out the operation presumably at
the [whited out] hospital in [whited out] Also involved in this would be a [whited
out] interpreter who is a consultant to this Agency since neither [whited out]
[Whited out] pointed out to [whited
out] that this type of operation could only be carried out with the
authorization of Security and that, under no circumstances whatsoever, could
anyone but an authorized M.D. administer drugs to any subject of this Agency of
any type. [Whited out] pointed out that there was a strong possibility that the
military authorities would not permit their hospital to be used for this type
of work and also that a re-conditioning operation of this type might take 30-60
days. [Whited out] further pointed out that if such an operation were carried
on, Security would have to be cognizant of it, would have to be co-ordinated
into the organization and would possibly take over and run the operation
themselves since this type of work is one which Security handles.
It was agreed between [whited
out] and the writer that a conference would be laid on Monday afternoon when [whited
out] representatives and the [whited out] interpreter return from [whited out]
and their talk with [whited out] At which time, the angles would be explored
and a dispatch would be forwarded to our people in [whited out] directing them
to find out whether the [whited out] would permit such an operation and whether
the [whited out] would allow the Agency to have the use of the necessary rooms,
medical facilities, etc. as would be required for this type of operation. At
this time, it was also to be determined whether the disposal of [whited out]
could infact be laid on.
Comment:
This particular operation was
mentioned in general terms to the writer by [whited out] approximately thirty
days ago on an informal basis but no significant details were given at this
time.
While the technique that [whited
out] are considering for use in this case is not known to the writer, the
writer believes the approach will be made through the standard narco-hypnosis
technique. Re-conditioning and re-orienting an individual in such a matter, in
the opinion of the writer, cannot be accomplished easily and will require a
great deal of time and the fact that an interpreter is necessary in the case
complicates it considerably more. It is also believed that with our present
knowledge, we would have no absolute guarantee that the subject in this case
would maintain a positive friendly attitude toward us even though there is
apparently a successful response to the treatment. The writer did not suggest
to [whited out] that perhaps a total amnesia could be created by a series of
electric shocks, but merely indicated that amnesias under drug treatments were
not certain.
A document entitled, “Hypnotic Experimentation and Research,
10 February 1954” describes a simulation experiment of relevance to the
creation of Manchurian Candidate assassins:
Miss [whited out] was then
instructed (having previously expressed a fear of firearms in any fashion) that
she would use every method at her disposal to awaken Miss [whited out] (now in
a deep hypnotic sleep) and failing in this, she would pick up a pistol nearby
and fire it at Miss [whited out]. She was instructed that her rage would be so
great that she would not hesitate to “kill” [whited out] for failing to awaken.
Miss [whited out] carried out these suggestions to the letter including firing
the (unloaded pneumatic pistol) gun at [whited out] and then proceeding to fall
into a deep sleep. After proper suggestions were made, both were awakened and
expressed complete amnesia for the entire sequence. Miss [whited out] was again
handed the gun, which she refused (in an awakened state) to pick up or accept
from the operator. She expressed absolute denial that the foregoing sequence
had happened.
In another experiment described in a document entitled “SI
and H Experimentation (25 September 1951),” two of the female subjects took
part in an exercise involving the planting of a bomb. SI means “Special
Interrogations.”[Note:3] Both Subjects performed perfectly and were fully
amnesic for the exercise:
[Whited out] was instructed that
upon awakening, she would proceed to [whited out] room where she would wait at
the desk for a telephone call. Upon receiving the call, a person known as “Jim”
would engage her in normal conversation. During the course of the conversation,
this individual would mention a code word to [whited out]. When she heard this
code word she would pass into a SI trance state, but would not close her eyes
and remain perfectly normal and continue the telephone conversation. She was
told that thereafter upon conclusion of the telephone conversation, she would
then carry out the following instructions:
[Whited out] being in a complete
SI state at this time, was then told to open her eyes and was shown an electric
timing device. She was informed that this timing device was an incendiary bomb
and was then instructed how to attach and set the device. After [whited out]had indicated that she had learned how to set and attach the device, she was
told to return to a sleep state and further instructed that upon concluding of
the aforementioned conversation, she would take the timing device which was in
a briefcase and proceed to the ladies room. In the ladies room. she would be
met by a girl whom she had never seen who would identify herself by the code
word “New York”. After identifying herself, [whited out] was then to
show this individual how to attach and set the timing device and further
instructions would be given the individual by [whited out] that the timing
device was to be carried in the briefcase to [whited out] room, placed in the
nearest empty electric-light plug and concealed in the bottom, left-hand drawer
of [whited out] desk, with the device set for 82seconds and turned on.[Whited out] was further instructed to tell this other girl that as soon as
the device had been set and turned on, she was to take the briefcase, leave [whited
out] room, go to the operations room and go to the sofa and enter a deep sleep
state.[Whited out] was further instructed that after completion of
instructing the other girl and the transferring to the other girl of the
incendiary bomb, she was to return at once to the operations room, sit on the
sofa, and go into a deep sleep state.
Hypnosis was not the mind control doctors’ only method for
creation of controlled amnesia, however. Drugs, magnetic fields, sound waves,
sleep deprivation, solitary confinement and many other methods were studied
under BLUEBIRD and ARTICHOKE. The amnesia was often tested through memorization
tasks of various kinds, and experiments were conducted to amplify subjects’
memory for information hidden behind amnesia barriers. As well as being
potential couriers and infiltration agents, the subjects could function in
effect as hypnotically controlled cameras. They could enter a room or building,
memorize materials quickly, leave the building, and then be amnesic for the
entire episode. The memorized material could then be retrieved by a handler
using a previously implanted code or signal, without the amnesia being
disturbed. The research and its applications were both offensive and defensive,
as evidenced by the following untitled and undated passage from the documents:
For instance, Metrozal, which
has been very useful in shock therapy, is no longer popular because, for one
thing it produces feelings of overwhelming terror and doom prior to the
convulsion.
But terror, anxiety, worry would
be valuable for many purposes from our point of view. We have some information
(not in detail and not confirmed) that the Soviets and their satellites have
used drugs which work along these lines. Therefore, this should be studied both
from our use offensively and defensively and to find antidotes or counteracting
agents.
The many different physical means for assisting
interrogators were often combined with or amplified by hypnosis:
Quite often amnesia occurs for events just prior to the
convulsion, during the convulsion and during the post seizure state. It is
possible that hypnosis or hypnotic activity induced during the post-seizure
state might be lost in amnesia. This would be very valuable.
The fact that complex Manchurian Candidate experiments were
conducted can be inferred from an untitled February 6, 1957 document in which
the writer states that:
Since the international
situation is in its present state, I feel the need for positive action in the
military application of hypnosis is imperative. In a field such as this you
need an individual, such as myself, who has lived with the problems of hypnotism
and its military applications for many years...
Please look over the enclosed
proposal and give me your reaction. The hypnotic messenger technique is
relatively uncomplicated. There are several other projects which I could submit
to you for consideration which are, in my opinion, even more important than
this but involve much more complicated techniques.
Similarly, a MEMORANDUM from the Chief, Security Research
Staff to the Chief, Technical Branch dated 15 July 1954 states that:
The idea of a courier that has
been hypnotized is not new and Iam absolutely certain that [whited out]
did not invent this idea. We ourselves have carried out much more complex
problems than this and in a general sense I will agree that it is feasible...
[Whited out] proposal about
using hypnotized individuals as counteragents is also not new and we, ofcourse,
have discussed this many times. Whether in fact it can be demonstrated we are
not sure and it is hoped that the field tests we are working on may help us
along these lines.
Yet another document entitled “STUDIES IN THE MILITARY
APPLICATION OF HYPNOTISM: I. The Hypnotic Messenger” is a proposal for a grant
of $10,000.00 to create hypnotic messengers out of twenty selected highly
hypnotizable military personnel. The subjects would be sent to foreign
countries to deliver their messages and then would be interrogated to determine
if the amnesia barriers could be breached. Interrogation methods were to
include “use of his wife, girl friend, alcohol, amytal or even physical duress.”
Another prospective mind control doctor wrote a handwritten
note to the CIA on a ruled notepad that has been labeled “A/B 5, 264/1” by hand
by someone responsible for filing the document. “A/B” stands for
ARTICHOKE/BLUEBIRD. The document reads:
I have developed a technic which
is safe and secure (free from international censorship). It has to do with the
conditioning of our own people. Ican accomplish this as a one man job.
The method is the production of
hypnosis by means of simple oral medication. Then (with no further medication)
the hypnosis is re-enforced daily during the following three or four days.
Each individual is conditioned
against revealing any information to an enemy, even though subjected to
hypnosis or drugging. If preferable, he may be conditioned to give false
information rather than no information.
This should be repeated every
six months in each case, in order to be sure that the suggestions established
have not “worn off.”
I would be glad to go anywhere
in the world (including Korea) to accomplish this for you. I think that the
greatest security would be in my travelling as a naval flight surgeon doing
research in aviation medicine, especially with the project of “motion sickness”
in mind.
Of course I would be willing to
undertake more hazardous investigative methods if you should deem them
advisable.
Another problem addressed repeatedly in the documents is
called “The Problem of Disposal of Subjects.” Several personnel recommended the
use of lobotomies for this purpose, but according to the documents this was
rejected as too unethical and too high a negative publicity risk for the CIA.
Another document describes an alternative strategy for disposing of ARTICHOKE
subjects:
Among the important security
problems, which will be discussed in detail later and which are mentioned only
briefly now for a matter of record, were the problems of disposal of subjects
after Artichoke treatment and the important questions as to whether or not
amnesias had been obtained. In connection with Case #1, in the professional
opinion of [whited out] and as far as the writer is able to determine, a total
amnesia was produced. Disposal of Case #1 (which was not a problem of the
Artichoke team) was apparently handled as follows: Since the Artichoke
technique had shown that, from an operational point of view the subject had no
further value to the Agency, the subject was to be returned to [whited out] and
after a period of time, removed from solitary and gradually permitted to mingle
with larger and larger prison groups. Ultimately, and after a considerable
lapse of time (perhaps as much as two years), the subject would be released.
The Artichoke Team recommended some observation in this case with a later
recheck on the amnesia, if possible.
In Case #2on the
first test, an almost total amnesia was reached with the exception of the last
ten or twelve minutes of interrogation under the hypnotic technique. In the
opinion of [whited out] and as far as the writer was able to determine, a total
amnesia was produced at the end of the test on the second day after the
Artichoke treatment of sodium pentothal and Desoxyn (full medication without
hypnosis).
Again in so far as disposal ofCase #2was concerned (which was not a problem of the
Artichoke Team), disposition was apparently to be made as follows: it had been
decided that the subject would be moved as a prisoner to some place in [whited
out] and held there until any possible usefulness to anyone had completely
disappeared.
As noted above, both ofthe
subjects were [whited out] speaking only and neither subject had any working
knowledge of the English language. This, of course, involved the use of an
interpreter and, in both cases, [whited out] the case officer involved in Case
#1, acted as a general interpreter and [whited out] acted as a specific
interpreter in the application of the hypnotic technique (under the direct
guidance of [whited out] in hypnotic matters) and also acted as general
interpreter in both cases.
Physicians including psychiatrists were directly involved in
all of the ARTICHOKE team operations. Documents refer to psychiatrists “of
considerable note” who were professors at prominent medical schools, who had
TOP SECRET CIA clearance and who were involved as consultants on the
development of the ARTICHOKE techniques. Insummarizing the role of
physicians in providing cover for ARTICHOKE interrogations, a writer stated
that:
At the present time, the use of
a carefully laid on medical cover to obtain either a narco-interrogation or
narco-hypnotic interrogation appears to be the best weapon presently available.
It is not necessary to gointo detail as to how this is done but
experience indicates it is our best technique.
The use of electric shock to the brain for creation of
amnesia, and amplification of the amnesia with hypnosis were discussed by the
author of an ARTICHOKE document dated 3 December 1951:
Immediately after the conference
on Friday, 30 November 1951, [whited out] succeeded in finding [whited out] and
[whited out], and the writer discussed electric-shock devices and certain
related matters from about 3:30 to 4:45 with [whited out].
[Whited out] is reported to be
an authority on electric shock. He is a professor at the Medical School of the [whited
out] and, in addition, is a psychiatrist of considerable note. Pro-[whited out]
is, in addition, a fully cleared Agency consultant.
[Whited out] explained that he
felt that electric shock might be of considerable interest to the “Artichoke”
type ofwork. He stated that the standard electric-shock machine
(Reiter) could be used in two ways. One setting of this machine produced the
normal electric-shock treatment (including convulsion) with amnesia after a
number oftreatments. He stated that using this machine as an
electro-shock device with the convulsive treatment, he felt that he could
guarantee amnesia for certain periods of time and particularly he could
guarantee amnesia for any knowledge ofuse ofthe convulsive
shock.
[Whited out] stated that the
other or lower setting ofthe machine produced a different type of
shock. He said that he could not explain it, but knew that when this lower
current type of shock was applied without convulsion. it had the effect of
making a man talk. He said, however, that the use ofthis type of shock
was prohibited because it produced in the individual excruciating pain and he
stated that there would be no question in his mind that the individual would be
quite willing to give information if threatened with the use of this machine.
He stated that this was a third-degree method but, undoubtedly, would be
effective. [Whited out] stated that he had never had the device applied to
himself, but he had talked with people who had been shocked in this manner and
stated that they complained that their whole head was on fire and it was much
too painful a treatment for any medical practice. He stated that the only way
it was ever used was in connection with sedatives and even then it was
extremely painful. The writer asked [whited out] whether or not in the “groggy”
condition following the convulsion by the electro-shock machine anyone had
attempted to obtain hypnotic control over the patient, since it occurred to the
writer that it would be a good time to attempt to obtain hypnotic control. [Whited
out] stated that, to his knowledge, it had never been done, but he could make
this attempt in the near future at the [whited out] and he would see whether or
not this could be done.
[Whited out] and [whited out],
as well as all others present, discussed the use of electro-shock at
considerable length and it was [whited out] opinion that an individual could
gradually be reduced through the use of electro-shock treatment to the
vegetable level. He stated that, whereas amnesia could be guaranteed relative [to]
the actual use of the shock and the time element surrounding it, he said it
would obtain perfect amnesia for periods further back. He stated several
instances in which people who had been given the electro-shock treatment
remembered some details of certain things and complete blanks in other ways.
[Whited out] said that a [whited
out], who is practicing in [whited out] has perfected a battery-driven machine
which, according to [whited out] is portable. [Whited out] said that the
standard electro-shock machine is a very common machine in medical offices and
in the major cities there must be several hundred of them in use at all times.
The use of electro-shock to produce amnesia was subsequently
successfully demonstrated in a series of cases by Dr. Ewen Cameron at McGill,
who received CIA money through MKULTRA Subproject 68 in 1957. Many of the
discussions, literature reviews and experiments conducted under BLUEBIRD and
ARTICHOKE were followed up on in MKULTRA and MKSEARCH.
The involvement of physicians including psychiatrists in
BLUEBIRD and ARTICHOKE was extensive, systematic and fundamental to the
Programs. The involvement included consultation, literature reviews,
experimentation and direct participation in field operations. The full extent
of this involvement is unknown because the names of the mind control doctors
who built Manchurian Candidates are redacted from documents provided under the
Freedom of Information Act, and because there are undoubtedly other documents
which are still classified.
[NOTES For this Google Site post]
[Note:1] Overview from Colin A. Ross Institute, 2001.
[Note:2] Synopsis from BLUEBIRD: Deliberate Creation of
Multiple Personality by Psychiatrists, Colin A. Ross, M.D., Richardson,
Texas: Manitou Communications, 2000.
136 Hunter, E. Brain-Washing in Red China. The Calculated
Destruction of Men’s Minds. New York: Vanguard Press, 1951.
66 Condon, R. The Manchurian Candidate. New York:
Jove Books, 1959/1988.
184 Marks, J. The Search for the Manchurian Candidate.
New York: W.W. Norton, 1988. [New York: Times Books, 1979.]
66 Condon, op. cit.
163 Lifton, R.J. Thought Reform of Chinese Intellectuals: A
Psychiatric Evaluation. Journal of Social Issues, 3, 5-20, 1957.
182 Mangold, T. Cold Warrior: James Jesus Angleton: The
CIA’s Master Spy Hunter. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1991.
136 Hunter, op. cit.
182 Mangold, op. cit.
210 Naylor, D. Mind Control. Los Angeles: ZM
Productions, 1998.
177 Malitz, S. The Role of Mescaline and DO Lysergic Acid in
Psychiatric Treatment. Diseases of the Nervous System, 27, 39-42, 1966.
66 Condon, op. cit.
[Note:3] CIA files confirm that SI is “Subconscious
Isolation” or a dissociative state. See, e.g., CIA MORI ID 144823, pp.
1-5, circa 1951. SI involves procedures that create dissociation or a split
personality to interrogate and control individuals outside their normal
consciousness.
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