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No matter how much we believe in critical, logical thinking and fact based decision making, a lot of us have a secret fascination and a feeling of curiosity when it comes to conspiracy theories. The mystery and secrecy behind them, intrigues us and even though some may appear totally unreal, there is always that little voice in the back of our heads wondering: ‘What if this is actually true?’ This series of articles will attempt to answer this question by examining the sources and any evidence available. Together we will go on a journey along that think line that sometimes separates reality from fiction and test the foundations of some of the world’s biggest conspiracy theories.
PROJECT MKULTRA: THE THEORY
MKUltra was a top secret CIA project which began in 1953. Originally it was intended to compete with the Soviet Union and its presumed advances with mind-control technology. But eventually things got out of hand as the CIA started performing human experiments on unsuspected people which included giving them high doses of illegal substances and observing their reactions.
VERDICT
The events behind this theory are so unbelievable that even with the Supreme Court hearings and the declassified CIA documents, it is still hard to comprehend that it is actually true. It all started in the early 1950s. As the tensions between the USA and the Soviets were rising, Allen Welsh Dulles, the CIA director at the time, gave the order for the initiation of project MKLUTRA. The goal of this project was best put by the US Supreme Court in the 1985 case ‘CIA v. Sims’: Between 1953 and 1966, the CIA financed the project MKLUTRA which was ‘concerned with the research and development of chemical, biological and radiological materials capable of employment in clandestine operations to control human behaviour.’ Initially the methods involved in this project were meant to be used during interrogation of prisoners and spies as well as to manipulate foreign leaders. The research for the project was performed in more than 80 Universities, hospitals, prisons and pharmaceutical companies across the US. Even though some top officials in these institutions knew who was behind the research, most participants were completely unaware of CIA’s involvement.
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MKUltra and other related projects continued for 20 years until 1973. Not many details are known about what exactly was happening during this project thanks to the CIA Director Richard Helms, who in 1973, ordered the destruction of all documents related to MKUltra. Despite this order, a few documents were saved and retrieved. As it was revealed, CIA tested various substances and methods in order to achieve the perfect ‘truth telling drug’ but also to improve its interrogation and torturing methods. One of these substances tested was actually the well-known drug LSD. They typically chose more vulnerable people such as prisoners, mental patients and prostitutes to whom they administer the drugs, sometimes without their consent, and observed their reactions. They even set up various brothels in which they used one-way mirrors to observe and record the effects of the drug. According to some documents, they even used CIA and military personnel whom they interrogated and used for their human experiments. Their ultimate goal was to develop the perfect interrogation technique which would force the subjects to confess or even wipe their minds clean.
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A shocking declassified document from 1955 reveals in detail some of the goals of project MKUltra. By using various methods they intended to ‘promote illogical thinking’ so that they could use this against the victims to discredit them in public. They tried to augment the intoxicating effects of alcohol, alter the subject’s perception and even cause temporary or permanent brain damage and memory loss. They planned to use substances to cause physical disabilities such as paralysis but they also wished to create substances which would enhance one's abilities to withstand torture during interrogation and brain-washing in case one of their agents would get caught. According to a Senate hearing 1975-1976, all of the above resulted in the death of two Americans and causing various side-effects in many more. Several lawsuits were filed with some plaintiffs receiving compensations.
Various other conspiracy theories are linked to project MKUltra. Some claim that even though it was officially terminated in 1973, it still continues to this day with many high profile people being its victims. Some conspiracists even support that some people who attempted to murder politicians (such as Robert F. Kennedy) were under the influence of substances developed by MKUltra. Unlike the actual story of MKUltra, these theories are not supported by any evidence and various mysteries and unanswered questions still surround the events behind this top secret project.
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Sources:
https://web.archive.org/web/20071128230208/http://www.arts.rpi.edu/~pellr/lansberry/mkultra.pdf
http://www.theblackvault.com/documentarchive/cia-mkultra-collection/#
http://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-supreme-court/471/159.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Olson
http://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/what-we-know-about-cias-midcentury-mind-control-project-180962836/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_MKUltra
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