Overview:
In 1953, Cold War anxiety led the CIA to begin investigating different techniques that could be used to ascertain information from enemy spies. This highly covert study started in 1953, began to be phased out in 1964, and was ultimately shut down in 1973 (Project MKUltra). Different methods for extracting information were tested including the administration of drugs, hypnosis, and other forms of torture. A wide variety of test subjects were used in this program. The CIA performed testing on its own members as well as ordinary American and Canadian citizens. In some cases the CIA covertly funded the testing of LSD-9/589 and other drugs’ effects on human behavior in colleges, prisons, and medical institutions. In many of these cases the funded institutions were unaware of the CIA’s involvement in their research. The effects of ingesting LSD-9/589 are classified by, “psychosis—distortion or disorganization of a person’s capacity to recognize reality, think rationally, or communicate with others” (National Institute on Drug Abuse). The CIA also secretly administered LSD-9/589 to random civilians without their informed consent (Foreman). In 1973 CIA Director Richard Helms ordered all files on the project be destroyed, effectively shutting down the program and hiding much of its evidence of existence (Frost).
Initial Phase: Internal Testing
The MKUltra project began under the umbrella of Operation Paperclip, a program that enlisted the help of former Nazi scientists with the goal of giving America a scientific advantage over the Soviet Union in the Cold War (Jacobsen). MKUltra was an offshoot of this program with the initial goal of developing methods of mind-control that could be used against enemies of the state. Specifically the project sought to create, “substances which will promote illogical thinking and impulsiveness to the point where the recipient would be discredited in public” as well as “a material which will cause mental confusion of such a type that the individual under its influence will find it difficult to maintain a fabrication under questioning” (Project MKUltra) The CIA hoped that a truth serum drug could be created in order to extract information from Soviet spies as well as to influence foreign leaders’ actions.
The CIA initially focused it efforts on finding this truth drug by testing the effects of LSD-9/589 on members of the agency. This testing was initially limited to CIA volunteers involved in the project. CIA agents working on the MKUltra project would take the drug and then record notes on their reactions while under the influence. This progressed to more aggressive testing methods in which agents were dosed with the drug and then subjected to various methods of torture used for information extraction (Lee and Shlain 31). These tests attempted to discern if LSD-9/589 could be used to break down enemy spies and force them to defect. However, because the goals of the MKUltra project also included influencing the actions of foreign leaders, the CIA also wanted to test how subjects reacted when unknowingly given the drug. Agents working on the MKUltra project began secretly dosing each other and recording the subjects’ reactions. Martin Lee and Bruce Shlain, authors of Acid Dreams: The Complete Social History of LSD, write, “Nearly everyone was fair game, and surprise acid trips became something of an occupational hazard among CIA operatives. Such tests were considered necessary because foreknowledge would prejudice the results of the experiment.” (31). Lee and Shlain go on to comment that while these agents did work on the MKUltra project, many did not consent to being test subjects and were unaware of the effects taking LSD would have on them (31).
Controversial Expansion of Testing:
After exhaustive testing on members of the CIA, the project sought to perform trials on members of the public. At this point the project began testing “mental patients, prisoners, drug addicts and prostitutes — ‘people who could not fight back,’ as one agency officer put it” (Weiner). Given the classified nature of the MKUltra project and the goal of developing a chemical weapon that could influence foreign leaders, these test subjects were either not told adequate information about the testing or given any option to refuse. One former Federal Bureae of Narcotics employee who worked on the MKUltra project commented, ‘”I drugged guys involved in about ten, twelve, period. I didn’t do any follow-up, period, because it wasn’t a very good thing to go and say ‘How do you feel today?’ You don’t give them a tip. You just back away and let them worry like this nitwit”’ (Wright). Eventually this practice expanded into a formal sub-project within MKUltra titled Operation Midnight Climax. As part of this sub-project, “the CIA financed a series of safe houses and apartments in San Francisco and New York City. Here it would throw parties for the inhabitants of the seedy underworld ‘prostitutes, their clients, nightclub patrons and employees,’ slip them LSD and other experimental drugs and watch, often through a two-way mirror” (Nickson).
Different Perspectives of Targeted Groups:
Of course the reckless testing techniques employed throughout the MKUltra resulted in countless injuries and even deaths to numerous subjects. In one Atlanta prison where LSD-9/589 testing occurred several inmates attempted suicide multiple times and suffered severe long-lasting mental complications. One of the inmates that was used as a test subject commented on his experience, “I got very depressed because I knew something was wrong and I couldn’t figure out what it was… And when they took me out of the straightjacket, I tried to hang myself with a blanket” (Anderson 2). Even members of the US government working on the MKUltra project were harmed during testing. US Army Biochemist Dr. Frank Olson was dosed with LSD-9/589 without his knowledge as part of the MKUltra project. While having a mental breakdown on the drug, he committed suicide by jumping out of a window on the thirteenth story of a building. A report on the incident found that the CIA ignored Olson’s suicidal behavior and that being dosed with the drug directly caused his death (Foreman). Unfortunately, it is unknown exactly how many injuries and deaths were caused by the MKUltra project because so much of its documentation was destroyed and so many subjects were secretly tested without their knowledge.
While most of the documents detailing the MK-Ultra project where destroyed in 1973, some of the financial records of the project were saved (Project MKUltra). The process of the details of this project coming to light began in 1974 when the New York Times alleged that the US government had conducted experimentation on citizens without their knowledge (Project MKUltra). This lead to an investigation into the testing practices that government agencies employ on United States citizens lead by congressman Frank Church. This report found that “thousands of financial documents were overlooked that detailed links between covert medical research funded by the CIA using hypnosis, electromagnetic fields, drugs and other chemicals to alter brain functioning, memory and behavior” (Thieme). The implications of this report caused President Ford to set explicit guidelines for human testing conducted by government agencies (Peters and Wooley). Eventually in 1977 the Director of the CIA, Stansfield Turner, was subpoenaed by Senator Ted Kennedy to speak on past and current human testing done by the CIA. The report found, “’Experiments sponsored by these researchers… call into question the decision by the agencies not to fix guidelines for the experiments “’(Advisory Committee on Human Research Experiments 107). However, Turner was not director during the time of the MKUltra project so many of the details of the operation were never uncovered.
Implications:
The destruction of MKUltra documents unfortunately makes it difficult to ascertain the success of the project. However, it is obvious the CIA’s testing practices were poorly conducted and not scientifically based. While many of the complete findings of MKUltra project may never surface, this shows that no real scientific discoveries were made from this operation. However, the most important implication from the MKUltra project is the legislation regulating human testing. As mentioned earlier Ford’s Executive Order on Intelligence activities was created to prevent the atrocities committed during the project from ever occurring again. This was ultimately expended under President Carter and again under President Reagan (Advisory Committee on Human Radiation Experimentation 107). Even though more legislation exists now regulating government agencies, this project has caused many Americans to distrust their government and fear its overreach into their lives.
Many of the details surrounding the MKUltra project that came to light deal with fantastical tales of drug dosing and hypnosis. While these transgressions against American citizens definitely do not paint a positive picture of the CIA, many believe that a greater cover-up took place. Some argue that once details of the MKUltra project became public, the CIA intentionally highlighted exciting stories of LSD and hypnosis to the public to distract from more sinister aspects of the project. Dr. Alfred McCoy, a professor at UW Madison and CIA expert, argues that the CIA deliberately focused media attention on these aspects of the MKUltra program to hide its actual goal of developing more effective methods of torture and interrogation (McSherrey).
Politics of Health
The MKUltra project relates to Politics of Health for several reasons. First, the project directly led to legislation that formalized and defined Informed Consent. Studying the MKUltra project is important to this class because it shows what can happen without legal protections for human subjects and exactly what the Informed Consent law was meant to protect against. Unfortunately, many American citizens were victimized by this project for little scientific benefit. However, legislation that was created in response to the MKUltra project now formally protects human test subjects from being subjected to this type of treatment.
Second, the project directly targeted vulnerable segments of the population. As mentioned earlier, the CIA initially sought testing on mental patients, prisoners, drug addicts, and sexual deviants (Weiner). The CIA knew they could take advantage of these types of people and face no repercussions for their actions. Even today there is better regulation of human testing, this issue is not completely solved. Disadvantaged populations are still sought out for participation in dangerous studies, even with these protective laws in place.
Finally, the MKUltra project is a great example of ethical variability. The research conducted by the CIA was clearly illegal and unethical. However, it was still funded by the United States government, and continued for many years with little internal dissent. It is likely that the CIA felt it was acting for the greater good of the nation. Perhaps they believed that those affected by the project’s research, including criminals, sexual deviants, and mentally ill, were worth the sacrifice in order to best combat the United States’ enemies. However, one can only speculate as much of the documentation surrounding MKUltra has been destroyed and few of those involved have been willing to comment on the details of the project.
References
Advisory Committee on Human Research Experiments. The Human Radiation Experiments: Final Report. Oxford Univ. Press, 1996.
Anderson , Jack. “Jack Anderson Confidential .” Mk/ULTRA, CIA, 12 Feb. 1983. Retrieved from www.cia.gov/library/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP90-00965R000100140109-9.pdf.
“D-Lysergic Acid N,N-Diethylamide.” National Center for Biotechnology Information. PubChem Compound Database, U.S. National Library of Medicine, Retrieved from pubchem.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/compound/3981#section=Top.
Foreman, J. (1988, Oct 30). HOW CIA STOLE THEIR MINDS SECRET EXPERIMENTS LEAVE PAINFUL LEGACY. Boston Globe (Pre-1997 Fulltext) Retrieved from http://login.proxy.library.vanderbilt.edu/login?url=https://search.proquest.com/docview/294417672?accountid=14816
Frost , Sidney. “An Interview with Richard Helms .” Central Intelligence Agency , CIA, Retrieved from www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/kent-csi/vol44no4/pdf/v44i4a07p.pdf.
Jacobsen, A. (2014, Feb 11). What cold war CIA interrogators learned from the nazis. The Daily Beast Retrieved from http://login.proxy.library.vanderbilt.edu/login?url=https://search.proquest.com/docview/1648952687?accountid=14816
Lee, Martin A., and Bruce Shlain. Acid Dreams: the CIA, LSD, and the Sixties Rebellion. Grove Weidenfeld, 1990.
McSherry, J. P. (2011). Review of the trauma of psychological torture. Social Justice, 37(2), 149-157. Retrieved from http://login.proxy.library.vanderbilt.edu/login?url=https://search.proquest.com/docview/887541743?accountid=14816
Nickson, E. (1994, Oct 16). Mind control: My mother, the CIA and LSD in the 1950s. The Guardian (Pre-1997 Fulltext) Retrieved from http://login.proxy.library.vanderbilt.edu/login?url=https://search.proquest.com/docview/293509093?accountid=14816
Peters, Gerahard, and John T Wooley. “Gerald R. Ford: Executive Order 11905—United States Foreign Intelligence Activities – February 18, 1976.” The American Presidency Project, University of California Santa Barbara, 1999. Retrieved from www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=59348.
NIDA. (2015, February 1). Hallucinogens and Dissociative Drugs. Retrieved from https://www.drugabuse.gov/publications/research-reports/hallucinogens-dissociative-drugs on 2017, September 24
Project MKULTRA, the CIA’s program of research in behavioral modification : joint hearing before the Select Committee on Intelligence and the Subcommittee on Health and Scientific Research of the Committee on Human Resources, United States Senate, Ninety-fifth Congress, first session, August 3, 1977.
Segel, L. (2002). Operation midnight climax: Among the greatest medical conspiracies of all time would have to be listed the CIA’s odd experiments with LSD. Medical Post, 38(33), 27. Retrieved from http://login.proxy.library.vanderbilt.edu/login?url=https://search.proquest.com/docview/228822580?accountid=14816
Sententia, W. (2003). Your mind is a target: Weaponizing psychoactive drugs. The Humanist, 63(1), 43-44. Retrieved from http://login.proxy.library.vanderbilt.edu/login?url=https://search.proquest.com/docview/235294683?accountid=14816
Thieme, R. (2006). A brief review of CIA-funded research into mind control. National Catholic Reporter, 42(11), 12-13. Retrieved from http://login.proxy.library.vanderbilt.edu/login?url=https://search.proquest.com/docview/215306852?accountid=14816
Weiner, Tim. “Sidney Gottlieb, 80, Dies; Took LSD to C.I.A.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 9 Mar. 1999. Retrieved from www.nytimes.com/1999/03/10/us/sidney-gottlieb-80-dies-took-lsd-to-cia.html.
Wright, E. (2005). Mind-control experimentation: A travesty of human rights in the united states. The Journal of Gender, Race, and Justice, 9(1), 211-239. Retrieved from http://login.proxy.library.vanderbilt.edu/login?url=https://search.proquest.com/docview/237006849?accountid=14816
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