The MKULTRA project was a CIA mind control program, but it wasn't the only one. Other programs existed which experimented on people where drugs and various methods of interrogation were used to try to weaken the mind and force confessions. They wanted to control the mind and get compliance. To achieve those results and manipulate mental states and brain functions through Project MKULTRA, drugs like LSD were used, so too was hypnosis, sensory deprivation, isolation, verbal and sexual abuse and other forms of torture. In recent times, the outright use of torture has been used to try to get compliance from subjects, and even tried to get a approval for a truth serum.

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In looking for a topic for the #deepdives research challenge 9, I was searching for "mind control" and found a mention of three other programs in WikiLeaks Email-ID 1685852 from The Global Intelligence Files. It was an email from a Stratfor employee about a 17-page document called Experimentation Programs conducted by the Department of Defense That Had CIA Sponsorship or Participation and That Involved the Administration to Human Subjects of Drugs Intended for Mind-Control or Behavior-Modification Purposes. It was prepared in 1977 by the General Counsel of the Department of Defense, which mentioned projects MKNAOMI, MKCHICKWIT and MKOFTEN:

Other programs, described briefly focused on mind control. MK-NAOMI was after "severely incapacitating and lethal materials ... [and] gadgetry for their dissemination," and MK-CHICKWIT was designed to "identify new drug developments in Europe and Asia," and then "obtain samples."

Another program, MK-OFTEN, started as a study on dopamine. But the scope was soon expanded to evaluate ibogaine, a hallucinogen, and then several more drugs, in hopes of creating "new pharmacologically active drugs affecting the central nervous system [to] modify men's behavior."

MKULTRA officially ran from 1953 to 1973, and so too did others like MKOFTEN. The CIA worked with the Army on project MKCHICKWIT and MKOFTEN which was developed by the Department of Defense in conjunction with the CIA.

The goal of MKCHICKWIT was to "identify new drug developments in Europe and Asia and to obtain information and samples". And for MKOFTEN it was officially to "test the behavioral and toxicological effects of certain drugs on animals and humans". But according to author Gordon Thomas of the book Secrets and Lies, they wanted to "explore the world of black magic" and "harness the forces of darkness and challenge the concept that the inner reaches of the mind are beyond reach."

Biological Weapons

MKCHICKWIT and MKOFTEN seemed to work towards advancing MKNAOMI. According to the Department of Defense document, MKNAMOMI was a successor to MKDELTA, and "its purpose was to stockpile severely incapacitating and lethal materials, and to develop gadgetry for the dissemination of these materials". MKNAOMI was described in the declassified CIA file CIA-RDPO1-01773R000100170001-5 as:

(a) To provide for a covert support base to meat clandestine operational requirements.
(b) To stockpile severely incapacitating and lethal materials for the specific use of TSD [Technical Services Division].
(c) To maintain in operational readiness special and unique items for the dissemination of biological and chemical materials.
(d) To provide for ‘the required surveillance, testing, upgrading, and evaluation of materials and items in order to assure absence of defects and complete predictability of results to be expected under operational conditions.

Project MKNAOMI was used to develop biological warfare agents. It was funded $200,000 per year at first, and increased to $390,000 in 1958, decreasing to $100,000 by the late 60s. The estimated total spent was near $3 million. Some of the "gadgetry" developed included:

"attaché cases rigged to disseminate an agent in the air, a cigarette rigged to disseminate an agent when lighted, a fountain pen dart launcher, an engine head bolt designed to release an agent when heated, a fluorescent light starter to activate the light and then release an agent, ect."

This project was apparently used to develop an alternative to the cyanide L-pill which "takes up to 15 minutes to work and causes an agonizingly painful death by asphyxiation". CIA Director William Colby has said about cyanide: "Agents didn’t want to face that kind of fate." As a result, the shellfish toxin was developed by researchers at the U.S. Army's laboratory at Fort Detrick.

The shellfish toxin could be taken orally, or also in a "gadgetry" with a pinprick. The victim "feels a tingling sensation in the fingers and lips, then dies within ten seconds of painless paralysis." It seems to be a successful development by the CIA as a greater way to kill oneself (or another) than the agonizing pain of cyanide.

Modern Truth Serum and Torture

Trying to influence the mind and brain to get compliance from interrogating subjects was also looked into by the CIA recently as it considered reviving MKULTRA-like programs. After 9/11 the CIA wanted to try to find a "truth serum". The ACLU recently released documents from the Central Intelligence Agency’s Office of Medical Services, describing Project Medication:

The CIA studied records of old Soviet drug experiments as well as the CIA’s notorious and discredited MK-Ultra program, which involved human experimentation with LSD and other drugs on unwitting subjects. The CIA doctors involved in Project Medication wanted to use Versed, a psychoactive drug similar to some of those used in MK-Ultra, on prisoners.

Apparently this was never put into action and was only a draft proposal. The legal approval of using Versed was not obtained as there was a "prohibition against medical experimentation on prisoners" and "a ban on interrogational use of 'mind-altering drugs' or those which 'profoundly altered the senses.'" But after 9/11, medical professionals played an "indispensable" role in legitimizing torture in a "veneer of legality".

The report notes that CIA doctors actually promoted the idea that waterboarding "provided periodic relief" from being forced to stand and subjected to other forms of sleep deprivation and physical torture. In fact, the CIA’s medical staff claimed that the torture program was "reassuringly free of enduring physical or psychological effects."

The ACLU says the doctors weren't sadistic, "but it means they were complicit because this pseudo-scientific torture could not have happened without the doctors’ participation". It's laughable that an honest doctor would think waterboarding was a "relief" or that it or other forms of torture were "free of enduring physical or psychological effects". Yet people have "cried, begged, pleaded, vomited, and required medical resuscitation after being waterboarded."

Dr. Sondra Crosby, of Boston University's School of Medicine and Public Health, also knows of the enduring psychological effects from torture victims, as she describes the CIA torture program:

"The enduring pain and suffering experienced by the survivors of the CIA program is immense, and includes severe, complex post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, physical ailments, and psychosocial dysfunction. At least one detainee was tortured to death. Their physical and psychological scars will last a lifetime."

It's odd that torture was considered "legal" to get compliance from subjects, yet they couldn't get approval for a drug to influence compliance. I think they drug would have been less damaging, not that it would be ethical. Maybe it's just that it was for testing on prisoners in the U.S. though.

I think outside of the U.S., they don't have issues with these legal barriers, just like torture wasn't a legal issue for the U.S. as long as it was done outside it's "official" borders, even though Guantanamo tortures are well known to us now and operated under the cloud of legal authority. It took a while for us to find out about MKULTRA and about the torture going on post-9/11. Who knows what else is going on in the darkness of the CIA.

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References:

• WikiLeaks 1685852
• Experimentation Programs conducted by the Department of Defense That Had CIA Sponsorship or Participation and That Involved the Administration to Human Subjects of Drugs Intended for Mind-Control or Behavior-Modification Purposes
• CIA-RDPO1-01773R000100170001-5
• Chemical Concussions and Secret LSD: Pentagon Details Cold War Mind-Control Tests
• Project MKOFTEN
• Project MKUltra
• Project MKNAOMI
• Project MKNAOMI
• New Documents Reveal CIA Considered Reviving MK Ultra-like Programs
• CIA considered potential truth serum to force terror suspects to talk

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