LOS ANGELES - ColoradoDesk -- The U.S. National Security Archive and ProQuest recently released a scholarly document collection uncovering the shocking secret history of mind control research programs conducted by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) from the 1950s to the 1970s. Titled CIA and the Behavioral Sciences: Mind Control, Drug Experiments and MKULTRA, the collection includes over 1,200 records documenting what the Archive describes as "one of the most infamous and abusive programs" in the history of psychiatry and behavioral science. These experiments included the use of hallucinogens, such as LSD, on unwitting subjects.[1] The Citizens Commission on Human Rights International (CCHR), a mental health industry watchdog that was exposing these experiments in 1969, welcomed the release, saying it serves as a warning against psychedelic drugs now being considered and approved to treat mental health issues.

Newsweek highlighted the significance of the document release, stating, "The documents will prompt further discussions on MKULTRA's implications on ethical boundaries in scientific research and governmental oversight."[2] Between 1975 and 1977, CCHR monitored three federal hearings that investigated these unethical research activities.[3] Testimony presented to the U.S. Senate in 1977 revealed that 80 institutions, including universities, were involved in CIA mind control experiments. The agency funded 185 non-government researchers in 149 separate projects, many conducted at well-regarded universities.[4]

Currently, over 70 universities in the U.S. are conducting clinical trials involving psychedelics.[5] It is a lucrative field. The psychedelic drugs market was valued at $4.87 billion in 2022 and is expected to reach $11.82 billion by 2029.[6]

CCHR warns that the whole system can easily spiral out of control. Although LSD was an investigational drug decades ago, authorized only for experimental use, by the late 1950s, psychiatrists and psychologists were administering it to treat neuroses and alcoholism and to enhance creativity. A 1960 study by researcher Sidney Cohen concluded that LSD was safe if given in a supervised medical setting. However, "by 1962 his concern about popularization, nonmedical use, black market LSD, and patients harmed by the drug led him to warn that the spread of LSD was dangerous," as was reflected in a 1997 study.[7]

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The earlier clandestine research operated under code names such as MKULTRA, BLUEBIRD and ARTICHOKE. Doctors conducted experiments using drugs, hypnosis, isolation, sensory deprivation, electroshock and other extreme techniques on human subjects, often U.S. citizens, many of whom had no idea what was being done to them, according to a report on the document's release.[8] Psychiatrists were interested in whether LSD could be potentially useful in "[gaining] control of bodies whether they were willing or not."[9]

An example of those documents are:

• A 1952 entry about drugs like LSD being tested and other experiments on unwitting Americans.
• A 1956 memo in which MKULTRA chief Sidney Gottlieb signs off a project that would "evaluate the effects of large doses of LSD-25 in normal human volunteers" on federal prisoners in Atlanta.[10]
• A document dated December 3, 1951, stated that a person "can be reduced to the vegetable level" through the use of electroshock.[11]

The Archive covered how individuals were part of the infamous "depatterning" experiments conducted by the late Dr. D. Ewen Cameron at the Allan Memorial Institute, a psychiatric hospital at McGill University in Montreal, Canada.[12] Cameron put patients into a prolonged sleep through the administration of barbiturates and LSD, then administered massive doses of electroshock, ultimately reducing patients to a childlike state.[13] The procedure, also known as deep sleep treatment, was practiced at Chelmsford private psychiatric hospital in Australia from the 1960s to 1979. At that hospital, psychiatrists placed patients into a two-week drug-induced coma, during which they were electroshocked, often without their consent or knowledge. CCHR had the treatment banned in 1983 after discovering a series of deaths linked to it. In 1988, CCHR played a pivotal role in obtaining a two-year New South Wales Royal Commission government inquiry into deep sleep treatment. Former NSW Health Minister, Peter Collins, called it "the darkest episode of the history of psychiatry in this country."

With this documented history of psychedelic and other psychotropic drug and electroshock abuse, CCHR warns that the growing trend toward the use of hallucinogens is dangerous and calls for these substances to be disapproved to treat "mental illness."

In 1969, CCHR was established by professor of psychiatry, Dr. Thomas Szasz and the Church of Scientology, which exposed numerous instances of brainwashing or mind-control practices, following L. Ron Hubbard, Scientology's founder, being acknowledged as one of the first to discover and expose mind control experimentation conducted by U.S. military and intelligence agencies.[14]

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Sources:

[1] "CIA Mind Control Experiments Focus on New Scholarly Collection," National Security Archive, 23 Dec. 2024, nsarchive.gwu.edu/briefing-book/dnsa-intelligence/2024-12-23/cia-behavior-control-experiments-focus-new-scholarly

[2] "What Is MKULTRA? CIA Secret 'Mind Control' Program Records Unsealed," Newsweek, 24 Dec. 2024, www.newsweek.com/mkultra-cia-secret-mind-control-program-records-unsealed-2005560

[3] www.cchrint.org/2023/12/11/1950s-mk-ultra-mind-control-experiments-prompt-warning-about-psychedelic-research-today/, citing "CIA Psychiatrist Louis "Jolly" West's 1960s LSD Mind-Control Experiments Come Back to Haunt America," www.cchrint.org/2023/01/06/cia-psychiatrist-jolly-wests-1960s-lsd-mind-control-experiments/, citing Tom O'Neill and Dan Piepenbring, "Inside the Archive of an LSD Researcher With Ties to the CIA's MKUltra Mind Control Project," The Intercept, 24 Nov 2019, theintercept.com/2019/11/24/cia-mkultra-louis-jolyon-west/

[4] "80 institutions Used C.I.A. Mind Studies," The New York Times, 4 Aug. 1977. www.nytimes.com/1977/08/04/archives/80-institutions-used-in-cia-mind-studies-admiral-turner-tells.html; nsarchive.gwu.edu/briefing-book/dnsa-intelligence/2024-12-23/cia-behavior-control-experiments-focus-new-scholarly

[5] psychedelicinvest.com/educational-organizations/

[6] brandessenceresearch.com/healthcare/psychedelic-drugs-market

[7] pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/9154737/

[8] nsarchive.gwu.edu/briefing-book/dnsa-intelligence/2024-12-23/cia-behavior-control-experiments-focus-new-scholarly

[9] www.cchrint.org/2023/12/11/1950s-mk-ultra-mind-control-experiments-prompt-warning-about-psychedelic-research-today/ citing Brianna Nofil, "The CIA's Appalling Human Experiments With Mind Control," History Channel, www.history.com/mkultra-operation-midnight-climax-cia-lsd-experiments; Tom O'Neill, Dan Piepenbring, "Inside the Archive of an LSD Researcher With Ties to the CIA's MK-Ultra Mind Control Project," The Intercept, 24 Nov.2019, theintercept.com/2019/11/24/cia-mkultra-louis-jolyon-west/

[10] nsarchive.gwu.edu/briefing-book/dnsa-intelligence/2024-12-23/cia-behavior-control-experiments-focus-new-scholarly

[11] truthaboutect.org/captive-brains-electroshock-for-mind-control/; Document obtained via the Freedom of Information Act dealing with the Central Intelligence Agency's MK-ULTRA program "Artichoke" dated 3 December 1951 entitled, "Artichoke"–… (blanked out).

[12] nsarchive.gwu.edu/briefing-book/dnsa-intelligence/2024-12-23/cia-behavior-control-experiments-focus-new-scholarly

[13] "In Memoriam: D. Ewan Cameron, 1901-1967," American Journal of Psychiatry, Dec. 1967; www.thetribune.ca/mind-control-mcgill-mk-ultra/

[14] www.scientology.org/faq/scientology-attitudes-and-practices/does-scientology-engage-in-brainwashing-mind-control.html