"Dr. Mary's Monkey"

[Jan Klimkowski]

All - thank you for continuing this thread in a constructive and thoughtful fashion.

Here are some criteria that a scientist would presumably consider in designing a a covert, classified Secret, experiment to test the ability of a chemical or biological substance to affect human behaviour:

i) Means of administering the substance effectively to ensure the test subject is genuinely affected (and is not experiencing a placebo effect).

ii) Ability to record the dose of the substance to which the test subject is exposed at various times.

iiii) Ability to monitor and record the reactions of the test subject throughout the time they are exposed to the substance.

iv) Ability to ensure that the experiment remains covert, and that the subjects of these Secret tests are not able to reveal their existence.

Now, known LSD experiments on POWs, prisoners in federal institutions, children in orphanages, soldiers, sailors and airforce personnel, all get a tick in each of the four categories.

Indeed, we can now see once classified films of soldiers struggling over army obstacle courses, and LSD test subjects in clinician's rooms, because the "MK-ULTRA" nexus recorded many of these experiments: firstly, to review and analyse the impact of the drugs at leisure, once the experiment had finished; and secondly, to provide training and informational films once the substances were close to operational field use.

How about Pont St Esprit? I would give a Fail mark in categories i) to iii), as there was zero ability to control and measure dosage, the means of delivery is a matter for speculation but could not have ensured reliable or guaranteed exposure to LSD, and monitoring and recording of the impact on individual test subjects accurately over a period of time would have been very difficult.

With regard to iv), I am yet to be convinced that France, in 1951, was a logical or likely choice. The risks of this grossly unethical secret experiment being exposed were much higher than in a controlled American colony such as Panama or Costa Rica, or a conquered enemy power such as Germany, Austria or Italy.

If the LSD came from Sandoz, technicians from Sandoz were used in the experiment, and it was felt the experiment had to take place close to Swiss labs, then why not use a German or an Italian village?

The French were "our allies".

The following passage is from the 1977 Church Committee:

MKULTRA was the principal CIA program involving the research and development of chemical and biological agents. It was "concerned with the research and development of chemical, biological, and radiological materials capable of employment in clandestine operations to control human behavior." [11]

In January 1973, MKULTRA records were destroyed by Technical Services Division personnel acting on the verbal orders of Dr. Sidney Gottlieb, Chief of TSD. Dr. Gottlieb has testified, and former Director Helms has confirmed, that in ordering the records destroyed, Dr. Gottlieb was carrying out the verbal order of then DCI Helms.

MKULTRA began with a proposal from the Assistant Deputy Director for Plans, Richard Helms, to the DCI, outlining a special funding mechanism for highly sensitive CIA research and development projects that studied the use of biological and chemical materials in altering human behavior. The projects involved:

Research to develop a capability in the covert use of biological and chemical materials. This area involves the production of various physiological conditions which could support present or future clandestine operations. Aside from the offensive potential, the development of a comprehensive capability in this field of covert chemical and biological warfare gives us a thorough knowledge of the enemy's theoretical potential, thus enabling us to defend ourselves against a foe who might not be as restrained in the use of these techniques as we are. [12]

MKULTRA was approved by the DCI on April 13, 1953 along the lines proposed by ADDP Helms.

Part of the rationale for the establishment of this special funding mechanism was its extreme sensitivity. The Inspector General's survey of MKULTRA in 1963 noted the following reasons for this sensitivity:

a. Research in the manipulation of human behavior is considered by many authorities in medicine and related fields to be professionally unethical, therefore the reputation of professional participants in the MKULTRA program are on occasion in jeopardy.

b. Some MKULTRA activities raise questions of legality implicit in the, original charter.

c. A final phase of the testing of MKULTRA products places the rights and interests of U.S. citizens in jeopardy.

d. Public disclosure of some aspects of MKULTRA activity could induce serious adverse reaction in U.S. public opinion. as well as stimulate offensive and defensive action in this field on the part of foreign intelligence services. [13]

Over the ten-year life of the program, many "additional avenues to the control of human behavior" were designated as appropriate for investigation under the MKULTRA charter. These include "radiation, electroshock, various fields of psychology, psychiatry, sociology, and anthropology, graphology, harassment substances, and paramilitary devices and materials." [14]

The research and development of materials to be used for altering human behavior consisted of three phases: first, the search for materials suitable for study; second, laboratory testing on voluntary human subjects in various types of institutions; third, the application of MKULTRA materials in normal life settings.

The search for suitable materials was conducted through standing arrangements with specialists in universities, pharmaceutical houses, hospitals, state and federal institutions, and private research organi-zations. The annual grants of funds to these specialists were made under ostensible research foundation auspices, thereby concealing the CIA's interest from the specialist's institution.

The next phase of the MKULTRA program involved physicians, toxicologists, and other specialists in mental, narcotics, and general hospitals, and in prisons. Utilizing the products and findings of the basic research phase, they conducted intensive tests on human subjects.

One of the first studies was conducted by the National Institute of Mental Health. This study was intended to test various drugs, including hallucinogenics, at the NIMH Addiction Research Center in Lexington, Kentucky. The "Lexington Rehabilitation Center," as it was then called, was a prison for drug addicts serving sentences for drug violations.

The test subjects were volunteer prisoners who, after taking a brief physical examination and signing a general consent form, were administered hallucinogenic drugs. As a reward for participation in the program, the addicts were provided with the drug of their addiction.

LSD was one of the materials tested in the MKULTRA program. The final phase of LSD testing involved surreptitious administration to unwitting nonvolunteer subjects in normal life settings by undercover officers of the Bureau of Narcotics acting for the CIA.

The rationale for such testing was "that testing of materials under accepted scientific procedures fails to disclose the full pattern of reactions and attributions that may occur in operational situations." [15]

According to the CIA, the advantage of the relationship with the Bureau was that

test subjects could be sought and cultivated within the setting of narcotics control. Some subjects have been informers or members of suspect criminal elements from whom the [Bureau of Narcotics] has obtained results of operational value through the tests. On the other hand, the effectiveness of the substances on individuals at all social levels, high and low, native American and foreign, is of great significance and testing has been performed on a variety of individuals within these categories. [Emphasis added.] [16]

A special procedure, designated MKDELTA, was established to govern the use of MKULTRA materials abroad. Such materials were used on a number of occasions. Because MKULTRA records were destroyed, it is impossible to reconstruct the operational use of MKULTRA materials by the CIA overseas; it has been determined that the use of these materials abroad began in 1953, and possibly as early as 1950.

Drugs were used primarily as an aid to interrogations, but MKULTRA/MKDELTA materials were also used for harassment, discrediting, or disabling purposes. According to an Inspector General Survey of the Technical Services Division of the CIA in 1957 -- an inspection which did not discover the MKULTRA project involving the surreptitious administration of LSD to unwitting, nonvolunteer subjects -- the CIA had developed six drugs for operational use and they had been used in six different operations on a total of thirty-three subjects. [17] By 1963 the number of operations and subjects had increased substantially.

In the spring of 1963, during a wide-ranging Inspector General survey of the Technical Services Division, a member of the Inspector General's staff, John Vance, learned about MKULTRA and about the project involving the surreptitious administration of LSD to unwitting, nonvoluntary human subjects. As a result of the discovery and the Inspector General's subsequent report, this testing was halted and much tighter administrative controls were imposed on the program. According to the CIA, the project was decreased significantly each budget year until its complete termination in the late 1960s.


5. The Testing of LSD by the Army

There were three major phases in the Army's testing of LSD. In the first, LSD was administered to more than 1,000 American soldiers who volunteered to be subjects in chemical warfare experiments. In the second phase, Material Testing Program EA 1729, 95 volunteers received LSD in clinical experiments designed to evaluate potential intelligence uses of the drug. In the third phase, Projects THIRD CHANCE and DERBY HAT, 16 unwitting nonvolunteer subjects were interrogated after receiving LSD as part of operational field tests.

[10] Senate Select Committee, 9/16/75, Hearings, Vol. 1.

[11] Memorandum from the CIA Inspector General to the Director, 7/26/63.

[12] Memorandum from ADDP Helms to DCI Dulles, 4/3/53, Tab A, pp. 1-2.

[13] I.G. Report on MKULTRA, 1963, pp. 1-2.

[14] Ibid, p. 4.

[15] Ibid, P. 21.

[16] Ibid., pp. 11-12.

17] Ibid, 1957, p. 201.

Now, I'm still perfectly prepared to consider the Pont St Esprit hypothesis, and Albarelli may be correct.

I also believe that the narrative published by the Church Committee was almost certainly a limited hangout by the military-industrial-intelligence complex: ie they put the best spin possible on crimes against humanity.

However, there is always a timescale for developing, testing and learning the positive and negative effects of a new drug. This is simply how it is.

The official narrative strongly suggests that it was difficult for the "MK-ULTRA" nexus, in its early Bluebird/Artichoke incarnation, to get much LSD, and it was initially tested primarily for its usefulness as an interrogation tool: ie a truth serum.

Here is the official three phase process (of course the line about "voluntary human subjects" is entirely incorrect, and "institutions" means prisons, orphanages, military bases etc). However, the order of events does have a logical structure:

The research and development of materials to be used for altering human behavior consisted of three phases: first, the search for materials suitable for study; second, laboratory testing on voluntary human subjects in various types of institutions; third, the application of MKULTRA materials in normal life settings.

MK-ULTRA was created in 1953. The Pont St Esprit incident happened in 1951.

So, if Pont St Esprit is part of the "MK-ULTRA" nexus, we are talking about a predecessor programme such as Bluebird or Artichoke. However, it still feels very early in terms of (covert) scientific knowledge of LSD to be conducting a mass field trial.

If Pont St Esprit was an LSD field test on hundreds of humans, then it can only have been to assess its power as an incapacitant.

But why would you need to test this on a village in the territory of an allied power?

Surely, it would be much better to run a military training exercise at one of the CBW bases like Dugway Proving Grounds or Fort Detrick, with Blue and Red teams, and then secretly feed the Red team a measured dose of LSD in their cornflakes just before the exercise began.

Such an experimental design would tick all four of my categories above.

In my judgement, Pont St Esprit fails all four criteria.