Project MK-ULTRA was a covert, illegal human experimentation program run by the CIA's Office of Scientific Intelligence from 1953 to 1973. The program was officially sanctioned by CIA director Allen Dulles and primarily overseen by Sidney Gottlieb, chief of the Chemical Division of the Technical Services Staff. The experiments focused on behavioral modification through the administration of drugs (particularly LSD), psychological manipulation, and other methods with the goal of developing mind control techniques and potential truth serums for interrogation during the Cold War.
The program involved numerous academic institutions, hospitals, and research facilities across the United States and Canada, including McGill University under Dr. Donald Cameron, who conducted particularly controversial experiments involving intensive electroshock therapy and drug-induced comas. Many subjects were unwitting American and Canadian citizens who were given LSD and other psychoactive substances without their knowledge or consent. When the program was exposed in 1975 through investigations by the Church Committee of the United States Congress and the Rockefeller Commission, most of the MK-ULTRA records had been deliberately destroyed in 1973 on orders from the CIA director Richard Helms, making a full accounting of the program's activities impossible. The revelations led to new regulations and oversight on human experimentation and greatly damaged public trust in the CIA.
20 years
Discussion Board
Please login to join the discussion.
No comments yet. Be the first to start the discussion!