HAS THE CIA MASTERED MIND CONTROL?

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP88-01350R000200420002-6
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 16, 2016
• Document Release Date: September 20, 2004
• Sequence Number: 2
• Publication Date: August 10, 1979
• Content Type: MAGAZINE

STAT
Approved For Release 2004/10/13: CIA-RDP88-01 q
SECOND LOOK
10 August 1979
CIA
by Ylst r Marchetti
THE SEARC:t-I FOR TH r. "7 # ANCHL RAIN
CANDIDATE"
by John Marks
Times Books, New York, 1979. 242 pps., $9.95_
fascinating tale in which truth is as strange as fiction-
.. and sometimes stranger-_this entertaining and in-
for: save book by_John Marks, a former Department of State
i ntelii,ence officer, is rich. in fact and detail about the CIA's
secret efforts during the Cold War (the 1950's and early
19:50-s; to discover and devise unique methods of controlling
the human mind, especially the mirids of -covert agents,
operators, and assorted other individuals involved in the
c Inge sine struggle between the CIA and the Soviet KGB.
Anyone 'rested in drugs, hypnosis, and brainwashin.c--
pari:C~.a.-ly with regard to their potential applicatic') to SPY
warfare-will find this slim volume worth reading . . . and
will be surprised by its conclusions.
Try as they might, and they certainly did try, the CIA's
spooks and scientists never were able to learn how to control
the human mind..
Reporting the observations of an anonymous retired hi;h-
ranking CIA counterintelligence officer, the author tells that
Americans tend to look for quick answers to complex human-
prob':em s-, often resorting to the latest techhnoio. y. "We are
gimmick-prone," says the mysterious old cold warrior. But,
he continues, "Gimmicks-machines, dru s, and technical
tr.?cks-comprise only the third method of behavior control,
after torture-and tradecraft." Crude? 'Perhaps. But-this is the-
thinking of many of the old CIA professionals.
Later in the book the author comments that "the CIA's
brainwashing program had come full circle" by the 1960's-
and that it was a complete failure. He cites the case of Yuri
~4o-tenko, who defected from tie F' ,G1 :: early 1974 to tell the
CIA that Lee Harvey Oswald was in no way connected with
Soviet intelligence. But the CIA did not believe Nosenko, so
they tried to find out why he was really dispatched by the
KGB. "After 10 years of research, with some rather gruesome
results. CIA officials had come up with no [mind-control]
tecz.1-lues on which they felt they could rely. Thus, when the
over:irional crunch came they fell back on tike basic brutalir-'
gra i ;s1KULTRA or any of its.related research and develop-
n.e-.t hypnosis, induced amnesia, or brainwashing. And
the ?_'!toff date. for most of the information is the mid-1950 s.
But =- e author does pull together all the avai,abie data oa
thes ; mgrams avid puts it into the perspective of the n- e,
i.e., that period of national paranoia known as the Cold Wtiar.
It is good historical document, but it falls short of the pro-
ve s. ? :look it could have been..
F irsc of all, the Nosenko case is not fully explained, The
-former KGB officer was put in solitary confinement in a .. '. r.-`
do vless ced-so that after awhile he did not know if it was day
or night, or what day of the week or month it was. In this.
specia )y-built jail the CIA- made for him-and in which h'e
spent three years-he was constantly subjected-to hostile :rx?
terrogation. But according to official CIA sources, the Soviet
never broke-despite the fact that he was constantly caught
lying. Eventually, he was made a $35,000-a-year consultant to
the CIA.
In my opinion, Nosenko either cracked or was brain-
washed. Why else would the CIA in later years use
Nosenko-actually peddle him about Washington as an ex-
pert on Soviet secret operations in the U.S.-for propaganda
and misinformation purposes to unsuspecting and naive
publishers, such as the Readers Digest Press? By the time the
Agency had finished with him, he was nothing more than a
robot.
ut late last yea: during the hearings of the House Sc-
.,= lect Committee on Assassinations, a CIA spokesman
officially denounced Nosenko as a braggart and liar, saving
that the ex-KGB officer's information and views could not be
trusted. Still, the Agency spokesman claimed that `'osea o
was a legitimate defector. Only the CIA would dare to ad-
vance such an Alice-in-Wonderland explanation, and only a
gullible Congressional Committee aria? American pub'-ic.
would accept it. But a discerning author should not.
A second major flaw in the book is the fac: that the author
relies almost exclusively on Freedom of Information Act
data-and-everyone knows-(or-should know) that the Govern-
rnerit, e Cialiy the CIA, releases only that information it
wants t e-public to have . , and nothing more. (This.I know
f-or: f st and-experience')-- T herefore, there is nothing new
in. t-ie- book. It is, in fact, only a retelling of the CIA drug
stony as t e CIA prefers-the public to know is-'Yes, we used j
to expo :want zsith wry:?s but nothing ever came of it, and rue
stopped th' program bade in the mid-1950'x.' The author
corucio,.sl ,or otherwise; promotes this misleadin7 a';'.~STAT
y
r.E tl:r Say;ier,
STAT
In s large sense, therefore. The Search for the "Man-
chi nia;?i Ca ndittate'ApproueeopRmR 4,%2QQ4lRLlXyvCIA-RDP88-01359rR000020.42-0.0.0-0-r.
revela,;on s or disclosures about the CIA's infamous drug pro-