MKULTRA SHOWS THE CIA RESTRICTIONS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-01208R000100150113-2
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: February 22, 2011
• Sequence Number: 113
• Publication Date: October 11, 1981
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

l III. J_Iii II-1 I
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/02/22 : CIA-RDP90-01208R000100150113-2
ARTICLE A?PE RED
ON PAGE - L- -
By Edwin Guthman
Editor ,JTlt.Inquirer
PHILADELPHIA ThQUI
11 October 1981
Shortly after the end of World War II, the
.U.. S. Navy, responding to reports that Soviet
military agencies. had achieved amazing
results in using drugs to alter human behav-
ior, began a program of identifying and test-
ing drugs that might be useful in interroga-
tions and in recruitment of agents.
It began as a defensive effort to detect and
counteract drugs and biological - agents
which might be used by the Soviets or other
hostile countries against the United States
and its allies.
But, as congressional investigating com=
mittees reported a quarter of a century lat-
er; the defensive orientation of the program
soon became secondary as U. S. intelligence
agencies experimented to find how the
drugs could be used to get information
from, or gain control over, enemy spies...
By 1953, the Central Intelligence Agency
began a project with the code name of
-MKULTRA to determine how chemical and,
biological materials could be used effective-
ly in clandestine operations. The results,
backers of the project said, would "enable j
us to defend ourselves against a foe who
might. not be as restrained in the: use of,
those techniques as we are." .......
MMKULTRA began by experimenting with
possible uses 'of LSD and over the next 10
Administration plans to ease curbs on the CIA:-News item "..
=t 4.
years expanded into a full-blown clandes .- .,.....:,?. s..: _~ ,
tine operation with "safe houses" in the San of an MICULTRA experiment. I All this happened despite the fact that the'!,
Francisco Bay and New York areas, plenty. "It might he argued that ISD was thought National Security Act of 1947 which estab-'
of cash and a range of experiments in-which - to be benign," the. Senate investigating l lished' the CIA stipulated. that the agency
LSD and other drugs were tested on unsus- committee reported in 1976. "After thel was to have no,police or domestic intelli
pecting individuals from all levels of sort-:. death of Dr. Olson the dangers of the surrep- genre: function. That was to be left -to the
ety.... titious administration of LSD were clear, yet Federal Bureau of-In e tigatiom
MKULTRA was a secret tightly held with the CIA continued or initiated-a project, What. happened .isahat the (lA officials
in the CIA. Few people within the agency . involving the surreptitious administration construed the language of the legislation in
knew about it. Even the CIA's inspector. of LSD to nonvolunteer human subjects. a way to give them the guise of, authority, to
general.was unaware of it after an inspec- "'T'his program exposed numerous indi- order MKULT.RA`and the variety:of other,
lion in 1957 of the Technical. Services Divi- viduals in the United States to the risk oft domestic operations: which infringed upon
sion which operated the project.-The con death or serious injury without their in-~ citizens' constitutional rights. ? - , =
vesti atin committees said fortified consent, without. medical supervi-l Now the Reagan administration is.work-
in
g g
gressona
there is no . evidence that anyone in the. sion and without necessary follow-up to ing on an executive order that, would put
White House or in the Congress-were told determine any long-term effects."
the 'CIA back in the domestic spying bust=
It was, in brief, an illegal, immoral, secret
about iL.. ~ -~--=:`~~'~ ~~,~ ?-'` ~ ' ~" ~?'''~~: ness again. The draft as it stands now, ac-1
How man unsuspecting, - tonvolunteer +.. project carried out by a handful of patriotic,
y professional intelligence a agents who short- cording to 'reports last week, would allow
persons. were gtven LSD or other drugs is p cut the democratic process in what they the CIA to infiltrate domestic organizations
,
not known as MKULTRA records were de= erceived. to be the interests of national and conduct. "special activities" in the Unit
ed States as long as they were not intended.
stroyed in" 1973 on the orders of Richard: security..,
Helms, then director of the CIA. :The congressional. committees' disclo- to influence official policies or politics
It is known, however, that at least one- surer in the mid-1970s about MKULTRA and ' . .The executive. order would replace one
ent
:person; Dr. Frank Olson, a civilian employ -other secret CIA domestic.operations -~ in- Carte ;.in January 1978 to which .President
offree..
ee ofthe Army; died in November 1953 after filtration of organizations, mail surveil- Carter. nsought g CIA to prevent ntelli ence be unsuspectingly=drank.:a glass: of_Coin shocked the?nation and wheeling CIA and .FBI`intelligenceoopera=
lance andspying -.
treau in, which a CIA officer. had injected did severe to theCIA's re tions such as hiKU1;TRA; ' b tilegaicove y
21 n _ ~.. damage IJutn
hihitina entno. hilt not-ll illegal covert
`approximat Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/02/22 CIA-RDP90-01208R000100150113-2