2. MK-Ultra Mind-Control Experiments
During the Cold War, there was a widespread fear in the United States government that the communist East was experimenting with mind-control techniques on American citizens, particularly those being held as prisoners of war in Vietnam and Korea. The only way to get ahead was to beat them at their own game by achieving mind control first. The logic works perfectly. Until you get to the actual experiments that were done on people in the quest to attain mind control.
In 1953, the director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), Allan Dulles, approved Project MK-Ultra to develop mind-control techniques using means such as psychedelic drugs, electroshock therapy, and people with paralysis. Experiments began with the use of LSD and moved on to heroin, “magic mushrooms,” barbiturates, and other drugs that are now illegal. They occurred mainly on college campuses, possibly because college students would be all too eager to engage in the use of psychedelic drugs. Many had no idea that they were participating in mind-control experiments.
One of the subjects in the experiments was Ken Kesey, who went on to write One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. The trials finally ended in 1973, and in 1975, President Ford established a committee to investigate illegal activity performed by the CIA. The revelations of MK-Ultra led to an executive order that any experiments involving the use of drugs had to require consent from the individual person participating in the study.