Museum of Hiram: Library: Operation Mind Control: book review
The message attached below is a news posting I made in September 1990.
At the time I was thoroughly studying the CIA and related activities.
This document used to be available on the WEB elsewhere but I can not
find it today.
With the Senate and House about to sign away all covert action
powers to the President, in after midnight unrecorded votes, I
hereby submit a book review for your consideration:
"Operation Mind Control - Our Secret Government's War Against Its Own People"
W. H. Bowart - introduction by Richard Condon
Dell Publishing Co., Inc
1 Dag Hammarskjold Plaza
New York, New York 10017
Copyright (c) 1978
Paperback format: 317 Total Pages, 7 pages Appendix, 4 pages notes,
13 page bibliography, 8 page index
About The Author, from inside front cover:
Walter Bowart was born in Omaha, Nebraska, in 1939. He was
awarded a McMahon Scholarship in journalism to the Univ.
of Oklahoma, and in 1965 he founded the New York weekly:
"The East Village Other" and was its editor for four years.
Since that time he has been a publisher and free-lance writer
whose articles have appeared in many magazines. Mr. Bowart
lives in Tuscon, Arizona, with his wife and three children.
According to a recent radio interview, Bowart said that there was
only one printing, in paperback, of his book. He said that one
of the board of directors of Dell was an old-timer from the OSS
and didn't appreciate the exposure this book gives to the CIA
drug and mind control experiments.
This book, and John Marks' "The Search for the Manchurian
Candidate", are based upon information released in 1975 by the
Rockerfeller Commission, and the Church subcommittee
investigations. The Rockerfeller Commission was charged with
investigation of illegal CIA operations. The Rockerfeller
Commission report was released on June 6, 1975. The Senate
subcommittee, chaired by Senator Frank Church (D-Idaho)
investigated CIA participation in assassination plots against
foreign leaders, and released its report on November 20, 1975.
John Marks was following up on the information of these reports
and one of his requests for documents under the Freedom of
Information Act, uncovered 16,000 pages of CIA financial records
concerning medical, drug, and mind control experiments carried
out by the CIA since the 1940's. These documents were found in
the spring of 1977. Based upon these reports, documents, and
interviews with participants and victims, Bowart published his
book in 1978, Marks in 1979. The two books are similar in their
coverage of the sources, however Bowart comes to the conclusion
that the mind control experiments were successful and the
techniques are used by the CIA. Marks comes to the conclusion
that the experiments were interesting intellectual exercises,
but the techniques were abandoned due to no consistent mind-
control results. Bowart's book is rare and hard to find, Marks'
book is still in print today and can be found in any up to date
bookstore.
A quote from "The Murder Talents of the CIA" by Jim Garrison in
the periodical: "Freedom", April-May 1987, page 15:
"The Church committee revealed that more than 1,000 books had
been "produced, subsidized, or sponsored" by the CIA. The
agency, however, refused to make available any listing of the
books, the subjects, or their authors to the congressional
committee. Subsequently, individuals turned to the Freedom of
Information Act to obtain the release of the names of these
agency-produced books but in every instance the federal judiciary
has bypassed this expression of legislative will and paid homage
instead to secret government. Considering the abundant
information which steadily has surfaced with regard to the
agency's commitment to the deception of the American public, the
unflagging support which it continues to receive gives testament
to its remarkable resiliency and influence within the
government."
--Hiram
[*~ Hiram Clawson - Member, Technical Staff, The Santa Cruz Operation ~*]
[*~ P.O. Box 1900, Santa Cruz, CA 95061 - tel. 408-425-7222 ext. 6289 ~*]
[*~ FAX: 408-429-1887, Electronic mail: uunet!sco!hiramc or hiramc@sco.COM ~*]
[ _underscore_ indicates italics ]
"Operation Mind Control - Our Secret Government's War Against Its Own People"
Contents:
page 13 Forward by Richard Condon
page 19 Ch. 1 The Cryptorian Candidate
page 27 Ch. 2 Only One Mind for My Country
page 43 Ch. 3 The Mind Laundry Myth
page 59 Ch. 4 Without Knowledge or Consent
page 75 Ch. 5 Pain-Drug Hypnosis
page 87 Ch. 6 The Guinea Pig Army
page 99 Ch. 7 The MKULTRANS
page 115 Ch. 8 The Mata Hari of Mind Control
page 131 Ch. 9 The Slaves Who Buried the Pharaoh
page 151 Ch. 10 Brave New World in a Skinner Box
page 161 Ch. 11 A School for Assassins
page 171 Ch. 12 The Four Faces of a Zombie
page 183 Ch. 13 The Lone Nuts
page 197 Ch. 14 The Ignored Confessions
page 205 Ch. 15 Another Hypno-Patsy?
page 215 Ch. 16 Confession by Automatic Writing
page 233 Ch. 17 The Patriotic Assassin
page 249 Ch. 18 Deep Probe
page 261 Ch. 19 From Bionic Woman to Stimulated Cat
page 275 Ch. 20 The Engines of Security
page 285 Appendix A - Memorandum from Richard Helms to J. Lee Rankin,
Warren Commission Document 1131
page 289 Appendix B - List of Drugs Tested by the CIA [146 listed]
page 293 Notes
page 297 Bibliography
page 311 Index
From pages 144-147:
--Begin Quote--
The Cold War _was_ World War III - a war waged largely with
words. Yet the men who had won World War II with advanced
weaponry were less artful in the use of the new psychological
warfare. As the Cold War escalated, propaganda was followed by
sabotage, assassinations, "para-military" covert operations, and
limited "police actions."
America had traditionally been a free and open society. But
after the war, U.S. leaders held in their hands an awesome
technological superiority. While being the love object of
government, the new technologies, especially nuclear energy, made
the leaders fearful of losing their monopoly. That fear gave
rise to the belief that new secret agencies and operations were
needed to guard against technological thefts by foreign
governments. The Cold War was a "secret" war in more ways than
one.
The psychological war, originally waged only against "enemy"
countries, was nevertheless created at home. It was used within
the United States, against beliefs and free thought, by a secret
bureaucracy which is still supported by all the power of the
federal government, but which operates outside the chain of
government command. It is a secret bureaucracy become paranoid -
a cryptocracy mad with world power.
Although the Central Intelligence Agency has long been the
convenient symbol for all those who have committed atrocities in
the name of national security, the secret bureaucracy, the
cryptocracy, does _not_ consist solely of the CIA. It is as well
a vast network of alliances between _individuals_ in a number of
government agencies normally thought to be outside the
intelligence field.
Since the cryptocracy violates every constitutional principle as
a matter of course, and commits every crime known to man in the
interest of "national security," it cannot entirely rely on the
patriotism of its agents to keep its secrets. Therefore, no
single individual is told more than he has a "need to know."
The cryptocracy is a brotherhood reminiscent of the ancient
secret societies, with rites of initiation and indoctrination
programs to develop in its loyal membership the special
understanding of its mysteries. It has secret codes and oaths of
silence which reinforce the sense of elitism necessary for the
maintenance of its strict loyalty. It is automated, organized in
the mode of a computer, where all have access to general
knowledge and the most obvious aims and goals, but where the
individual is isolated by tribal rituals and
compartmentalization.
It is a technocratic organization without ideology, loyal only to
an unspoken, expedient, and undefined patriotism. Its members
are anonymous. Its funds are secret. Its operational history is
secret. Even its goals are secret. It is a degenerative disease
of the body politic which has grown rampantly, spreading so
invisibly that after nearly four decades its existence is known
only to a handful of "decision makers."
The cryptocracy is designed to function like a machine. It also
has the feelings of a machine - none at all. But, unlike a
machine, it does have ambition. To it, human beings are so much
cheap hardware who perform certain set function which produce
certain predetermined results. They are valued relative to cost
and efficiency. The cryptocracy is the perfect cybernetic
organism - pure logic at the planning level - nothing but
automatic response in the field.
If a prospective agent cannot be recruited by an appeal to
patriotism, he is bribed. If he cannot be bribed, he is
blackmailed. If he refuses to be blackmailed, he is
"programmed." If all these fail, he is killed, for it must not be
known that he had ever been approached - so important is
"national security."
It is sometimes hard to determine whether the cryptocracy is
working for or against the interests of the U.S. President, to
whom its constituent agencies are supposed to be accountable.
Many of its crimes, now a matter of public record, would indicate
that it has often worked against, the President. It _has_, we
know, worked against the U.S. Constitution and the American
people. It has needlessly caused the death of innocent people
who were working for it, just as it has tortured and murdered
those who have stood in its way. Documented atrocities and
criminal blunders have been revealed by congressional
investigations, yet no one has been brought to trial. [Note in
text: Since the completion of this book, former CIA Director
Richard Helms was given a two-year suspended sentence and fined
$2,000 for lying to the United States Congress about the CIA's
involvement in the overthrow of Chile's Allende government.]
Little congressional, judicial, or executive action has been
taken to limit its power or ferret out its leaders. Figureheads
have been changed, but the _organization_ and the National
Security Act which has bred this cancer remains in essence
_un_changed.
The cryptocracy serves big business and spends a good deal of
time and energy supplying American corporations with industrial
intelligence. These favors, offered only to those companies
friendly to the cryptocracy, may be repaid by such things as
political campaign contributions to candidates who are either
sympathetic to or compromised by the cryptocracy. In the past
the cryptocracy has supported both foreign and domestic
politicians with such campaign contributions.
The "old boy network" of retired cryptocrats working within major
corporations plays an important role in the cryptocracy's
international influence. Secret funds are shunted not only from
one agency of government to another, but also from agency to
corporation and then, under cover of the corporation's legal
business activities, throughout the world, wherever expediency
dictates.
Through its authorized functions, the cryptocracy controls the
United States government. It feeds the executive branch
"intelligence reports" which are often slanted and sometimes
falsified, so that the policy decisions which result will be
those which fit the cryptocracy's game plan.
Like a fifteenth century Machiavellian princedom that has been
computerized and automated, the cryptocracy has systematically
manipulated the American consciousness. By justifying its
existence by citing an exaggerated danger from communism, it has
justified its _own_ totalitarianism by convincing key politicians
that fire must be fought with fire. The practices of the
cryptocracy, once officially sanctioned only in operations
outside the U.S., have become internalized. Those practices have
included spying, stealing, blackmail, and murder, even within the
borders of the country it is supposed to protect and defend.
There is nothing hypocritical about the KGB's employment of
totalitarian, police-state tactics. The Soviet equivalent of the
CIA, the KGB, is an extension of the Soviet political system,
which _is_ totalitarian. Neither is there anything hypocritical
about the Chinese use of "brainwashing" on American POWs in
Korea. The Chinese have "brainwashed" three and a half million
of their own people, though generally they used techniques less
drastic than starvation, sleep interruption, and isolation. But
the U.S. cryptocracy is the ultimate hypocrisy, subversive to
its own government's democratic structure. It operates with
methods which are not permitted in most democracies and certainly
not permitted by the Constitution of the United States.
--End of Quote--
You can email the Museum's Curator at
curator@hiram.ws.NoSpam
Page last updated: Thursday, 31-May-2001 00:00:00 PDT.