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The CIA’s Project MK-ULTRA aimed to find a way to control people’s minds during the Cold War. Chemist Sidney Gottlieb spent $240,000 on LSD to distribute to research facilities and prisons. Some “volunteers” and prisoners died or were left unable to live a normal life. Swiss chemist Albert Hofmann first synthesized LSD in 1938. The US outlawed LSD in 1967, and Richard Nixon declared drug abuse America’s number one enemy. Actors Peter Fonda, Dennis Hopper, and Jack Nicholson took LSD together to prepare for the film The Trip.
Psychologist and writer Timothy Leary famously urged the 1960s counterculture movement to “turn on, tune in, drop out.” He believed that taking LSD would lead to a new society of peace and free thought. What Leary probably didn’t know was that a significant number of people had already been forced to learn exactly what LSD can do to you. In the 1950s, at the height of the Cold War, the CIA feared that the Soviet Union had developed a way to force American prisoners to do their bidding (they hadn’t), and the US spy agency didn’t want to. be left behind. So chemist Sidney Gottlieb was put in charge of a secret program known as Project MK-ULTRA, which was tasked with finding a way to control people’s minds. One of Gottlieb’s first acts was to fork over $240,000 USD to buy as much LSD as possible and bring it back to America. He then distributed the hallucinogenic drug to an assortment of research facilities and prisons, where the human guinea pigs were administered varying amounts. In the years that followed, some “volunteers” and prisoners died, while others were so broken that they could not live a normal life. What was earned? Just the knowledge that LSD doesn’t lead to mind control.
Learning about LSD:
Swiss chemist Albert Hofmann synthesized LSD in 1938 and was the first person to ingest it five years later.
The United States outlawed LSD in 1967, four years before Richard Nixon declared drug abuse America’s number one enemy.
To prepare for Richard Corman’s 1967 film The Trip, leads Peter Fonda, Dennis Hopper and Jack Nicholson took LSD together; Corman also rehearsed it before filming.
