Grab your tin foil chapeau — it ’s time to get paranoid . Let ’s take a look at someconspiracy theoriesthat get a few details right .
Conspiracy: The government is trying to control my mind.
The Truth:The government has invested millions in mind control technologies.
Who does n’t want a telepathic ray gun ? The U.S. Army surely does . It ’s already explore a machine that could beam tidings into your skull , consort to the 1998 report “ Bioeffects of Selected Nonlethal Weapons ” [ PDF ] . The story suppose that , with the help of exceptional microwaves , “ this technology could be develop to the point where words could be transmitted to be discover like the spoken word , except that it could only be heard within a person ’s head . ” The gadget could “ intercommunicate with surety ” and could “ facilitate a secret content transmission . ”
In 2002 , the Air Force Research laboratory patent a similar microwave oven equipment . Rep. Dennis Kucinich seemed implicated , because one class in the first place , he proposed the Space Preservation Act [ PDF ] , which shout for a banning of all “ Psychotronic weapons . ” It did n’t slip by .
The head games do n’t hold on there . The CIA ’s massive mind control experimentation , Project MKUltra , persist the pet project of paranoid people everywhere . set about in the other 1950s , the CIA embark on postulate strange dubiousness in memo , like : “ Can we get control of an individual to the point where he will do our bidding against his will and even against fundamental laws of nature , such as self - conservation ? ”
In April 1953 , the CIA decided to find out . The Agency wanted to develop drugs that could manipulate Soviet spies and foreign leader — essentially , a truth serum . The CIA brimmed with other ideas , too , but Director Allen Dulles complained that there were n’t enough “ human wop grunter to try these sinful technique . ”
That lack of test subjects drove the CIA to wander off the honorable deep - end , conduct the Agency to try out on unwitting Americans .
About 80 institutions—44 of them colleges — housed MKUltra labs . There , the CIA toyed with drugs like LSD and diacetylmorphine , test if the substance “ could potentially help in discredit soul , eliciting selective information , and embed proffer and other forms of genial control . ” The CIA tested LSD and barbiturate on genial patients , prisoners , and addicts . It also injected LSD in over 7000 military personnel office without their knowledge . Many bear psychotic episodes .
The CIA tried its hand at erasing people ’s memories , too . Project ARTICHOKE tested how well hypnosis and morphia could induct amnesia . And when the CIA was n’t trying to originate a memory - kill equivalent of the neurolyzer fromMen in Black , it studied Chinese brainwash technique : Project QKHILLTOP examined ancient mind - scrambling methods to make interrogations gentle .
In the wake of the Watergate scandal , the CIA destroyed century of chiliad of MKUltra documents . Only 20,000 escaped the shredder , and the CIA shifted its movement from judgment restraint to clairvoyance . In the mid 1970s , it launched the Stargate Project , which studied the wraithlike phenomenon of “ outside viewing . ” ( That is , the CIA investigate if it were possible to see through paries — with your mind . ) The projection closed in 1995 . A terminal memoranda concluded , “ Even though a statistically significant issue has been observed in the lab , it remains undecipherable whether the existence of a paranormal phenomenon , remote viewing , has been demonstrated . ”
Conspiracy: The government is poisoning me.
The Truth:It poisoned alcohol supplies to curb drinking during prohibition.
As the ’ 20s roared , alcoholism soared . Booze was banned , but speakeasies were everywhere . Few people followed the law , so the Treasury Department get down enforce it differently — by poisoning the tearing hole .
Most John Barleycorn in the 1920s was made from industrial intoxicant , used in paints , result , and fuel . Bootleggers steal about 60 million gallons a twelvemonth , redistilling the pigwash to make it drinkable . To beat back rumrunners away , the Treasury Department started envenom industrial hootch with methyl alcohol . But moonshiner kept stealing it , and masses pop out getting sick .
When dealers noticed something wrong , they take chemists to renature the intoxicant , make it drinkable again . appal , the government throw a counterpunch and bestow more poison — kerosene , gasoline , trichloromethane , and high concentration of methyl group alcohol . Again , it did n’t dissuade drinking ; the booze business carried on as common .
By 1928 , most of the liquor circulate in New York City was toxic . Despite increased illness and death , the Treasury did n’t discontinue taint industrial supplies until the eighteenth amendment was lift in 1933 .
Conspiracy: The government is trying to ruin my reputation.
The Truth:The FBI’s COINTELPRO did it for 15 years.
The FBI has never been a fan of critic . During the second Red Scare , the Bureau fought dissenters , launching a covert broadcast call in “ COINTELPRO . ” Its charge ? To “ expose , disrupt , misdirect , discredit , or otherwise neutralize ” rebellious people and groups .
Under COINTELPRO , the FBI supervise 2000 insurgent smear operations . agent intercept phones , counterfeit documents , and planted false report to create a negative public image of dissenters . COINTELPRO place hate groups like the KKK , but it also keep close lookout man on the “ New Left , ” like polite right marchers and woman ’s rights activists . It trackedMuhammad Ali , Malcolm X , John Lennon , andErnest Hemingway .
Few , however , were look on as closely asMartin Luther King Jr. After MLK gave his celebrated “ I Have a Dream ” spoken communication , this memo floated through FBI offices :
“ In the light of King ’s powerful demagogical language yesterday he remain firm head and shoulder over all other Negro leadership put together when it comes to charm great masses of Negros . We must pit him now , if we have not done so before , as the most severe Negro of the futurity in this body politic from the viewpoint of communism , the Negro , and national security department . ”
King became an unofficial Enemy of State . Agents tracked his every move , performing a “ complete analysis of the avenue of approach aimed at neutralizing King as an efficient Negro leader . ” When a wiretap let out King ’s extramarital affair , the FBI place him ananonymous letter , predicting that blackmail was in his future . “ You are a stupendous impostor and an evil , vicious one at that , ” the alphabetic character said . A month by and by , MLK accepted the Nobel Peace Prize .
COINTELPRO close down in 1971 , although the FBI continued to monitor sure chemical group . In the 1990s , it trackedPETAand put member ofGreenpeaceon its terror watch leaning .
Conspiracy: The government is germ-bombing its own people.
The Truth:It was a common practice during the Cold War.
From 1940 to 1970 , America was a giant germ laboratory . The U.S. Army wanted to assess how vulnerable America was to a biological approach , so it spread cloud of microbes and chemicals over populated areas everywhere .
In 1949 , the Army Special Operations released bacterium into the Pentagon ’s melodic line conditioning organization to watch over how the microbes scatter ( the bacteria were reportedly harmless ) . In 1950 , a U.S. Navy ship sprayedSerratia Marcescens — a vulgar bacteria subject of nonaged contagion — from San Francisco Bay . The bacterium floated over 30 naut mi , propagate through the urban center , and may have caused one demise .
A twelvemonth afterwards , during Operation DEW , the U.S. Army unblock 250 pound sign of cadmium sulfide off the Carolina sea-coast , which circulate over 60,000 square miles . The military did n’t know that cadmium sulfide was carcinogenic , nor did it fuck that it could cause kidney , lung , and liver price . In the 1960s , during Project 112 and Project SHAD , military force were discover to nerve agents like VX and GB and bacterium like E. coli without their knowledge . At least 134 similar experiments were do .
President Nixonended offensive trial of the U.S. biological weapons program in 1969 .
Conspiracy: The government is spreading disease with insects of war.
The Truth:You may have been attacked by a six-legged soldier, but you’re fine.
In 1955 , the military dropped330,000 yellow pyrexia mosquitoesfrom an aircraft over Georgia . The hunting expedition was smartly called “ Operation Big Buzz , ” and the mosquito buzzed their fashion to residential areas . In 1956 , Operation Drop Kick dropped 600,000 more mosquito over an Air Force pedestal in Florida .
In both cases , the mosquitoes did not carry any disease . They were psychometric test weapons , part of the war machine ’s entomological warfare squad , which studied the hemipterous insect ’ power to scatter and attack . Results found that the six - legged soldier successfully feasted on humans and guinea cop placed near the drop arena .
In 1954 , Operation Big Itch devolve 300,000 strikebreaker fleas in the Western Utah Desert . The military machine wanted to test if flea could effectively carry and conduct disease . During one test , a hemipteran - bomb break down to cast off , crack loose inside the plane . The fleas swarmed the cabin , sting everybody aboard .
At the metre , the military be after to build an insect farm , a installation that could produce 100 million infected mosquito per month . Multiple Soviet cities were label with buggy bullseyes .
Conspiracy: The government has exposed me to harmful radiation.
The Truth: If you’re over 50, it’s possible.
“ It is desired that no text file be release which refers to experiments with humans and might have contrary upshot on public belief or result in effectual suits . document cover such work field of study should be relegate ‘ secret . ’ ” — Atomic Energy Commission memo , 1947
In the late 1980s , the U.S. House Committee on Energy and Commerce released a damning account call up “ American Nuclear Guinea Pigs : Three decade of Radiation Experiments on U.S. Citizens . ” The report card spotlighted Operation Green Run , a military mental testing at a Washington Pu facility . There , in 1949 , managerspurposefully releaseda massive cloud of radioactive iodine-131 to test how far it could go downwind . Iodine-131 and xenon-133 reportedly traveled as far as the California - Oregon molding , infect 500,000 acres . It ’s believe that 8000 curies of radioactive iodine floated out of the mill . To put that into linear perspective , in 1979 , Three Mile Island emitted around 25 curies of radioactive iodin .
The report depict that the military planned 12 similar irradiation discharge at other facilities .
The United States also conducted hundreds of unannounced nuclear tests . In 1957 , Operation Plumbbob ( above ) realise 29 atomic explosions windfall in America ’s southwestward . The explosion , which 18,000 soldiers find out nearby , released 58 curies of radioactive iodine — enough radiation to do 11,000 to 212,000 cases of thyroid gland cancer . Through the 1950s alone , over 400,000 people became “ nuclear veterans . ” Many did n’t screw it .
Conspiracy: The government is staging terrorist attacks on itself.
The Truth:Military officials once suggested staging phony terrorist attacks to justify war with Cuba.
In the former sixties , the Joint Chiefs of Staff proposed the impossible : an American attack on America . The plan paint a picture fake terrorist attack on U.S. cities and foundation . The goal ? To blame Cuba and grind away up backing for war .
Officials called the proposal Operation Northwoods [ PDF ] . The original memo suggested that , “ We could get a communist Cuban affright campaign in the Miami area , in other Florida city , and even in Washington . ”
Northwoods suggested that U.S. personnel could disguise themselves as Cuban agents . These undercover soldiers could glow ammunition and cesspool ships in the seaport at Guantanamo Bay . “ We could gasconade up a US ship and fault Cuba , ” the memo says .
Northwoods also include a plan to “ sink a boatload of Cubans en route to Florida ( real or simulated ) " and propose “ an incident which will show that a Cuban aircraft has attack and shoot down a charter civil airline . ” Officials planned to fake a commercial-grade hijacking , secretly landing the planing machine while an selfsame monotone crashed nearby .
When the attacks finished , the governing would release incriminating documents “ actualise Cuban engagement … World opinion and the United Nations forum should be favorably strike by develop the outside image of the Cuban governing as rash and irresponsible . ”
President Kennedyrejected the proposal of marriage .
Conspiracy: The government is manipulating the media.
The Truth:From 1948 to 1972, over 400 journalists secretly carried out assignments for the CIA.
If you think the spinning on news channels today is spoilt , imagine what it would be like if the CIA still steered the ship . UnderOperation Mockingbird , the CIA ’s sticky fingerbreadth touched over 300 newspapers and magazine , includingThe New York Times , Newsweek , and theWashington Post .
Over 400 journalists were in cahoots with the CIA . They promoted the Agency ’s views and provide services : spying in extraneous res publica , gain intelligence , and publication reports written by the Agency . Sometimes , CIA Head Frank Wisner commissioned journalists to write pro - government articles at menage and overseas . And , as if a CIA spin were n’t enough , the Agency also paid editor in chief to keep anti - government pieces off the presses . diary keeper with tie to the CIA also planted fictive intelligence in newsrooms so that unconnected newsperson would pick it up and write about it .
The CIA teamed up with journalist because many reporter had firm foreign ties . A journalist reporting from abroad could conglomerate information that the CIA could n’t , and he could set propaganda better , too .
Although a congressional hearing in the seventies put an end to inside job , Big Brother still manipulates markets elsewhere . In 2005 , the politics spent $ 300 million placing pro - American message in strange media outlet — an endeavor to hamper extremists and rock support .
Read more write up about confederacy theory :
A adaptation of this story ran in 2013 ; it has been update for 2024 .
