Army Continues Cover-Up of Secret Experimentation 65 Years Later
Pentagon moves to block release of court documents
Adan Salazar
The D.O.D. and U.S. Army are attempting to delay a court order
that would force them to provide certain notice to Vietnam veterans
disclosing the extent to which they had secretly been used as test
subjects for experimentation during the Cold War.
Under ‘Project Paperclip,’ the U.S. government recruited Nazi scientists for “postwar intelligence purposes.”
The federal lawsuit, filed by Vietnam Veterans of America as well as
individual soldiers, has dragged on since January 2009, and requests the
Army disclose details about covert testing performed during “Project
Paperclip,” an operation through which the U.S. Office of Strategic
Services recruited Nazi scientists for “postwar intelligence purposes.”
“With the help of Nazi scientists recruited through ‘Project
Paperclip,’ the Army and CIA used at least 7,800 veterans as human
guinea pigs at the Edgewood Arsenal, [Maryland] alone,” the veterans’ class action suit states.
Starting in the 50s, the Army casually went about using troops to
research the effects of various psychoactive elements on the human mind.
“[T]he U.S. government sought drugs to control human behavior, cause
confusion, promote weakness or temporary loss of hearing and vision,
induce hypnosis, and enhance a person’s ability to withstand torture,”
the lawsuit states.
“These experiments also used civilian ‘volunteers’ such as college
students, who were paid small sums to participate, or prisoners,” the
complaint alleges.
Carried out under project names such as “Bluebird,” “Pandora,”
“Monarch,” “Artichoke” and “MKUltra,” subjects were unknowingly
“administered at least 250 and perhaps as many as 400 types of drugs,
among them Sarin, one of the most deadly drugs known, amphetamines,
barbiturates, mustard gas, phosgene gas and LSD,” in efforts to develop
drugs that would produce the desired effects.
“Defendants videotaped many of the experiments involving ‘volunteers;
at Edgewood, as evidence by releases signed by many of the
‘volunteers.’ Varying doses of each substance were administered to the
‘volunteers,’ typically through multiple pathways, including through
intravenous, inhalation, oral and percutaneous,” the suit states (.pdf).
It is also alleged chemicals administered were “above the known toxic
threshold,” and left many service members suffering “excruciating pain,
blackouts, memory loss, hallucinations, flashbacks, trauma, psychotic
disorders, and other lasting health problems.”
“The crux of the veterans’ argument,” reports Courthouse News,
“is that the Administrative Procedure Act obligates the defendants to
provide notice to test subjects and to provide them medical care.”
Additionally, plaintiffs are citing a 1962 Army regulation mandating
that experiment participants “will be told as much of the nature,
duration, and purpose of the experiment, the method and means by which
it is to be conducted, and the inconveniences and hazards to be
expected, as will not invalidate the results.”
Among several claims for relief, the veterans are chiefly seeking the
disclosure of medical information “concerning all tests conducted on
Plaintiffs (including any results thereof),” as well as a court order
“stating Defendants’ duty to provide Plaintiffs with all necessary
medical treatment on an ongoing basis is mandatory.”
