Pastore told me that Lashbrooks statements and behavior disturbed him and led him to doubt the truth of Lashbrooks recitals. Available documents indicate that a Detrick-CIA interrogation program called Artichoke with which my father was involved had debriefed these POWs prior to their recantations. He brought home a lot of slides from his many travels. At the request of Frank Olsons son, Eric, an autopsy was performed in 1994, revealing that Olson had apparently been struck on the left side of the temple and knocked unconscious before going through the window. In 1996 Eric asked Manhattan District Attorney Robert Morganthau to open a new investigation. 48.43 Those incidents were the inspiration for Condons novel, in which a group of American soldiers are hypnotically brainwashed by the Korean and Chinese communists and one is programmed to kill a presidential candidate. According to an agency memo, the CIA feared KGB agents might employ psychedelics to produce anxiety or terror in medically unsophisticated subjects unable to distinguish drug-induced psychosis from actual insanity. In an effort to school enlightened operatives for that eventuality, Dulles and Gottlieb instructed high-ranking agency personnel, including Gottliebs entire staff at TSS, to take LSD themselves and administer it to their colleagues. It did not spontaneously appear among the youth of the Western world as a gift from the God of Gettin High. When the Church Committee published its findings, Eric realized that Gottlieb had been involved in work much darker than mere experimental drugging., In 1978, an even bigger shocker surfaced: In his memoir, former CIA chief William Colby admitted that Frank Olson was more than an Army scientist, as the official story claimed. Frank remained agitated all weekend. In some Frederick circles, youll hear disapproving murmurs about Erics obsession contrasted with the success of his younger brother, Nils, a dentist. Did Olson tell the British psychiatrist/SIS agent Sargant that he wanted out of the mind-control project, and that his conscience might compel him to reveal publicly what the intelligence services had been doing? They will also be affected by whether or not the assassin is to be killed with the subject. What was the nature of Olsons duties? Ruwet would spent long-daytime hours with Mrs Olson. Then, on June 29, 1953, John Mulholland wrote a letter to journals subscribers. Third, we would later learn that the subject of the experiment was not an Army scientist., We recognized our father in this story only by the fit of the details: the man was a scientist, the year was 1953, the fall was from a tenth floor window.. I had almost been foiled in this opportunity by my initial attempt to engage him in conversation unannounced with CBS cameramen in the background. Jeff Kercheval rolled the mummified palmar surface of the finger pads after having in fused them with a saline solution to puff up the flesh of the finger pads, and I mikrosiled (a silly putty type of material) cast them, both with splendid results, in the hope that ante-mortem fingerprints of Frank Olson in his military records might be retrieved for comparison purposes. During almost a quarter of a century, the CIA conducted or sponsored at least 419 secret drug- testing projects. The essential point is this: it is necessary to insert the notion of psychological discrediting into theManchurian Candidate scenarioas it applies to the Frank Olson story. Would the information be coherent? On August 25, Gottlieb outlined this new project on the application of the magicians art to the covert communication of information in a confidential CIA memo. The one scientist who probably knows the full history, Sidney Gottlieb, revealed little in an appearance before Senator Edward Kennedys Subcommittee on Health and Scientific Research in September. He might have fallen. [15]Mulholland letter to subscribers ofThe Sphinx, June 29, 1953,op. 344-348), So I went on to TSS with Allen [Dulles] blessing and Hughs strong arm around my waist. (2009) and Not Another Teen Movie (2001). Cameron was engaged in secret experimental work for the CIA (details of that can be found in my book Journey into Madness). He explains the contradiction by citing the Shakespearean son who pursues the truth about his fathers murder. Throw him out a window and make it look like he committed suicide., Raji said, Elliot like, are you stupid or something? The serpents were in the details. But his plans were not to be. Dr Sargant was engaged by me as a consultant for a number of programmes. And indeed a consoling one. He told the police that he worked for the Defense Department and he didnt know why Olson had jumped from the window, but he did know that Olson suffered from ulcers and might have been suffering from job-related stress. The agency wanted a drug, as LSD historians Martin A. Lee and Bruce Shlain put it, that would blow minds and make people crazy.. Olson seems to have concentrated on counter- biological warfare, trying to find vaccines and special clothing that would protect against attack. Eric was nine years old at the time. Despite Lashbrooks pathetic attempts to deflect blame by trumping up a bogus psychiatric history for Olson, CIA Inspector General Lyman Kirkpatrick officially (but secretly) concluded that Olsons suicide had been triggered by the LSD dosing. The asterisk at the end of this paragraph directs us to a footnote at the bottom of the page and here it comes: the Frank Olson story as a footnote to assassinations in Europe! I saw no lacerations there, nary a one, although Dr. Di Maios report had indicated the presence of multiple abrasions and lacerations. While we were examining the remains prior to the autopsy, Eric Olson arrived and insisted on viewing his fathers remains. (What Dr. Lashbrook told Dr. Gibson). [1]Mulholland letter to subscribers ofThe Sphinx, June 29, 1953, George Daily Collection, [2]Memorandum for Director, Central Intelligence,Two Extremely Sensitive Research Programs, Central Intelligence Agency, April 3, 1953, authors files, [4]Memorandum for Deputy Director (Administration), Project MKULTRA Extremely Sensitive Research and Development Program,Central Intelligence Agency, April 13, 1953, authors files, [5]Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St. Clair, US Official Poisoner Dies,CounterPunch, Institute for the Advancement of Journalistic Clarity, March 1999, [6]Stewart Alsop,The Center: The Anatomy of Power in Washington, London, Hodder & Stroughton, 1978, [7]John Northern Hilliard,Greater Magic, Kaufman and Greenburg, 1994, page 1095, [8]Mulholland invoice, Central Intelligence Agency, MKULTRA document 4-30, April 13, 1953, authors files, [9]Mulholland letter to Dr. Sidney Gottlieb, Central Intelligence Agency, MKULTRA document 4-29, April 20, 1953, authors files, [10]Memorandum for the Record,Project MKULTRA, Subproject 4, Central Intelligence Agency, MKULTRA document 4-28, May 4, 1953, authors files, [12]Letter to John Mulholland, Central Intelligence Agency, MKULTRA document 4-28, May 5, 1953, authors files, [13]Mulholland letter to Dr. Sidney Gottlieb, Central Intelligence Agency, MKULTRA document 4-2, May 11, 1953, authors files, [14]James B. Alfredson and George L. Daily, Jr.,A Bibliography of Conjuring Periodicals in English: 1791-1983,Magicana for Collectors, York, PA, 1986. But on the day Eric put his father to rest for the second time, the son seemed to have found his footing again. Then, in January 1973, acting on Sidney Gottliebs verbal directions, the Agencys Technical Services personnel sought out and destroyed every single MKULTRA record they could find. He said, I dont want to go on further than that, he said. The sort of contrived accident that the manual recommends for the purpose of disguising a murder as a suicide is a fall from a high window or roof onto a hard surface. It is requested that the original six month time period be extended an additional six months. And what did he know that made his death so convenient? Rinkel, who fled Nazi Germany before the war to work at the Boston Psychopathic Hospital, had known both Abramson and Hoch when all three studied together at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute in Germany. Sources F.W. The committee began testing a wide variety of chemicals on test subjects, from peyote and marijuana to goofball concoctions of sedatives and stimulants. Second would be that my mother or I should have been made aware of it, if it happened. One stoned night, he and a girlfriend got down on their knees in her apartment and began cutting pictures out of magazines and gluing them down. In November 1953 Dr. Gibson, then a young doctor of twenty-five, was working as an admitting psychiatrist at Chestnut Lodge Hospital in Rockville, Maryland. Retired Admiral Eric T. Olson serves as the President and Managing Member of ETO Group, LLC. As a freshman, Eric Olson ('77, Ph.D. '81, DSc '03) planned to follow his chemist-father into a career as a research scientist when he hit an obstacle that forced a profound reckoning. Even more remarkable than what he did not find was what Starrs did find: A large bruise over Olsons left eye, which suggested to Starrs that the victim had been smashed on the head before plunging through the window. As chief of the governments most secret biological lab in the early 1950s Frank Olsons position concerning these allegations could not have been discredited. Everyone seemed to get high on the Frank Olson story. How should we read the word disappeared? Published by Carol Pubishing Group Some of the people they interrogated died. And if it were determined to be glass from the window of Room 1018A, there remained a question whether it came to adhere in this laceration when Dr. Olsons head struck the window of Room 1018A in exiting it or whether it was the broken window glass of Room 1018A already lying on the sidewalk of 7th Avenue when Dr. Olsons head hit there. He was then told the drink had been spiked. The President assured us that the White House would support our efforts to obtain justice. Consequently, the decision to employ this technique must nearly always be reached in the field, at the area where the act will take place. The next day an official SOD car came to convey Frank Olson to New York. What little else they knew came from a small article in their local paper: Army Bacteriologist Dies in Plunge from NY Hotel. In order to assure his family of Civil Service benefits, the CIA had his death officially recorded as a classified illness.. However, the simplest local tools are often much the most efficient means of assassination. VOYAGE OF THE DAMNED (with Max MorganWitts) Eric had captioned the photograph Happy Bikers. There were 8mm videos shot two decades earlier of Erics father, Frank, playing in the garden with the children. In Erics quest for truth two quotes have been key: One came from CBS correspondent Anthony Mason in 1994: Eric, Mason said, you are going to get to the bottom of this, but it is going to be a false bottom.. Even with these additional resources, Mulholland found the project a greater challenge than he expected. Colonel in the Chemical Corps and a man who described himself as a close personal friend of the Olson family. The authors account is based on the documents contained in these two sets of materials. His death was so dark and so unmentionable. He settled in California. TRAUMA (with Max MorganWitts) They reveal new details, including names and dates, about the safe house project, dubbed Operation Midnight Climax, which was part of the CIAs MK-ULTRA program in the 1950s and 1960s to manipulate human behavior. On Sunday night, Frank and Alice Olson took in a movie, Martin Luther, the just-released biopic on the 16th-century Protestant reformer. 5.35 In 1998, the Manhattan District Attorneys office reclassified Olsons death cause unknown.. Its hard to accept that your father didnt die because of suicide, nor did he die because of negligence after a drug experiment, he died because they killed him. It could fry my kishkes if read by the wrong eyes. Eigelsbach, Robert Lashbrook, and Dr. [Abramson].. Certainly the virtuoso job of disinformational engineering that had been applied to the whole affair seemed to suggest that no resources would be spared to keep the truth secret. While our studies so far have been carried out in isolated individuals, one at a time, it is well known that hysteria is compounded when several vulnerable individuals are together. The grave marker was presumptive evidence of his identity and burial location, as was the toe tag attached to the remains in the coffin. New evidence in Olson case suggests similarities with other incidents, The Very Best Men: Four Who Dared: The Early Years of the CIA, The Biology of Doom: The History of Americas Secret Germ Warfare Project. By now, the Agency was utilizing more and more of his expert advice. I hope this helps to set the record straight. Ward and his partner, detective Robert Mullee, took Lashbrook to the precinct house for interrogation. And if you lack provable truth, you do not get justice. DEADLY PERFUME According to George Belk, a former head of the Drug Enforcement Agency in New York, Feldman quit the drug agency following a probe by the internal security division. On page 157 (hardback edition) Regis describes the Tuesday morning when, for the second time after the Deep Creek drugging, Olson arrived at work: Ruwet now decided that this was far more serious than hed realized at first. While interviewing Pastore he showed us the approximate location of a wooden barrier that had been in place at the time Olson fell. This interpretation is given support by another anomaly in the story. Internal memoranda written after the biochemists passing questioned his emotional stability a direct contradiction to statements evaluating his mental state prior to the Deep Creek incident. By March of 1953, he was certainly consulting for the Agency and being paid for these professional services.Inasmuch as he was billing the government on a biweekly basis, it seems apparent that this was ongoing work with at least some of it related to development of Project MKULTRA. employee. He was troubled after he came back from Germany one time. Mike Miniccino, an American businessman and historical researcher who has spent 25 years studying the MK-ULTRA programme and developing a database on its activities says that if Olson expressed doubts about MK-ULTRA and its work then he would have done so to William Sargant, the Harley Street psychiatrist, who had evaluated MK-ULTRAs work and who had been a close colleague of Olsons. Among MKULTRA papers that later came to light, Lee and Shlain write, were, CIA documents describing experiments in sensory deprivation, sleep teaching, ESP, subliminal projection, electronic brain stimulation, and many other methods that might have applications for behavior modification. CIA specialists also studied the effects of magnetic fields, ultrasonic vibration, and other forms of radiant energy on the brain. Falls before trains or subway cars are usually effective, but require exact timing and can seldom be free from unexpected observation. (New York: Henry Holt, 1999; paperback 2000). 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