Dead Wrong: Straight Facts on the Country's Most Controversial Cover-Ups (4 page)

▸ World War Two

The “sweeping up” by the Allies following the fall of Nazi Germany includes Operation Dustbin, Operation Trashcan, and Operation Paperclip. The Allies perceived that both Russia and China were already enemies. Some generals recommended continuing on from Berlin to Moscow in order to keep Eastern Europe from going Communist, while other generals counseled that land wars in Asia were unwinnable (wisdom that the U.S. later ignored in its wars against Vietnam-Laos-Cambodia, Iraq & Afghanistan).

Therefore, a contest ensued to capture the best of Nazi technology for use in the coming Cold War.

▸ Operation Paperclip

Operation Paperclip “saved” Nazi scientists. It was a mission to determine those scientists of value to the West in the Cold War. We interviewed Nazi scientists, including those who had conducted experimentation on human subjects in concentration camps such as Dachau, to determine what research was of value and potential use. One of these men was the infamous Kurt Blome. They were shielded from conviction at the Nuremberg war trials (although the evidence against them was substantial and they were clearly Nazi war criminals) and they were quite literally “rescued” from the gallows in exchange for their help with U.S. research programs.

▸ Operation Artichoke

Artichoke continued where the research had left off in Nazi Germany, and Kurt Blome worked with the scientists on the program. Frank Olson, as Acting Director of CIA Special Operations Division, oversaw the work of this program. Artichoke largely dealt with mind-control techniques and brutal interrogation methods often ending in the death of what the CIA termed “expendables” (prisoners, suspected double agents, etc.). Olson witnessed these interrogations and apparently considered them immoral and very disturbing. “Tests” under Artichoke included combinations of hypnosis, torture, LSD and other hallucinogens, and “mind-opening” and “tongue-loosening” agents. These tests were in the direction of mind-control, maneuvering subjects into controllable states to manufacture “Manchurian candidates” (programmed killers) or, in the case of interrogations, will-less subjects who became totally compliant. Tests sometimes left victims in vegetative states and were other times fatal.

▸ Use of BW (Bacteriological Warfare) against North Korea

Top secret order JCS 1837/26 dated September 21, 1951, from the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff Command clearly authorized the “field testing” of anthrax weapons and there is evidence that testing was conducted on the civilian population of North Korea.
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Eyewitnesses to the testing verify the reports.
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▸ Murder of Frank Olson

Olson became disturbed at the macabre events to which he was privy and became openly talkative and critical about the secret work the CIA was conducting. Among the things Olson apparently talked about, in addition to the lethal interrogation techniques, were the use of anthrax as a bacteriological weapon during the Korean War, and the fact that the “recanted confessions” of dozens of returning POWs who witnessed BW in North Korea were the apparent result of "debriefings” utilizing techniques garnered from Operation Artichoke.
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A close associate and colleague of Olson at Ft. Detrick, Norman Cournoyer, testified that Olson personally told him that in the course of Operation Artichoke, he had witnessed torture interrogations in Europe that had disturbed him deeply at a moral level, so much so that he was disgusted with the CIA and intended to leave. Cournoyer also stated Olson was convinced that, despite official denials, the U.S. had employed the use of biological weapons, including the use of anthrax, during the Korean War. A film,
Code Name ARTICHOKE,
documents the events surrounding the secret program and can be accessed on YouTube
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Close friends, family, and coworkers document that Frank Olson was a very decent man boxed into a corner by a very indecent position, who became increasingly outraged by what he saw.

Olson was deemed a security risk. The same advanced interrogation techniques under LSD and talk-inducing drugs that were perfected by his Special Operations Division were then used on Olson himself. He then informed the CIA that he was resigning his position, and a few days later he was apparently again drugged, subdued, and thrown out of a thirteenth floor window.

The methods of Operation Artichoke did not disappear. Quite to the contrary, some have apparently been applied at Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib, and most notably, in the CIA secret prisons for extraordinary rendition. Some have accused the government of using Artichoke-type techniques on Josè Padilla prior to his terrorism conviction in 2007 that made him into a “human vegetable.”
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Events Leading to Death of Frank Olson

▸ Late 1940s

In a secret facility at Fort Detrick, Maryland, a massive arms program was underway to develop bacteriological weapons, primarily anthrax spores, which were proven to be highly resistant and therefore suitable for biological warfare.

▸ 1949

As Acting Director of the CIA’s highly secretive Special Operations Division, Olson was privy to many secrets. As a leader of Operation Artichoke (brainwashing and mind control interrogation techniques via drugs, hypnosis, and torture), he witnessed unscrupulous experiments on human beings that resulted in their deaths. The experience left a noticeable mark on him, according to friends and family, and he began to question the morality of their work.

▸ October, 1949

Olson’s free-thinking and talkative lifestyle was considered dangerous in relation to his work in military secrets. He was suspected of disclosing government secrets (an accusation that was never proven) and interrogated by Military Intelligence. Olson was from then on considered a security risk. The Military Intelligence report stated that:

“Olson is violently opposed to control of scientific research, either military or otherwise, and opposes supervision of his work. He does not follow orders, and has had numerous altercations with MP’s … ”

Norman Cournoyer, a co-worker who was close to Olson, summarized:

“He was very, very open and not scared to say what he thought. For that matter, to the contrary. He did not give a damn. Frank Olson pulled no punches at any time … That’s what they were scared of, I am sure.”

▸ April, 1950

Olson was given a diplomatic passport, highly unusual for an Army scientist, and began making frequent trips to Europe, especially to Germany.

▸ 1950-1953

In CIA safe-houses in Germany, Olson witnessed horrific brutal interrogations on a regular basis. Detainees who were deemed “expendable,” suspected spies or “moles,” security leaks, etc., were literally interrogated to death in experimental methods combining drugs, hypnosis, and torture to attempt to master brainwashing techniques and memory erasing … The “live” testing on human beings was designed to extract information from the detainee and then leave him in a blank mental state in which he was unaware what happened to him.

▸ June, 1952

Family and co-workers reported that Olson’s behavior had markedly changed. He became openly critical and talkative about the work being conducted at the CIA.

▸ 1952-1953

CIA established that large doses of LSD are much better “tongue-looseners” than alcohol. They tested the technique on unsuspecting victims right in New York City’s Greenwich Village section, having prostitutes slip the drug into the drinks of customers who were then interrogated.

▸ August, 1953

After returning from another trip to Germany where he witnessed the CIA’s torture-to-death interrogations, Olson became extremely moody. Friends and family commented that he began to behave like he was boxed into a corner and could not do anything about it. He informed close friend and co-worker Norman Cournoyer that he was planning on resigning his CIA position:

“He said ‘Norm, you would be stunned by the techniques that they used. They made people talk! They brainwashed people! They used all kinds of drugs, they used all kinds of torture.’ He said that he was going to leave. He told me that. He said, ‘I am getting out of that CIA. Period.’”

Olson and Cournoyer were both aware of two disturbing truths:

1.The use of anthrax as a biological weapon during the Korean War;

2.The fact that the “recanted confessions” of dozens of returning POWs who witnessed BW in North Korea were the apparent result of “debriefings” utilizing techniques garnered from Operation Artichoke.

▸ Thursday, November 19, 1953

The same LSD interrogation technique that was perfected by his Special Operations Division was then used on Olson himself. At a work retreat just prior to Thanksgiving, the CIA’s “Dirty Tricks” Division met with ten of its scientists at a remote location. Olson was given a large dose of the drug, without his knowledge or permission, and was then interrogated under the influence of LSD using Artichoke techniques.

▸ Friday evening, November 20, 1953

Olson returned home to his family and was visibly and deeply disturbed. He told his wife that there were very serious problems with his work and that he had made “a terrible mistake."

▸ Saturday & Sunday, November 21-22, 1953

Olson stayed inside alI weekend and was very quiet and thoughtful all weekend long. His children recall the weekend as being very somber and serious and vividly remember their father at that time as sitting for hours on the sofa and staring thoughtfully out the window.

▸ Monday, November 23, 1953

Olson informed his boss, Lieutenant Colonel Vincent Ruwet, that he “wanted out of the germ warfare business” to “devote his life to something else” and that he, therefore, was resigning from his position. LTC Ruwet refused to accept Olson’s resignation.

▸ Tuesday, November 24, 1953

Olson returned of the office of LTC Ruwet and again formed him that he was resigning from his position. Lt. Colonel Ruwet advised Olson not to resign and told him that they would take him to New York City to get treatment for his depression about his work.

▸ Friday, November 27, 1953

Olson was brought to New York City by Lt. Colonel Ruwet and was also in the constant accompaniment of a CIA agent who was assigned as his shadow. They checked Olson and the CIA agent into room 1018a (which is actually the thirteenth floor when the first three unnumbered floors are counted) of the Hotel Statler (which is now the Hotel Pennsylvania). They were visited there by a CIA doctor who administered medication to Olson.

▸ Saturday, November 28, 1953, 2:30 AM

In the early morning hours of Saturday night/Sunday morning, Frank Olson went through the closed thirteenth floor window of his hotel room, crashing through a canvas window shade, a cloth curtain covering the shade, and a closed plate glass window, before landing on the 7th Avenue sidewalk.

▸ Saturday, November 28, 1953, 2:30-2:35 AM

Hotel manager Armand Pastore rushed outside, attempting to comfort the victim, who died in his arms.

▸ Saturday, November 28, 1953, 2:30-2:35 AM

CIA agent Robert Lashbrook phoned Dr. Harold Abramson (the doctor working with the CIA who had sedated Olson earlier) from the hotel room. Via the system in use in 1953, Lashbrook had to use the hotel operator to place the call to a number in Long Island. The hotel operator stayed on the line and heard the call in its entirety. After the call was connected and answered, the caller only stated the following: