35. ⁠CIA Mind Control: The Birth of MK Ultra (Ep 1)

The Rest Is Classified

Goalhanger

History

4.6 • 732 Ratings

🗓️ 6 April 2025

⏱️ 45 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

What if the government knew how to control your mind? Could a secret program unlock the secrets of the human psyche? And how far would the CIA go to win the Cold War? In the shadowy world of espionage, the line between science and sinister experiments blurs. As the Cold War gripped the globe, the CIA embarked on a desperate quest to weaponise the mind. Unwitting Americans became guinea pigs in a series of covert experiments, pushing the boundaries of ethics and legality. Listen as Gordon and David delve into the shocking truth behind MKUltra, the CIA's mind control program, and the chilling story of Sidney Gottlieb, the man at its centre. ------------------- Order a signed edition of David's latest book, The Seventh Floor, via this link. ------------------- Get our exclusive NordVPN deal here ➼ www.nordvpn.com/restisclassified It’s risk-free with Nord’s 30-day money-back guarantee! Email: [email protected] Twitter: @triclassified Assistant Producer: Becki Hills Producer: Callum Hill Senior Producer: Dom Johnson Exec Producer: Tony Pastor Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	It's like you've been on something already.
0:02.5	70 micrograms of LSD, man.
0:05.0	Gordon, you just look like a purple, fuzzy-shaped being that I'm communing with.
0:10.4	People who only listen to this rather watch it, might think that's what I actually look like.
0:13.7	Anyway, that's normal.
0:14.5	You look fuzzier than normal, Gordon.
0:16.4	Okay, great.
0:24.5	Yeah. Great. We might call it in its new form brain warfare.
0:28.4	The target of this warfare is the minds of men on a collective and on an individual basis.
0:33.6	Its aim is to condition the mind so that it no longer reacts on a free will or rational basis,
0:39.3	but a response to impulses implanted from outside.
0:44.3	The human mind is the most delicate of instruments.
0:47.3	It's so finely adjusted, so susceptible to the impact of outside influences,
0:52.3	that it is proving malleable in the hands of sinister men.
0:56.8	The Soviets are now using brain perversion as one of their main weapons in prosecuting the Cold War.
1:03.8	Some of these techniques are so subtle and so abhorrent to our way of life that we have recoiled from facing up to them.
1:10.4	We in the West are somewhat handicapped
1:12.6	in brain warfare. We have no human guinea pigs to try these extraordinary techniques. Well,
1:18.9	welcome to the rest is classified. I'm Gordon Carrera. And I'm David McCloskey. And that was Friend of the
1:24.3	Pod's CIA director, Alan Dulleses giving a talk which she makes public in April
1:29.4	1953 on the stakes of brain warfare and mind control as seen from the early days of the Cold War
1:37.7	and that's going to be our subject of this series isn't it David The sprawling world of CIA mind control programs under the rather wonderful code name, M.K. Ultra.
	...

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