The CIA’s clandestine operation known as Project MKUltra

The CIA’s clandestine operation known as Project MKUltra, inadvertently transformed the use of LSD from being a highly classified method of mind control into a massively popular drug that, in part, defined the counterculture movement of the 1960’s. While the CIA had no intention to supply the American public with the most potent hallucinogen known at the time , their poorly ran mission to create a foolproof truth-drug created an LSD following and changed it into a prominent entheogen. At that time, issues like the threat of an apocalyptic war with the USSR to the horrifying reports from the Vietnam War to the struggle for civil rights pervaded the minds of many young, disillusioned Americans who then sought an escape from their harsh reality. When they discovered a new and legal (until 1968) psychedelic drug thanks to public advocates like Ken Kesey or Timothy Leary, a massive demand was created, with roughly 2,000,000 individuals admitting to have tried it by the end of 1970 .

In the early 1950’s, prior to Project MKUltra, the groundwork for underhanded scientific research was being laid. Immediately after World War II, the United States’ Office of Strategic Services - the predecessor to the Central Intelligence Agency - launched Operation Paperclip, a mission to prevent the Soviet Union from obtaining any wartime German scientific research or expertise, while exploiting those sources of information to directly benefit American programs. Over 700 German scientists were recruited by the US, both voluntarily and by force . These scientists were employed in various government programs depending on the focus of their research, but the OSS took special interest in the men who had pursued brainwashing and other controversial interrog...

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...presence of LSD in the US that was completely unaffiliated with the government, there is clear evidence that because of MKUltra’s experiments, the drug was propelled from a niche market to a national – even global – stage. In addition to the many subjects of the drug trials, thousands of people were exposed to LSD when they read Leary’s published works and attended his public lectures, participated in Kesey’s Acid Tests and listened to his endorsements, attended Robert Hunters concerts, and witnessed the extensive work done by many others – all influenced by MKUltra in some fashion. Ultimately, the alterations in its use gave the emergence of LSD a sense of irony that truly reflected that era – instead of becoming the government’s secret chemical weapon, LSD became a sacrament that shaped a generation, epitomizing the counterculture’s belief of “make love, not war.”