The visionary chemist Sidney Gottlieb was the CIA’s master magician and gentle hearted torturer―the agency’s “poisoner in chief.” As head of the MK-ULTRA mind control project, he directed brutal experiments at secret prisons on three continents. He made pills, powders, and potions that could kill or maim without a trace―including some intended for Fidel Castro and other foreign leaders. He paid prostitutes to lure clients to CIA-run bordellos, where they were secretly dosed with mind-altering drugs. His experiments spread LSD across the United States, making him a hidden godfather of the 1960s counterculture. For years he was the chief supplier of spy tools used by CIA officers around the world.
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Kinzer, author of groundbreaking books about U.S. clandestine operations, draws on new documentary research and original interviews to bring to life one of the most powerful unknown Americans of the twentieth century. Gottlieb’s reckless experiments on “expendable” human subjects destroyed many lives, yet he considered himself deeply spiritual. He lived in a remote cabin without running water, meditated, and rose before dawn to milk his goats.
During his twenty-two years at the CIA, Gottlieb worked in the deepest secrecy. Only since his death has it become possible to piece together his astonishing career at the intersection of extreme science and covert action. Poisoner in Chief reveals him as a clandestine conjurer on an epic scale. Excerpt from Amazon.
Poisoner in Chief: Sidney Gottlieb and the CIA Search for Mind Control by Stephen Kinzer (Playlist) (Reading began on April 20, 2020)
Poisoner in Chief, by Stephen Kinzer: Reading and Comments part 1
Poisoner in Chief, part 2 “Unit 731 and Ft. Detrick: Dirty Business Continued “
Poisoner in Chief, part 3: “LSD, Edgewood Arsenal, Dulles, Blome, and Unwitting Subjects”
Poisoner in Chief, by Stephen Kinzer, part 4: “Gottlieb, Dulles and Ft. Detrick”
Poisoner in Chief, part 5: “Weaponizing LSD”
Poisoner in Chief, part 6: “Abolishing Consciousness”
Poisoner in Chief, part 8:”How Much LSD Can a Person Take?”
Poisoner in Chief, part 9: “A Person’s Psyche Could be Very Disturbed by These Means”
