ForgottenSecrets
Chemical warfare watchers, from scientists to policy advocates, often wonder what went on at the Army Chemical Center during the 1960s.
It was a decade in which thousands of Army enlisted men served as volunteers for the secret testing of chemical agents. The actual historical record, however, has until now remained disturbingly incomplete.
What chemicals was the Army studying?Why was the program never fully documented in books available to the public?Who planned and carried out the tests, and what was their purpose?How, and by whom, were the volunteers recruited?How adequately were they instructed before giving their informed consent?What long range effects, if any, have been found in follow-up studies?
Written by the physician who played a pivotal role in psychoactive drug testing of hundreds of volunteers,the story breaks an official silence that has lasted almost fifty years.Dr. James Ketchum may be the only scientist still equal to the task. His book goes a long way toward revealing the contents of once classified documents that still reside in restricted archives.
The author spent most of a decade testing over a dozen potential incapacitating agents including LSD, BZ and marijuana derivatives. His 380-page narrative, loaded with both old and recent photographs, derives from technical reports, memoranda, films, notes and memories. The book is written primarily for the general reader, but supplemented by a voluminous appendix of graphs and tables for the technically inclined, Dr. Ketchum’s book combines a subjective diary with an objective report of the external events that shaped and eventually terminated the program. Informal and autobiographical in style, it includes numerous amusing anecdotes and personality portraits that make it simultaneously intriguing and informative.
Excerpts:
AA: It gives you a … contented feeling like some [inaudible] of - peace and quiet.Q: Suppose you had to get up and go to work now. How would you do?A: I don’t think I’d even care.Q: Yeah? Well, suppose you, you know, you - well, like the place were on fire?A: I don’t think it would be - it would seem funny.--volunteer who received a THC analogue
....During these dark early morning hours, some of the coalition soldiers are understandably nervous. Their charge is to carry out a plan they have never attempted, except in simulated exercises. Each platoon has gone through drills with gas masks for several days, sometimes also wearing the hated, stifling suits that make it so difficult to function...excerpt from prologue
“They chanced upon a herb that was mortal, first taking away all sense and understanding. He that had eaten of it remembered nothing in the world, and employed himself only in moving great stones from one place to another, which he did with as much earnestness and industry as if it had been a business of the greatest consequence. Through all the camp there was nothing to be seen but men grubbing upon the ground at stones, which they carried from place to place.”From historical article describing atropine poisoning
Price: $59.95 Postage included8" x 10.5" hardcover with 220+ images, many in color.
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