In the early days of MKULTRA, while the Central Intelligence Agency scrambled to defend against the alleged “brainwashing” programs of foreign countries, and to create its own, Agency staff responsible for the program responded to a report describing reported Soviet brainwashing efforts. In a letter formerly classified SECRET, CIA staff dismissed the Soviet techniques as “police tactics which would not be condoned in a democratic country.” The tactics described in the report not only mimic tactics which have been used in Guantanamo Bay and in CIA black sites, proved to be a source of inspiration for some post-9/11 interrogation programs.

Some researchers in the JFK assassination community are aware of the fact that one of the doctors that treated Jack Ruby was none other than Louis Jolyon West, a figure equally infamous for allegedly killing an elephant with LSD and for his work in MKULTRA - the Central Intelligence Agency’s infamous interrogation, hypnosis, and mind control program.

One of the many interesting documents in Central Intelligence Agency’s declassified archives was guidance for public statements regarding their MKULTRA mind-control projects. The guidance, produced in 1983 and modified the following year, was intended for CIA’s Deputy Directors, the Executive Director, the Director of Public Affairs and “all Agency employees on the speaking circuit.” Just over a page long, the text is riddled with lies, errors, and half-truths, starting with the very first sentence.

Forty years after the Central Intelligence Agency’s experiments on U.S. citizens was revealed in a series of Congressional investigations, materials related to their findings and the CIA’s response live easily-accessible online.

Take it from the Central Intelligence Agency - if you want to get away with murder, just say you’re committing a “potentially involuntary redistribution of consciousness.” Here are five times the Agency used jargon to get away with the jarring.

We’ve begun putting the day-to-day diary entries of the Central Intelligence Agency’s Executive Committee in chronological order, starting with 1963: the year John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas.

In a 1978 memo urging the curbing of the newly-empowered Freedom of Information Act, the CIA compiled a list of six FOIA request topics considered to be the most potentially dangerous to the Agency’s reputation.

In early December 1981, the CIA was preparing to go before a Senate Judiciary Committee with the goal of adding additional restrictions to FOIA. A memo released through CREST shows that there were concerns that in making its case, the CIA might overshare the nature of its work, which would lead to leaks, embarrassment, and even worse, a call for stronger transparency laws.