Chronology of Secret Experiments

1931 Dr. Cornelius Rhoads, under the supervision of the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research, inoculated human subjects with cancer cells. Later, he established the U.S. Army Biological Weapons facilities in Maryland, Utah, and Panama, and was appointed to the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission. During his tenure here, he began a series of experiments involving the administration of radioactive materials to American soldiers and civilian patients hospitalized in medical facilities.

1932 The Tuskegee Syphilis Study began. Two hundred Black men who had been diagnosed with syphilis, but were not informed of their disease, were used as guinea pigs to monitor the course and symptoms of the disease instead of being treated. In the end, all of these people died of syphilis, and their families were never told that they could have actually been treated.

1935 The Pellagra Incident: After millions of people died from Pellagra (a disease caused by vitamin deficiency) within two decades, the U.S. Public Health Service Agency finally took action to get to the root of the disease. The director of the agency confessed that they had known for at least twenty years that Pellagra was caused by a niacin deficiency, but did not act because the majority of the deaths occurred among the poor Black population.

1940 Four hundred inmates in Chicago were injected with the malaria microbe in order to investigate the effects of new and experimental drugs. Later, Nazi doctors on trial at Nuremberg cited this American study as an example to defend their own actions during the Holocaust.

1943 In response to Japan’s full-scale biological weapons program, the United States also initiated research on biological weapons at the Fort Detrick military base.

1944 The American Navy used human guinea pigs to test gas masks and protective clothing. Confined to gas chambers, these subjects were exposed to mustard gas and lewisite.

1945 Operation Paperclip was launched. Recruiting Nazi scientists, the U.S. Department of State, Army Intelligence, and the CIA granted them immunity and new identities in exchange for working on top-secret government projects in the United States. “Program F” was initiated by the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission. This program was the most comprehensive study investigating the effects of ‘fluoride’, one of the most critical chemical components in atomic bomb production, on human health. During the research, it was understood that fluoride is one of the most toxic chemicals known to mankind and causes severe damage to the central nervous system; however, most of the information obtained was kept secret in the name of national security out of fear that the production of atomic bombs would be hindered.

1946 Patients in hospitals serving war veterans were used as guinea pigs in medical experiments. To eliminate suspicion, whenever a report was prepared regarding a study conducted in such a hospital, it was ordered to use the words “research” or “investigation” instead of the word “experiment.”

1946–1948 Guatemala Syphilis Experiments: The U.S. Public Health Service deliberately infected mental patients, prisoners, and soldiers in Guatemala with syphilis and gonorrhea without their consent or knowledge, in order to test the effects of penicillin on venereal diseases. (This scandal would officially come to light in 2010, and the U.S. administration would officially apologize to Guatemala.)

1947 The U.S. Atomic Energy Commission issued a secret document stating that it would begin experiments in which human subjects would be intravenously administered radioactive substances. The CIA began research into LSD so that it could be used as a weapon (a tool for mind control, brainwashing) by American intelligence. Both civilian and military subjects were used in these experiments, with or without notification.

1950 The Department of Defense began making plans to test nuclear weapons in deserts and to observe the health problems and mortality rates of people living within the bomb’s blast radius. To determine the extent to which American cities would be damaged in the event of a biological attack, ships belonging to the U.S. Navy sprayed a cloud of bacteria over the city of San Francisco. Numerous people fell ill, exhibiting pneumonia-like symptoms.

1951 The Department of Defense initiated open-air tests using bacteria and viruses that cause disease. It is suspected that large populations were exposed to these bacteria in these tests, which lasted until 1969.

1951 Project Sunshine: The U.S. Atomic Energy Commission and military units began secretly collecting bone tissues of deceased infants and children worldwide, without the permission or knowledge of their families, to analyze the effects of nuclear fallout (specifically the radioactive substance Strontium-90) on human tissue.

1952 Operation Cauldron: Scientists from the British Ministry of Defence and the Porton Down laboratory carried out secret biological weapons trials by spraying plague and tularemia bacteria into the air and onto test animals from ships near the Isle of Lewis off the coast of Scotland. The accidental passage of a civilian fishing vessel through this deadly cloud was hidden from the public for years.

1953 The Ronald Maddison Incident: British Royal Air Force technician Ronald Maddison was deceived at the Porton Down military facility by being told that it was a “new formula testing clothes and protective equipment.” The young soldier, who was secretly subjected to deadly Sarin gas, died within minutes; the British government attempted to cover up the incident for decades.

1953 Operation Midnight Climax: As one of the darkest sub-operations of the MKULTRA project, the CIA established safe houses (brothels) in San Francisco and New York. Unwitting civilian subjects lured to these locations by sex workers were given high doses of LSD. CIA agents secretly filmed and monitored the subjects’ mental breaking points and behavioral changes from behind one-way mirrors.

1953 The U.S. military released clouds loaded with zinc cadmium sulfide gas in Fort Wayne, Minneapolis, Winnipeg, St. Louis, and Leesburg, Virginia, to determine how effective they were at dispersing chemical agents. In experiments jointly conducted by the Army, Navy, and CIA, tens of thousands of people living in New York and San Francisco were exposed to airborne microbes. The CIA launched the MKULTRA project. Officially lasting for eleven years, this research program was designed to produce and test drugs and biological weapons that could be used in mind control.

1955 Seeking to measure the ability to infect large populations with biological agents, the CIA released a bacterium taken from the military’s biological weapons arsenal into Tampa Bay, Florida.

1956 The American military released mosquitoes carrying the malaria microbe into the Savannah region of Georgia and the Avon Park region of Florida. Following each experiment, army agents posing as public health officials examined the effects of the microbe on the victims.

1960 The Department of Defense approved the conduct of field trials regarding LSD on populations in Europe and the Far East. The experiment conducted in Europe within the scope of MKULTRA was codenamed Project Third Chance, and the one in Asia was called Project Derby Hat.

1960s UK Airborne Bacteria Experiments: The British Ministry of Defence subjected large populations to unwitting experimentation by releasing millions of Bacillus globigii (a simulator bacterium claimed to be harmless) into the air in the London underground and along the south coast of England, aiming to map the spread of a potential biological attack.

1964 The CIA and the Department of Defense jointly launched Project MKSEARCH, in which mind control techniques were researched. Project MKULTRA, which appeared to have officially ended in the same year, was actually merged with Project MKSEARCH. Project MKSEARCH is the name given to studies aimed at manipulating human behavior through chemicals (drugs) that cause behavioral and cognitive disorders.

1965 Inmates at Holmesburg State Prison in Philadelphia were given dioxin, the chemical component of Agent Orange, a highly toxic substance used by the U.S. to destroy vegetation and forests during the Vietnam War. The subsequent cancer screening of the inmates indicated that Agent Orange had been suspected of being a carcinogenic substance from the very beginning.

1966 The CIA launched Project MKOFTEN, which was also a continuation of MKULTRA. This was a project investigating the toxic effects of certain chemicals on humans and animals. The U.S. army released the Bacillus subtilis microbe into the New York City subway system. More than one million people inhaled this tainted air as a result of army scientists dropping bacteria-filled bulbs into ventilation grates.

1967 The CIA and the Department of Defense launched Project MKNAOMI, which again aimed to test biological and chemical weapons.

1969 Dr. Robert Mac Mahan from the Department of Defense requested a ten-million-dollar appropriation from the U.S. Congress to develop a synthetic virus within 5-10 years that “attacks the human immune system and cannot be treated with any drug.”

1970 Following the provision of the funding, the project, conducted under CIA supervision, was initiated at the Secret Operations Division at Fort Detrick, known as the military’s top-secret biological weapons facility. Speculation increasingly grew here that molecular biology techniques were being used to isolate AIDS-like viruses. The U.S. intensified efforts to develop “ethnic weapons” designed to target and eliminate specific ethnic groups vulnerable due to genetic variations and differences in their DNA (Military Review, November 1970).

1975 The virus section of the Biological Weapons Center at Fort Detrick was named the Frederick Cancer Research Facilities and placed under the supervision of the National Cancer Institute (NCI). It is estimated that the U.S. Navy initiated a special virus cancer program here to develop viruses that cause cancer. Scientists here also isolated a virus against which there was no immunity. This virus was later named HTLV (Human T-cell Leukemia Virus).

1977 Hearings held in the Senate confirmed that 239 populated areas had been contaminated with biological agents between 1949 and 1969. San Francisco, the capital Washington, Key West, Panama City, Minneapolis, and St. Louis are just a few of these regions.

1978 Experimental Hepatitis B vaccination studies conducted by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) began in the cities of New York, Los Angeles, and San Francisco. Advertisements placed to find research subjects explicitly emphasized that polygamous homosexual men were being sought.

1981 It was confirmed that the first AIDS cases emerged among homosexual men in New York, Los Angeles, and San Francisco. The emergence of these cases also caused widespread speculation that AIDS was transmitted through the Hepatitis B vaccine.

1985 It was revealed that VISNA, a deadly sheep virus, was highly similar to HTLV (Human T-cell Leukemia Virus). This similarity pointed to an evolutionary relationship common to both viruses.

1986 According to the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (83: 4007-4011), the HIV and VISNA viruses were almost identical to HTLV (carrying a high rate of similarity except for a small portion). This information gave rise to speculations that the HTLV and VISNA viruses might have been combined to isolate a new virus against which there was no natural immunity. A report submitted to Congress revealed the fact that these new viruses produced by the U.S. government included viruses and chemical substances that had been manipulated through genetic engineering in a way that left them with no known treatment in the world.

1987 The Department of Defense acknowledged that it was continuing research activities in 127 facilities and universities across the country, despite the existence of an international convention prohibiting the development of biological weapons.

1994 Dr. Garth Nicholson from the MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston discovered a modified strain of mycoplasma incognitus, a microbe used in biological weapons production, in many of the soldiers returning from Operation Desert Storm using a technique called “gene tracking.” The incorporation of HIV protein coating into 40 percent of its molecular structure indicates that the microbe is man-made. Senator John D. Rockefeller published a report revealing that the Department of Defense had used hundreds of thousands of military personnel as guinea pigs in experiments for at least 50 years and consciously exposed them to dangerous substances. These substances include mustard gas, nerve gas, radiation, and chemicals used during the Gulf War.

1995 The U.S. Government admitted to offering salaries and immunity to Japanese war criminals and scientists who had conducted medical experiments on humans, in exchange for information regarding biological weapons research. Dr. Garth Nicolson came forward with evidence showing that the biological weapons used in the Gulf War were produced in Houston, Texas, and Boca Raton, Florida, and were tested on inmates in the Texas Prison System.

1996 The Department of Defense admitted that soldiers participating in Desert Storm had been exposed to chemical substances.

1997 Eighty-eight members of Congress signed a letter requesting an investigation into the use of biological weapons and Gulf War syndrome.

1998 The British Ministry of Defence refused to reopen the investigation into the death of technician Ronald Maddison, who was killed in a Sarin gas experiment at the Porton Down military facility in 1953. However, due to public pressure and the persistent work of independent researchers, the veil of secrecy over the incident continued to be lifted.

1999 The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs was forced to expand compensation and healthcare rights for thousands of soldiers who were exposed to the chemical “Agent Orange” during the Vietnam War and subsequently contracted various types of cancer. The government indirectly accepted the permanent and genetic damages of the dioxin substance on human health within a broader framework.

2001 Immediately following the September 11 attacks, letters loaded with Anthrax sent by mail to media outlets and senators in the U.S. caused panic. As a result of the investigation named “Amerithrax,” it was revealed that the anthrax spores used were genetically the “Ames strain” produced in the U.S. military’s biological weapons laboratories at Fort Detrick. The prime suspect of the incident, army scientist Dr. Bruce Ivins, committed suicide in 2008 just before a lawsuit was filed.

2004 A historic verdict emerged in the United Kingdom regarding the 1953 Ronald Maddison case. Following years of legal struggle, a newly established forensic jury ruled that Maddison was “unlawfully killed.” This decision became one of the biggest steps legally confirming that soldiers had been misled and used as guinea pigs in chemical and biological experiments at the Porton Down facilities for decades.

2010 U.S. President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton officially apologized to the government and people of Guatemala due to the syphilis experiments conducted in Guatemala between 1946 and 1948. Documents brought to light by Professor Susan Reverby of Wellesley College proved that the U.S. Public Health Service deliberately infected mental patients and prisoners with the disease for penicillin tests.

2013 Former CIA employee Edward Snowden exposed the secret mass surveillance and data collection programs called PRISM, conducted globally by the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA). These cyber operations went down in history as one of the largest mass tracking projects carried out without consent, evolving from biological laboratories to digital surveillance mechanisms in the modern era.

2015 The U.S. Department of Defense (Pentagon) confessed that “live” anthrax bacteria samples were inadvertently sent from a military laboratory in Utah (Dugway Proving Ground) to various locations, including sivil laboratories across the U.S., South Korea, Canada, and Australia. Although the Ministry explained the incident as a procedural error, the lack of oversight in the shipment of deadly biological substances led to a major scandal.

2020 Major debates began in the international intelligence and scientific communities regarding the origin of the SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19) virus, which emerged in Wuhan, China, and turned into a global pandemic. The question of whether the virus spread from nature or accidentally leaked from the laboratory during “gain-of-function” research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology became the focus of official investigations and speculations in U.S. Congressional committees and WHO (World Health Organization) reports.

2022 During the Russia-Ukraine war, the existence of biological research laboratories located on Ukrainian territory and funded by the U.S. Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA), as well as the activities conducted there, became a subject of debate in the international press and the UN Security Council. While the U.S. administration explained that the laboratories were supported for the destruction of dangerous pathogens and peaceful public health research, allegations were put forward by the opposing side that work was being carried out on secret biological weapon components in these facilities.

A significant portion of the events included in this chronology (cases such as the Tuskegee Study, Guatemala Syphilis Experiments, UK Porton Down Chemical Trials, and the MKULTRA Project) are historical facts proven years later by declassified official state documents, senate investigations, and official apology statements from governments.