MIND CONTROL SERIES Ryerson CKLN Radio in Toronto: Producer Wayne Morris interviews Ronald Howard Cohen Week 7 (Tape A Side) in a Series of Broadcasts CKLN FM 88.l in Toronto Wayne Morris: Welcome to the International Connection. We are continuing with our radio series on mind control. This is Week #7 in the Series and we have heard so far a lecture by Dr. Colin Ross about the documented history of creating Multiple Personalities in people to be used as Manchurian Candidates or programmed agents. Colin Ross talked about the documented evidence of LSD experiments with children ... where they were kept on strong doses of LSD for up to months at a time. And also the use of brain implant experiments on children by George Estabrooks who is another Canadian doctor who was involved in U.S. National Security mind control experiments. We heard last week the testimony of mind control and radiation experiments conducted on children that was introduced at the Presidential Hearings on Radiation Experiments in 1995. President Clinton has since publicly apologized and compensated some of the victims of the radiation experiments. Survivors of mind control are now calling for hearings on the mind control experiments in particular. Today we are airing the story of Ronald Howard Cohen who was abducted and severely drugged by CIA and military in the late 60's. Ronald Cohen was an activist in the early 60's in the United States and he is a writer. He has subsequently written a book about his experiences, only to have transcripts of the book stolen and he was told he was not publishing a book by the CIA and the FBI. You are listening to CKLN 88.l. Here is the story of Ronald Howard Cohen. RONALD HOWARD COHEN: "Transgressions" by Ronald Howard Cohen Prologue Step 1: The Patricians "We need to surprise human guinea pigs, volunteers won't do. We need to take people by surprise. It is as simple as that." The speaker stopped, looked at the man he was talking to, and took a deep breath. "It's field research," he went on, "that's all. Just field research." "You mean United States citizens? Not Orientals, or Europeans?" "Yes. Don't look at me like that. Better us do it to them than someone else. Don't bring up the menace to me. I'm not big on that." "United States citizens. That's what we're talking about here, right?" "Yes. What's wrong with you? I said yes, God, man. You've put screws into wood. You know it takes some effort. Both of us have been in the world long enough to know that everything has a risk element to it. Field research that's all. Some things aren't pretty. You know that. Don't make me out like I'm a bad guy. I'm responding to a need that's all. Anyway it's not something I brought you in here to debate. It's been cleared from above. Your job is simply to get to work on it." Wayne Morris: I am here talking with Ronald Howard Cohen, a victim and survivor of abduction and drugging experiments by the U.S. government. Welcome Ron. Ronald Howard Cohen: Good morning Wayne. It's a pleasure being here. And I really want to sincerely thank you for having the courage to have me on since it's proved to be a very difficult task to find somebody with any courage at all who has access to the public media. WM: I'd like to thank you for coming on as well. It's a courageous act in talking about this. As you are well aware, and probably a lot of the listeners know, that there are many forces out there that don't want this information to get out into the public and so I appreciate you telling your story. RHC: I guess it's possible that I should start with a brief introduction about who I am. I'm a 53 year old writer who was born in the Bronx, N.Y. about six blocks from Yankee Stadium. I was raised with the idea that I might become the first Jewish President of the United States and I used to think that the Founding Fathers were great human beings. Then in the 1960's I became very active ... I have always been a writier ... since I was fourteen ... I have always considered it as part of my calling. In the 1960's I became very active in the Civil Rights movement and in the Peace Movement, worked with SNCC, and COR, and the War Resistance League. I spent twelve years living in the Village in the Lower East Side in New York. I was a very "hip" dude. And I was an original flower child in Haight-Ashbury. In 1967 I left ... I was one of the original coterie of the people who got that all off the ground. And in so doing, I apparently became part of Mr. Nixon's 20,000 or so shit-list, and became tagged -- I am assuming from the research that I have done -- that this was as per the Houston Project which was something of the coordination of the CIA and the FBI and US Army Intelligence to get all those radicals. Kissinger was convinced and telling Nixon, like, "we've got 1915 out there for God's sakes, Richard!! We've got to do something about it." WM: Did you have any indication that you were being monitored or targeted at that time? RHC: Well, you see, that's very interesting because I was sincerely a member of the counter-culture, and in sincerely being a member of the counter-culture, what our raison d'etre was to change the world ... we used to kid around and to prove your mettle it was "how many undercover narcs did you turn?" and get them to quit the force and become hippies or how many undercover guys did you get to have a drink with you, or even smoke some dope, and start telling you about ... "yeah, well, you know it's not a great job" and blah, blah, blah. Confrontation was part of the game. I hitch-hiked over 100,000 miles, I don't know, maybe 150,000 miles all over the United States. I started out as a careerist. I started out working for the newspapers in New York. I received one of the quickest promotions in the New York Mirror's history from Copy Boy to Assistant Editor and then I worked on trade journals in New York, and I was a careerist. And then the Vietnam War was happening and the Civil Rights Movement, and then ... all of that took place. But it wasn't a thing that was a big deal ... it was sort of like ... well, obviously. If we are the best minds of our generation, and we refuse to be defeated, okay? Well, you are challenging the Dragon ... and the Dragon is going to breathe fire. WM: We could talk about what you were doing at the time of the abduction and talk about the abduction itself. RHC: Let me just give a little bit of background about what MKULTRA was ... it is not the easiest thing in the world to do because Mr. Helms, who was the Head of the CIA, and Sydney Gottlieb who was the CIA Director of the project ... their liaison was with the Department of Defence -- supposedly either shredded or burned all of the files on this. John Marks, who wrote a book, "The CIA and the Cult of Intelligence" ... after they claimed to have burned all the files on MKULTRA -- he came across some documents -- and I have read other things other researchers say like "oh man they didn't burn the documents, it's just a story ..." but it's very deep. I don't know. MKULTRA was a major project ... the sincerity of the reasons, as far as I can make out, was that if you are doing noble work as part of the Warrior Class and you are a spy for the Warrior Class then one of the things that you have to cover is well, what happens if they capture one of us, what are they going to do to us? Well, I don't know. They might give us all sorts of drugs and they might torture us, but we've been through that. They might use more sophisticated things with rays, with god knows what else, just thoughts ... you can just go off into all sorts of trips. There were six major divisions of MKULTRA and what happened with the Project I was tagged under -- which if I am correct was Sub Project 255 -- this came out during the Carter Administration with Senator Kennedy and Senator Church -- was stuff where they basically had worked with US Army people. The BBC did a wonderful documentary on this stuff -- giving LSD and then running US Army through calisthenics. They ruined people's minds. Then they did black prisoners -- of course the United States is a race-conscious, class-conscious society -- they gave drugs to black prisoners, and people in mental institutions. They were discountable. So what. They had many different types of drugs. I was part of the drug culture. I became very well acquainted with what marijuana was, what LSD was ... what I was given was not LSD, was not marijuana. It screwed up my mind for five years. From what I understand in dealing with LSD, they had given it in laboratory settings to people -- and everybody had a bad trip -- they were just miserable. Then they decided to do field research with that ... and there's a lot of conjecture about whether the whole hippie movement was a CIA sponsored project but that's more fantasy than reality. (Eli) Lilly Corporation in Indianapolis, as far as I understand, bought a lot of their drugs for them. If they would release documents, people could be a little firmer on what their understandings are as a matter of fact. They then decided ... we've got to find unsuspecting people. Given their reasoning, if they are looking to protect their agents, they are not going to have a situation where they are going to say "excuse me, can I give you this dangerous drug?", right? They needed to just take somebody and just give them this drug. The situation was politically ... here's these hippies, and they're taking drugs ... well, they don't get along with their families ... they're all travelling around hitch-hiking ... they are easy game ... We pick up a couple of hippies. What are they going to do, go to the police and say "I'm stoned" ? That's, from what I understand, where I came into the picture personally. I was hitch-hiking ... I was very counter-culture. I had given up my career, I had sold all my suits, I was basically in a different garb and hairstyle. I was living and situating myself in different communities ... Lower East Side and Greenwich Village in New York; Berkeley and San Francisco in California, other sections in L.A.; Taos, New Mexico; Boulder, Colorado; Madison, Wisconsin. There were little pockets of counter-culture communities. That was one of the central thrusts. The sixties has gotten such a terrible, bad rap ... the basic good thing that I experienced in the sixties really had nothing to do with drugs. What it had to do with ... that was a tool ... whether the tail wags the dog, or the dog wags the tail ... the thing that I (and I haven't touched drugs in 15 years) ... looked at things ... there is no sense of community, everything is screwed up. Why is everything screwed up? People function in a world that they don't like. Why don't they like it? Because it is competitive. Well, let's try to have a cooperative community. To the executive powers, that's communism ... that's where the New Left came in. Although I wasn't political any longer at that point ... what I had decided was ... I tried politics. I was getting arrested on demonstrations and all that ... it didn't matter. Some guy burned himself to death in front of the Pentagon and Nixon said he was watching football games. What mattered, it seemed to me, was the changing of personal self. Changing about how you relate to the next person you meet. That's what matters. The same function that Mother Teresa functions under ... but that's a whole other gig. So ... I'm hitch-hiking between these communities ... I used to hitch-hike across the country. I would do it in five or six days ... it was like going around the corner for a container of milk to me ... I'm hitch-hiking through Indianopolis, Indiana ... from the west coast to the east coast ... I get picked up by this gentleman who wants to discuss the Vietnam War ... all I wanted to do was get a ride. I sort of debate ... it's like a born-again Christian picks you up and wants to discuss religion ... okay, is this worth 300 miles ... (excuse my cynicism, remember I am from New York City ... I have been here for twenty years, I try to modify it but it flips back every once in a while) ... finally I say the hell with it, this guy's a jerk ... I start telling him my views about the Vietnam War ... immediately he isn't going very far any longer ... he lets me off ... (I hope I have established my sanity before we get into this ... because this starts getting a little weird. The thing is ... when you start talking about stuff ... it's weird ... somebody is listening to you who doesn't know you ... it's sort of like, who's this weirdo talking about weirdness ... I am not weird ... believe me ... after five years of being nuts ... I know what weird is ... I got my feet on the ground, okay? ... but when I start talking about this here, if it sounds bonkers ... it's bonkers ... and it's US government policy that was bonkers ... these projects in 1947 as ARTICHOKE and BLUEBIRD and then became MKULTRA and it was only have supposed to gone on from 1953 to 1957 but it's open to conjecture if it's not still going on ... ) Anyway. I'm standing on the side of the road. This grey car comes and picks me up and I knew how to read drivers ... I had done a lot of hitch-hiking. This guy seemed kind of ironed, starched shirt, slacks, short haircut, nothing in the car, no bouncing doggie heads, or dice, no music going ... so I think, I don't know, insurance salesman. I figured like ... I got in the car and thanked me for giving me a ride. Immediately I wanted to know how far he was going ... and I'm like, if you are interesting, and you are not threatening, he's stopping to pick someone up so you've got to cool them out ... and you talk sex or you talk football or whatever, music ... I tried just chatting this guy up ... nothing. Straight out. Immediately, I go into my mind, I've been in all sorts of situations with people showing me their guns in cars, or people picking you up and saying, I'm gonna rob the gas station up the road ... Whoa, why don't you let me out before you do that, you know, and stuff like that ... Immediately, because this guy's not saying anything, I'm just going, oh is this one a weirdo, is this guy dangerous to me ... I ask him, can I smoke, because I smoke Marlboroughs at the time ... he said, yeah. The thing was the car was immaculate ... in retrospect, it was a government issue car ... I slipped down in the passenger seat, slouched down, trying to assess the situation ... now it starts getting weird. Under the dashboard is a reel-to-real tape recorder ... a small one ... running. I think, oh fuck, what is this? I'd seen a lot of stuff, but that one, I hadn't seen that one before ... I just sort of went, whoa boy, next coffee stop I'm out of here ... I don't want to find out any more literary content, this is enough ... I flip open the side ashtray on the door ... now it gets movie-time bizarre ... I can't explain really what happened ... obviously I got hit somehow by a knock-out drug. But what I thought happened next, and what I see in my mind's eye ... because that's the last coherent observation I had for the next five years ... dig that ... What I see is a needle coming out of the ashtray. Now the mind is going, that's crazy, man, needles don't come out of ashtrays ... and I'm out. The rest of this is like scattershot ... my head was picking up ... like a screen goes black ... and then it becomes light for a little bit ... and it's a little bizarre ... and then it goes black again. And my body ... I'm weak like a kitten ... I'm drugged, zip, zero ... I'm just raising consciousness when I come out of the black. What I remember is it's now night-time ... it's raining and then ... I'm still in the car ... and I look over at the guy ... and I never got a clear ... this is really ... it was sort of ... is that the same guy? What's important and what really happened was a total panic attack, it was sort of like, what the fuck is going on? Out again. Come to. Highway sign. Virginia, Maryland. I know I went to Maryland. There's a place called Fort Detrick, Maryland which is significant to the FBI, the CIA, and US Army Intelligence ... mucho. I don't know if that's where I was taken ... W.M. This was the Edgewood Arsenal ... R.H.C.: Right ... I went out again ... I came to ... I am starting to get tension just remembering all this ... anyway ... (it's not a thing that leaves you ...) ... I came to and now it even gets Alfred Hitchcock movie-ish ... it's still raining, which is the perfect scenario, right? But it's not fiction kids. This is reality. I write fiction ... but this stuff really happened. No doubt. So I come to and there's an M.P. (military police) comes to the window ... he comes out of a little thing ... they go through some gyrations ... we enter this place. I don't know why I was going in and out to tell you the truth ... although I was barely coming out ... We then drive down into a basement driving thing and the door swings open ... Next thing, two guys are walking me up a back staircase, out again, sort of like a ward place ... it is interesting that I have never been able to follow through in all of the research I've done ... I've done years and years of research on this stuff ... the feeling I got ... was like, oh shit, there's other people here ... the research I've tried to get is like nursing staff, dietitians, I mean whatever ... Out again ... the significant part of it ... I don't know how long I was there. My feeling is it was a couple of days, at most a week ... I mean you got to understand ... at that particular time I wasn't following newspapers or calendars and I didn't wear a watch, etc. etc. But it was summertime and it was still summertime ... maybe it was a week, maybe it was a couple of weeks ... one of the other projects by the way was implants but I don't believe that was the thing they did to me ... I believe I got hit with a drug ... I was given a drug ... I do not know with all of the requests, I have files and files, and pages and pages, of Freedom of Information requests, of letters to senators, of letters to congressmen, of letters to every significant journalist that you can think of ... to lawyers, to lawyers' associations ... Believe me when I thanked you for having the courage to have me on, that's heartfelt. I don't know what I was given and I don't know how long I was there ... W.M.: Did you just have the sense that other people were there, or did you actually make eye contact? R.H.C.: Oh no ... it was sort of like bunk-beds, and people are stretched out ... sort of like wipe-out city ... recuperation ward and I just got walked through there ... that's the only ... the last ... they must have hit me ... I mean, I can only assume ... maybe somebody said, oh you didn't give him enough, and then I'm, you know, phlunk ... gone. They erased my memory ... I don't know ... open-ended conjecture ... I don't know what the hell what on there ... it's more than a little bit of curiosity to me ... I then start having some conscious memory of what happens next ... I've been there obviously for some time, and I am now in a cafeteria ... it's an empty cafeteria ... there's two guys ... wearing suits ... government straight arrows in suits ... they walk me down ... they're getting coffee, right? We walk back to a table. I remember one guy was eating a muffin, and one guys shoves a muffin under my nose and says, here you want a bite? And the other guy said, hey leave him alone. Then I'm out again. I'm in a car. A different car. It's sunny out. Highway. Pennsylvania.