Memorial Day Special: Conspiracies Targeting our Military Heroes

**Discussion begins at 4:45**

Memorial Day is the US holiday observed on the last Monday of May, to honor our military personnel who have died in service to the country. Originally known as Decoration Day, the holiday began after the Civil War to commemorate fallen soldiers, and over time, it expanded to include all U.S. military service members who died in wars and conflicts.  It is a day of remembrance and reflection to honor the sacrifices made by the armed forces and their families.  Now Memorial Day is not to be confused with Veterans Day – which is observed on November 11 of each year, and honors all military veterans who have served both in wartime and peacetime, and recognizes the contributions of all veterans – both living and deceased.  If you’ve been listening to this podcast for a while, you know that we are huge supporters of the military and we love our veterans.  So in honor of the holiday, I thought we would take a look at some of the other sacrifices our military servicemen and women have made over the years, often without their knowledge.  Unfortunately, many of these have proof proof – so they don’t really even fall into the “conspiracy theory” realm, but they are definitely conspiracies…

Transcript

Hey guys.

Hi.

You don't have one, you don't have three, but you do have two SchemeQueens.

You know, the spring virus has been making the rounds.

Oh my gosh.

So, I'm sorry we haven't all been together.

I have crawled out of a cave of health problems.

Kait is back in the cave.

She's researching some of those wives tales that we talked about last week.

She texted me that she had some soup, and it did warm her up and make her feel good.

Anyway, so, yep, two SchemeQueens.

Queens.

Do you get what I'm doing when I do that?

No.

Two chains.

Nope.

One for one.

Oh, okay.

I'll play for you after.

Okay.

It's from your era.

So, we haven't really had a good conspiracy theory the last few episodes.

We've kind of ventured off course, and today's gonna be sort of more of the same.

It's like conspiracies that are factual, that we have proof proof of.

Oh, so these are things that I don't consider conspiracy because we have proof proof.

But they are conspiracy because it's all about multiple people conspiring.

That's when I learned the definition of conspiracy theory.

Yes.

But thank you for joining us today for our special Memorial Day episode.

In memory.

You know, we are pro-military here at 3SchemeQueens, 3SQHQ as Kait would say.

You're right.

And so we're gonna honor them today with these stories.

But before we get into it, so is it time for our drink check?

Yeah, drink check.

How's this, how's this cocktail?

It's delicious.

Yeah.

I didn't even make a face.

And she did not make a face.

This, I knew this one would be up your alley because it has Coke.

Oh.

And lime.

Oh.

And some rum.

Oh.

So I felt like I knew you would-

That's a good drink.

You like the Coke and you like the lime.

It's like put the lime in the coconut, shake it all up, shake it all up.

Our drink check is memorial themed because we would like to pay respects to all our military people who have served.

That's right.

And so we have a themed drink.

That's right.

It is the Cuba Libra.

Cuba?

Yeah, but I'm gonna tell you-

God bless America, Megan.

Well, it was created by Americans.

Ooh.

So Cuba Libra means free Cuba.

Okay.

And this drink goes back to the Spanish-American War.

Ooh.

So there's a couple versions of the story.

One is that in the early 1900s in Havana, there was an American army captain who was living in Havana just after the war.

And he used to go to the local bar and order Coca-Cola with a little lime juice and Bacardi rum.

Ooh.

And he would toast his Cuban comrades and cry, Por Cuba Libre.

Por Cuba Libre.

Exactly.

That sounded much better.

And so this was like, which was the slogan of the Cuban Independence Movement.

There's another version of the story that the Cuba Libre was invented in the Tampa Bay Hotel, where a bartender created the recipe to serve to Teddy Roosevelt's rough riders.

While they awaited transport to Cuba, and that lifting their glasses, the soldiers toasted.

Por Cuba Libre.

Yep.

So I know Cuba doesn't feel very pro-American, but either version of these stories, an American soldier created this drink.

What is the true definition of America?

Freedom.

Freedom.

So let Cuba be free, let America be free.

You know what I mean?

I like how you brought that back in.

Yeah.

All right.

So shall we get into it?

Da da da da da da da.

Quick, list every veteran that you know.

Go.

Well, before we get into the veterans, let's just do a clarification for their listeners about what Memorial Day is really about.

Veterans Day is for the living.

Memorial Day is for those that pass.

Correct.

So for our international listeners, because we have listeners in everywhere, pretty much, not to flex on you.

A hundred different countries.

Heck yeah, we do.

That's everywhere in my mind.

It is a US holiday that is observed on the last Monday in May to honor our military personnel who have died in service to the country.

It was originally known as Decoration Day, and it began after the Civil War to commemorate fallen soldiers, but over time, it expanded to include all US military service members who died in any war or conflict.

Today, I have remembrance and reflection to honor the sacrifices made by the armed forces and their families.

But again, not to be confused with Veterans Day, which is observed on November 11th of each year.

And that is the holiday that honors all military veterans who have served both in wartime and peacetime and recognizes the contribution of all veterans, both living and deceased.

God bless.

So again, if you've been listening to this podcast for a while, you know that we are huge supporters of the military.

We love our veterans.

If Kait were here, I'm sure she would take this opportunity to-

Sure, there would be a rant.

To rant.

Yeah.

Yes.

Not a rant, but like-

In a positive way.

An emotional conversation.

Exactly.

So in honor of the holiday, I thought we would take a look at some of the other sacrifices that our military servicemen and women have made over the years, often without their knowledge.

Oh, are we gonna get into Montauk?

A little bit.

Oh my gosh, okay.

Unfortunately, many of these have proof proof.

So they, again, as I mentioned, we aren't even gonna really fall into the conspiracy theory realm, but they are definitely conspiracies.

Well, I know, baseline fact, that military are often test subjects.

Like majority of government funded research is done on military personnel.

Bingo.

You just summarized.

Because it's cheap.

The episode.

Yeah.

Sentence.

Yeah.

Okay.

All right.

So I know a little bit.

And I know this mostly just from like the psych classes I had to take in college.

Like if you're trying to find evidence for a psych project, 90 percent of what you're going to be using was done with the military.

Hopefully they don't do this anymore because a lot of these stories are a little bit older, but it is kind of eye opening.

Before we get into them again, I have a handful of examples we're going to talk about.

But the Ferris doctrine is a legal principle that originated from a US Supreme Court case.

And it holds that military personnel cannot sue the United States government for injuries that arise from their service in the military.

It states that the government should not be liable for injuries that occur as a result of military service, as these situations are covered by the unique relationship between the government and its service members.

Congress has considered bills to address certain aspects of the doctrine, like maybe providing more compensation for injured service members, but it's still a significant legal barrier for military personnel seeking compensation.

So as we talk about a lot of these and like the repercussions of them, I think what makes it even sadder is like not only did our government experiment on our personnel, but we made it so they can't, they have no way, now they're left, they're dead or left with medical conditions, and they have no way of getting compensation.

Like you lost your leg on the battleground, and now you can't sue them for losing your leg.

Correct.

But what you would get is you get disability.

You just get money.

But I think that in some of these situations, it's a little harder to prove that because these things were done under the radar, it's not as easy as I went to war and I came back missing a leg.

But then, yeah, and then they wouldn't even gray.

Oh, I don't like that.

Yeah.

And now they cannot sue.

Correct.

Oh, that's awful.

Okay.

So again, I've got a handful here.

I watched a lot of docs.

I went on a deep dive here.

So we're going to start with the most famous, the one we've talked about before.

You referenced it a little bit with your Montauk reference.

MKUltra, New York, Mick Ultra.

I love a Mick.

So again, go back to our Montauk, go back to our Plum Island episodes early in season one, our dolphin episode from last summer.

Well, we just talked about RFK and MKUltra.

So we've definitely covered this in the past.

But as a reminder, MKUltra was the covert program run by the CIA under the direction of Alan Dulles during the Cold War that aimed to explore methods of mind control, interrogation, and psychological warfare.

So after the Korean War, POWs came home appearing brainwashed, and the CIA invested $25 million into the experiments that involved secretly dosing subjects with high doses of psychoactive drugs.

Again, we talked mostly about LSD in the past, but there were well over 100 different drugs that were used in these experiments.

Other techniques include electroshocks, hypnosis, sensory deprivation, isolation, verbal and sexual abuse, and torture.

The subjects were in the US and Canada and involved patients in psychiatric hospitals, prisoners and military personnel.

And they were given drugs without their knowledge or consent and again, like researched.

Did they know they were in a study?

They just didn't know what they were getting?

Well, so we'll talk about that in some of these, but like I watched this BBC documentary and they talked about not so much like from the military standpoint that like people would go to like their doctor or like a psychiatrist for help with like a medical condition.

And then they would think they were like undergoing treatment, but it was all like part of the study.

Oh my god, no consent.

So this is happening in the United States, but the CIA was also paying a doctor in Canada to experiment on his patients on their behalf.

A Canadian?

Canadian.

I know.

I thought they were nice.

Goddamn.

But back in the US, prostitutes would also lead victims and subjects to houses that had been set up with two-way mirrors and the CIA would experiment on the unwitting victims.

Many participants experienced long-term psychological damage, including memory loss, depression and anxiety.

In 1973, Richard Helms, the CIA director, ordered the destruction of all documents relating to the project.

But again, we've talked in the past about how then the Church Committee kind of revealed to the public the existence of MKUltra.

In 1977, 20,000 documents were discovered, which led to Senate hearings.

And we learned that over 30 universities were involved in the testing of drugs on quote, unknown citizens of all social levels, high and low, Native Americans and foreign.

They also revealed the army had experimented on their soldiers.

So it sounds like the first, you were asking about these soldiers experimenting, the experiments on the soldiers, which is what our focus is here.

So it sounds like the first phase involved up to a thousand soldiers who had volunteered for testing of chemical warfare experiments by the later phases, the soldiers were unwitting non-volunteers who were drugged and interrogated.

The military personnel involved were threatened with court-martial if they ever told anyone.

So pretty much it ended with the government acknowledging that this happened, but none of the victims or their families have ever received any kind of compensation or apology.

Oh my God.

I think we also touch on how we now know that Nixon ordered the shutdown of the project, and projects like it in the 60s, but we know that they continued to the 70s, and other famous victims included Whitey Bolger was experimented on.

Oh my God.

Ted Kaczynski, you know him?

The Unabomber?

Yeah.

I actually don't know who that is.

Whose brother turned him in?

I don't know.

The Unabomber.

That's a good story.

I don't know anything about it.

Okay.

I also don't know something, something slaughter guy.

No, wait.

There's like the Unabomber, and then there's something else that everybody talks about, and I'm like, I don't know about this.

Oh, okay.

Somebody who chokes people?

No.

A BTK killer?

Maybe.

Bind, torture, kill?

But that's different from the Unabomber.

No, there was something else.

I definitely don't know who that is, but there was somebody else.

Head Bundy?

No, I know who that is.

That's the gay one.

No.

Oh.

Which one's the gay one?

Dahmer.

Dahmer.

Jeffrey Bundy killed all his college girlfriends, right?

Head Bundy.

Head Bundy.

Yeah.

Then Dahmer is the one.

This is so embarrassing.

This is like-

When I don't know things, it's not shocking.

It shouldn't be shocking.

You're like, I don't even know anything that happened before I was born.

Okay.

And then Charles Manson, you know Charles Manson?

Scary person.

Really pale.

That's Marilyn Manson, the singer.

Charles Manser was the cult leader from the 60s, who got his followers to murder Helter Skelter.

You don't know?

Scary guy with makeup on.

That's not him.

No, that's Marilyn Manson.

Oh, I'm so embarrassed for you right now, Colleen.

Was that the one that is also like a Christian leader, and he has like 19 children or something, or like a crazy amount of children?

No, but he had like some of his followers.

His followers are still are like kind of being released from jail.

He just brainwashed.

He had a cult.

There's the movie.

But wasn't it all women?

There were some men.

Ypres, Ypres, whatever.

Ypres Kill?

No.

So I don't know.

We digress.

A lot of famous people that I think all of our listeners probably know.

Just not me.

But you do know Whitey Bulger.

And then we reference in our RFK episode that one of the theories was that Sirhan Sirhan had been MK Ultrad.

So he experimented on.

In the hearings of 1977, it was revealed that at least one person, Frank Olsen, died as a result of the experiments.

I feel like I know that name.

So Frank Olsen, there's a good Netflix movie.

About him?

A good Netflix series about this.

Yeah, I feel like I know that name.

So Frank Olsen was in the Army Medical Corps.

He was an employee, what is now Fort Detrick in Maryland.

So again, we talk a lot about that in our Plum Island episode.

So Camp Detrick and Fort Detrick and Frederick, Maryland, primarily focused on like biologic warfare.

And then we had the Edgewood Arsenal in Edgewood, Maryland, which focused on like chemical weapons research.

But both of these were kind of sub parts of MK Ultra.

Biologic warfare is like viruses, bacteria.

That is what I think is going to be the new world.

Well, slash already is COVID.

Yeah, I mean, we don't believe that that was a, but yes.

But like, that is what I'm terrified of.

But it would have been a pretty successful one if that was the goal, right?

Yeah.

So Frank Olson had a PhD in bacteriology.

Right.

He was smart.

He joined the military to pay for college, which relatable, and was stationed at Fort Detrick, where he worked with ex-Nazis through Operation Paperclip.

Oh my God.

We're going to talk about that in a second, on aerosolizing anthrax.

He was eventually discharged, but remained a contractor for the army.

And he worked on Operation Sea Spray, which we talked about in your chemtrails episode, when they released the Suresha off the ship in San Francisco.

Oh, yes.

I remember that.

He also did a lot of work in Plum Island.

He was in charge of the Special Operations Division at DETRIC, which looked at covert chemical weapon use, and also worked for the CIA as part of Project Artichoke, which is a precursor to MKUltra, which again, we've referenced all of these in previous episodes.

I'm sure you remember them all very clearly.

Yes.

So it sounds like he was sort of becoming disillusioned with the research before he attended a retreat at Deep Creek Lake on November 18th, 1953.

Deep Creek Lake, that sounds familiar.

I think it's like a vacation spot though.

I don't know then.

I know that place.

So we think there are about 12 men at this retreat, including people we've discussed in the past.

Sidney Gottlieb, the CIA chemist responsible for MKUltra.

Allegations are that on November 19th, Robert Lashbrook, Gottlieb's deputy, secretly dosed everyone with LSD.

The following day, he returned home and his family said he was really quiet and disengaged.

And disengaged, I guess.

He was quiet and disengaged.

His wife said, quote, It's a real shame that the adults in this family don't communicate.

And he told her the meeting had gone poorly and he'd made a terrible mistake.

On November 23rd, when Olson returned to work, he was allegedly very ad-shaded and he went to his boss and he's like, You need to fire me.

Well, I just kind of know like you don't have to answer this, but like, why is it always LSD?

Well, that's why I said that LSD is the big one we keep hearing about.

And I don't know, I might talk about that.

Is it because they think it's gonna like open up more brain usage?

Yes, I think they think it's like the true serum.

But again, LSD is the one we talk about a lot, but there were over a hundred.

And we're gonna talk about some of the other crazy.

It's just weird that they almost always dose them with LSD.

Yeah, but in future studies I'm gonna get to, they dose them with other things.

Oh, okay.

But this is just a weird story.

And this is again, this is the one story that the one guy we know for sure was a victim of MKUltra.

So he goes to this retreat, he gets dosed with LSD, he comes home, he's like, not himself.

And then he goes back to work, still not himself.

And he tells his boss, you need to fire me.

Then when he came home with, he was being escorted by his coworker, and he told his wife that they wanted him to undergo psychiatric treatment and to talk to someone who had the appropriate clearance.

So they were taking him to New York City for a little bit to talk to a psychiatrist up there.

Right.

They ended up taking him to see Dr.

Abramson, a CIA quote, allergist.

So not a psychiatrist.

He had done aerosolized research with ulcer in the past.

And it sounds like they stayed for a few days and then headed back to DC.

And then in later stories, we hear that like they went to his coworkers, DuPont Circle apartment, and Olson was like doing handstands and acting bizarrely.

So they ended up turning around and going back to New York.

And so he and his coworker, Lashbrook, are staying in a room together at what was known as the Hotel Pennsylvania.

And then at 2 a.m., Olson falls, jumps, is pushed.

You decide from the 13th floor window.

13th?

Yep, trippy.

A night manager rushes to him on the pavement and he's trying to speak, but nothing makes sense.

The night manager said that he then asked the operator if there had been any calls.

If you made a phone call, you had to go through an operator, right?

Like a person?

Yes.

So you would pick up the phone.

You would say, I want to speak to Dr.

Abramson.

And then she would connect you and then she should hang up the phone.

But sometimes they listen?

But sometimes they just want to listen to the goss, you know?

Oh my god.

I would have loved to have been an operator.

So they said that someone asked someone from room 1018 called Dr.

Harold Abramson and said, well, he's gone.

And the doctor said, well, that's too bad.

And then they disconnected.

And that was a whole phone conversation.

And that's what the operator said?

Yes.

The family's told that he committed suicide.

Fast forward to 1975, the government finally admits that he had been dosed with LSD without his knowledge nine days before his death.

Oh my God.

So the family files a lawsuit.

They ended up receiving apologies from President Ford and the CIA Director Colby, as well as $750,000, which would be $3.8 million today.

Oh my God.

They said, hush.

That's some mad hush money.

It's got kind of a side, side story.

So the money got split up amongst like his kids, his wife and one of his pregnant daughter was trying to use her share to invest in a lumber mill.

So she and her husband and child got on a plane, like a private plane to go assess this lumber mill they were going to invest in.

And the plane went down and they all died.

So that's sad.

But after Olson's wife died, his son, his son had the body exhumed to be buried with his wife.

Right.

And when they dug up the body, they said, you know, why don't we just get like another autopsy?

Oh my God.

And that autopsy determined that he had blunt force trauma to the head and chest that had occurred prior to the fall.

Oh my God.

And they determined this to be homicide.

Oh my God.

We don't know what happened to this guy, but what we know is either he was dosed with LSD, went crazy and jumped out the window.

Or, yeah, which you probably wouldn't have done because it sounds like he began at.

I mean, nine days after his first dose of LSD.

But they're saying that he was behaving oddly.

And the thought is like, when he got the LSD, did he like say something embarrassing?

Did he do something embarrassing?

So we don't know if he didn't receive more than one dose.

Right.

I mean, dose them once doesn't mean they didn't dose it again.

Right.

And they just said they only did it once.

So either suicide or they were worried about him and like, you know, keeping the, keeping their security clearance, like their secrets under wraps.

Push them off a cliff.

Push them off a cliff out of a hotel window.

But yeah.

Okay.

Wow.

So that is MK Ultra.

So that's like the probably the most famous one.

In memoriam of Frank Olson.

Frank Olson.

RIP.

Okay, so the Edgewood Arsenal experiments, like I kind of briefly mentioned, occurred from 1948 to 1975, and the US Army Chemical Corps conducted them at Edgewood Arsenal in Maryland.

And the purpose of these experiments was to try to find ways to temporarily incapacitate the enemy without killing them.

This was an Army program, as I mentioned, separate from like the CIA-run MKUltra, they were occurring at the same time.

You know what my perspective is?

Go Navy, beat Army.

Well, I can get behind that.

Initially, these studies were formed on animals, but by the mid-1950s, they sought to replicate their findings on human subjects.

So you were asking about volunteers and not volunteers.

So this started as a volunteer study, where active duty members were sent on temporary duty and told that they would be testing equipment, i.e.

gas masks, boots, et cetera.

Oh, God.

Okay, so this assignment was sold as a pretty fluff assignment.

No weekends, no scut work like KP duty.

Oh, I'd do that in a heartbeat, risk my whole life for that.

Yeah, so 6,000 6,720 soldiers took part in the experiments involving more than 250 different drugs and chemicals.

Oh, Jesus.

What is different here is that these military personnel did volunteer, but the Cold War and fear did lead to unethical practices.

Volunteers claim that they weren't told exactly what was being studied.

They didn't even know what they were being given.

Dr.

Ketchum, who was in charge of the project, claimed that it was classified in a matter of national security, which is why none of them knew what they were being administered.

When you give informed consent, you have to know the risks and benefits.

And since they don't even know what they're getting, they're not being told the risks and benefits.

So they could not give informed consent.

They were told they couldn't talk about the study or they would face court martial.

So some of the psychoactive agents they talked about, you mentioned, why is it always LSD?

They also experimented with PCP, marijuana, BZ, so like they said, marijuana just made people giggle.

PCP just made people feel like they were rock stars.

So tripping on the loose and eugenic.

But BZ is an anti-cholinergic agent, meaning it works by blocking the action of acetylcholine, a neurotransmitter that plays a crucial role in muscle control and other bodily functions like memory, attention, and arousal.

So it blocks the muscarinic receptors in the brain and body.

And so this is where we get mad as a hatter, hot as hell, red as a beet, dry as a bone, and blind as a bat.

Right.

So when it's ingested or inhaled, it can cause a range of psychological and physiologic effects, including delirium, confusion, hallucination, severe agitation or excitement, memory loss, dilated pupils, dry mouth, blurred vision, increased heart rate, and difficulty in speech and coordination.

The effects can take 30 minutes to two hours to onset, with six to eight hours to peak, and effects can last up to 36 hours.

My God, what a drug.

So, there was a documentary that I use as one of my sources.

It's the Dr.

Delirium documentary on Hulu or Discovery Plus.

In the Dr.

Delirium documentary, they show, when they gave BZ, they had video evidence.

And people going, crazy.

Yeah, and they give BZ at varying dosages to three volunteers, and then one gets a placebo.

So, there's four of them, and they just lock them in a room for days.

And one of these guys in this experiments, who got the-

Wait, all three of them in one room?

Four of them in one room.

Oh, no, no, no.

Can you imagine the poor guy who didn't get the drug?

Go crazy.

And is just like watching, yeah.

Oh my God.

So, the guy who got the highest dosage in this specific study, ended up killing himself and his wife.

Oh.

And so, who's to say whether or not this, and I tried to like do a deeper dive on that, and there's not a lot of information out there.

So, this just kind of goes back.

I know, I mean, I'm mentioning this guy who killed his wife and himself, but these experiments, again, they involve soldiers being exposed to a lot of different chemical agents, and many of the soldiers who volunteered later reported significant psychological issues, including depression, paranoia and memory loss.

So, in Johnson's case, the guy who killed his wife and himself, after undergoing these chemical tests, his mental health deteriorated, and this culminated in, again, the murder of his wife before he took his own life in 1975.

Initially, the US government did not acknowledge any connection between the murder, suicide and these experiments.

However, in the years that followed, as investigations into the Edgewood Arsenal experiments and their effects on participants came to light, it became increasingly clear that his actions may have actually been linked to the harmful psychological effects of the chemicals that he'd been exposed to.

In 2009, a report by the National Academy of Sciences concluded the chemicals used in the Edgewood Arsenal experiments could have contributed to lasting psychological and physical damage in many of the volunteers.

However, the government has still not acknowledged that there's a connection between this murder, suicide involving Raymond Johnson and these experiments.

My God.

Other people in the documentary talk about how they still have daily hallucinations, they couldn't apply for VA benefits because of the classified nature of this study, so when you talked about like, well, what happens if you go to war and you come back with no leg?

Well, usually, you get some VA benefits for that.

Right.

But if like, this is a top secret, you can't apply and say like, and I, you know, I have, I think it's also much harder to prove like a causal relationship.

Right.

You can't even tell people you're a part of this experiment or you could be, you know, jailed.

So how are you supposed to get your benefits?

So they were literally putting military personnel in gas chambers and exposing them to different toxins to study them.

BZ was stockpiled as a result, but as far as we know, was never used in battle.

In 1975, when the studies came to light, the program faced backlash.

It was quickly shut down.

But again, the participants didn't receive any kind of follow-up medical, like they had been getting, you know, maybe, I don't know what it like at certain intervals, seeing a medical provider, because they were trying to assess the like, you know, long-term effects of all of these chemicals they were exposing them to.

Once they shut down the program, there was no more medical follow-up.

That's so cool.

These poor people.

They, again, going back to what we talked about, how the government, they can't sue the government, but I mean, they can't sue the military.

But some evidence was uncovered that the CIA might have been funding some of these studies, and they were, so if you follow the money, the CIA might have been involved in this.

And so veterans were able to sue the CIA, and in 2017, they won, and really what they won is that they were able to get their VA benefits.

Oh my God.

But then there's a whole side story about how like, once they won, there was no attempt on the army's part to like, track down these people, or to track down these people.

So like, if you didn't know, if you weren't involved in the initial like, you wouldn't have known, you wouldn't know that you're now eligible for benefits.

Oh my God.

Also like, did they get back pay for like, the years of suffering without benefits?

I don't know, because I think that the, like, if you apply for your VA benefits, it takes a long time to go through.

But your like, start date of your benefits is like, that first day that you submit your application.

So I feel like if they weren't able to do that, they probably didn't get back benefits.

Yeah, that's crazy.

Sometimes I really hate how, like, the system works.

That's fucked up.

Our military is successful, because you have this belief that, like, your government has your back, and they'll do anything for you.

And so if you get captured, they will come get you.

If you have a, if you lose a leg, they will support you through that, right?

Yeah.

And, but like, and then it's like, wait, they were experimenting on their people.

And then I'm like, then they just leave astronauts in space for a year.

Yeah.

I don't think they do that.

And then Operation Paperclip, this is another one we've mentioned in the past.

Paperclip.

We talked about Erich Traub.

Right.

Because I remember I couldn't pronounce his name in the last one he heard.

I don't think I remember this one.

He was the Nazi scientist who was brought over as part of Operation Paperclip, and he was gifted Plum Island to continue his bioweapons research.

I'm sorry, why are we giving Nazis gifts?

Yeah, why are we giving them islands?

We talked about the islands with bioweapons and chemicals, and like, oh yes, just go.

Put them on an island, maybe.

You know what I mean?

And cut resources.

Well, as a reminder, Operation Paperclip was a secret CIA operation.

See ya.

Love her.

Operation Paperclip was a secret CIA operation from 1945 to 1959, in which more than 1,600 German scientists and engineers were recruited to work on US military projects, particularly in rocketry, aerodynamics and chemical and biological weapons development.

So again, not all 1,600 of these people were Nazis, but many of them were built on the backbone of Nazis.

Yep.

I mean, the ethical issue here is more that we provided like safe haven for former Nazis.

Yeah.

What the frick?

Like you have a skill, so we're just going to forgive what you did.

But on another level, this does impact the veterans because some of the scientific advancements made by these scientists were tested on US military personnel.

So some Nazi doctors had conducted horrific experiments on prisoners during the Holocaust.

And we brought these doctors over and allowed them to be involved in US military research, which for sure could have influenced future unethical studies.

Wow.

We know that some of the scientists brought over with the operation were involved in experiments on soldiers looking at the effects of chemical agents like sarin and mustard gas, as well as biological warfare agents.

Many of them were working in the Edgewood Arsenal experiments, and they were involved in psychiatric experiments, often without consent.

They were guinea pigs in radiation experiments, and then some of the tests led to health problems among military personnel who were unknowingly exposed to these agents.

You know what all this is reminding me of?

What's that?

The most sacrificed soldier there ever was.

Who was that?

Captain America.

He always goes back to Marvel.

And Bucky, to be honest.

Bucky was actually experimented on by Nazis.

Captain America got the good stuff.

LSD?

What do you mean the good stuff?

Probably.

I don't know.

The serum.

Super Soldier serum.

Goddamn it.

Oh, that's what made him a super soldier.

In memoriam.

You may not know who Marilyn Manson is or Ted Kaczynski, but you do know all about Captain America and Bucky.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I know a lot about Bucky.

Ask me anything.

Go ahead.

Ask me when his birthday is.

March 10th.

So we have Project Shad, Shipboard Hazard and Defense, and Project 112.

So in the 1960s and 70s, the government was hoping to investigate the effects of potential chemical and biological weapons, and so they developed Project 112, a subset of Project Shad.

They wanted to more specifically assess the risks posed by exposure to these agents, predict how quickly service members could detect and respond to chemical and biologic attacks.

So 5,900 Navy and Marine Corps personnel were unknowingly exposed.

We had 6,000.

I just over 6,000 in the previous one.

The previous one.

Yeah.

There's just so many.

Yeah.

So they were exposed to biologic agents that included bacterial and viral agents, and then chemical agents and smoke agents that were supposed to simulate spread.

So military personnel were told that they were participating in training exercises.

They were not aware of the exposure until years later.

In 2000, the DOD was forced to release the name of any veteran that may have been exposed to biological or chemical warfare.

So as a result, the Department of VA reported that approximately 6,000 service members were involved in these tests.

Many of those who were part of these tests reported long-term health problems, including respiratory issues, cancers and neurologic disorders.

However, on the VA website, they still deny any known adverse effects related to the Project Shad and Project 112.

But I mean, I feel like when they're like, our goal is to release, for example, a nerve agent and see how long it takes these military personnel to recognize that they have been exposed.

Right.

Like that doesn't sound like a study I want to be in.

No.

You know, that doesn't sound good.

How long till you like, no, who signs up for this?

What I want to know what they're reading when they're choosing to sign up.

Like, how much is obscured?

I mean, I don't know if this, if they were just like, just go about your day because we're doing a training exercise.

Yeah.

And then just watching to be like, what are they going to notice that something's not right?

Like, I mean, I think they had no idea.

I don't think they were signing up for it.

And then the last one, we have kind of some nuclear experiments done on the military.

Of course.

So from 1945 to 1962, the US military conducted a series of nuclear tests in the Pacific Ocean, Nevada, and some other locations.

Thousands of US military personnel, so we have soldiers, sailors, and airmen, were exposed to radiation during these tests.

You know which ones are my favorite?

The seamen?

Yeah.

I'm not funny.

The juvenile humor is easy to predict.

The first large scale test was Operation Crossroads in 1946.

Personnel were often near the blasts, either on ships or a short distance away, and were used as human subjects to gauge the effects of radiation exposure.

So again, some of them were told these were training exercises.

Others had no idea that they were even being exposed to anything.

Many of these veterans later developed cancers, particularly leukemia and thyroid cancer.

They had birth defects in their offspring and other radiation-related illnesses.

And again, it wasn't until decades later that the full extent of their exposure was acknowledged.

In 1990, the US passed the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act to provide compensation to people who were harmed by exposure to radiation during the atomic tests.

However, many atomic veterans were not eligible under this law.

And so the National Association of Atomic Veterans worked tirelessly to raise awareness about the plight of these veterans and push for legislative action, which was instrumental in getting the government to acknowledge the harms and provide some forms of compensation and medical care.

Brutal.

So that's what I have, but it's just kind of a crazy pattern.

It wasn't just one experiment, right?

It was like decades of experiments of different types of experiments against the military.

And then them refusing when we have all these people with health issues, refusing to acknowledge that they're the cause and them having to fight in court just to get veterans benefits is wild.

I will say, I think that now they're, I don't know, they're quicker to be like, here, take it.

From my experience, I think that when you go online, if you have proof that you were exposed to certain things, there is just a list of things you could qualify for.

If you have any kind of respiratory issue and you were in any of these locations, we're just going to give you the money.

Yeah.

Or if you have any GI issues and you were in any of these, I think that they...

Well, and that's physical, but then also the mental side effects of so many things.

That they get a lot of.

But I think that's some of these things, like when we talked about the MKUltra and the psychiatric stuff, and then it's hard to say, did that guy go on to kill his wife and himself?

Would he have done that if he wasn't?

Yeah.

We can't say.

Bro, that's so sad.

And it really makes you not like the government.

So anyway, that was kind of dark, but we talk a lot about our Vietnam vets and our, all these military service members who have died protecting our country, but some of them have died.

Doing other things.

And still thinking that they're fighting for our country, being put at risk without their knowledge and not getting quite the fanfare and appreciation after they died.

So that's what I have.

But well, God bless you, everyone, said Tiny Tim.

Thank you all.

Thank you, Tiny Tim.

Thank you for everyone who served.

Thanks for everyone who supported people who served.

And thanks especially to those who gave the ultimate sacrifice.

So when we're barbecuing this weekend, take a minute to think about them.

Yeah.

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What should the people do?

Stop right now.

Take out your phone.

Think of three vet-ter-in-arians that you know.

And be like, hey, you're not a vet, but you should listen to this episode.

And then scroll on down, give us a five-star review, leave a comment, like, subscribe, interact, catch us on social media, catch us on wherever you listen, catch us on, you know, catch us, how about that?

You know what I mean?

That's a TikTok reference.

Catch me outside, how about that?

And yeah.

I think it's probably been like a month since we've really all been together, and we've all had a like, here's the conspiracy and do you believe it?

And we haven't had like just a good, solid, typical conspiracy theory.

Like again, these are all proven.

So proof proof, they happen.

Sometimes I hate when there's proof proof.

So hopefully next week, we're back all together and we, but I don't want to make any promises.

Next week's my week.

Yeah.

Okay.

Do you have a good conspiracy?

Yeah, I will.

All right.

So come back next Tuesday.

See you next Tuesday.

And we'll have another good one.