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Speaker 1: If you're anything like me, you've definitely heard those stories, right,

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the ones that sound just completely wild, you know, whispers

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about secret groups, hidden agendas, government agencies may be doing

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things way outside the law, poisoning citizens, maybe even assassinating rivals,

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the kind.

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Speaker 2: Of stuff you want to dismiss immediately.

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Speaker 1: Exactly. Our first reaction, and it's usually the right one,

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is skepticism. We think, no, the systems we have in place,

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they just wouldn't allow that kind of organized, long term

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darkness to happen.

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Speaker 2: And that tension, that space between healthy skepticism and well

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documented historical fact, that's really what we're diving into today. Yeah,

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we tend to rely on our institutions, government, just the

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system medicine, to be this firewall, you know, to stop

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the really bad organized abuses. But history, well, this few

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tells a different story sometimes, especially the material we've dug

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into for.

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Speaker 1: This, and we have gathered an incredible amount of source

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material here, accounts that details all these pivotal moments in

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history where organized secrecy, real subversion. It wasn't some myth,

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It was documented actions by recognized powerful organizations, including governments themselves, right,

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including governments. The scale of some of these operations when

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you really look at it, it's just it's kind of staggering.

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Speaker 2: It really forces you to look at a pattern, doesn't it.

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You see these institutional players, and when they operate under

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the excuse of say national security or political necessity, they

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consistently sign ways to justify things that are deeply unethical.

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Speaker 1: And they set up structures, whole systems to carry out deception,

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often on a massive scale.

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Speaker 2: Exactly, so when we start dissecting these operations, the question

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isn't really could this even happen? It becomes wow, how

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did they actually manage to keep this secret for as

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long as they did?

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Speaker 1: Okay, so let's untack all of this. Our mission for

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this duck dive today is to really get into these

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specific moments, the times the official story just crumpled and

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you found these organized hidden operations literally reshaping his.

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Speaker 2: And often causing damage to public trust that lasts well

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forever in some cases.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, we're going straight into the details, asking how how

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could this level of secrecy be pulled off? And maybe

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more importantly, what does it reveal about power when it

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operates completely in the shadows, unchecked?

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Speaker 2: And we should probably start with the ultimate conspiracy myth, right,

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the historical reality behind it.

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Speaker 1: It's funny you say Illuminati today and people immediately picture

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like pyram Is all seeing eyes.

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Speaker 2: Maybe Beyonce at a secret meeting.

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Speaker 1: Deciding the fate of the world, or at least gas prices.

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It's this huge, kind of cartoonish fantasy.

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Speaker 2: Which is such a stark contrast to the actual historical group.

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The Order of the Illuminati founded way back in seventeen

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seventy six in Bavaria, which is modern day Germany.

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Speaker 1: And it didn't start as some grand conspiracy. It was

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basically an academic club founded by a guy named Adam Weishaupt.

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He was a law professor University of Ingolstadt.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, and to really get why Weishaupt did this, you

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have to picture Bavaria back then eighteenth century. It was

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incredibly dominated by the Catholic Church, by the Vatican, very conservative,

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very anti Enlightenment. Intellectual freedom basically non existent.

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Speaker 1: We're not talking about just like disagreeing over interpretations here.

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If you were an academic like Weishaupten, you even dared

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to talk about new scientific ideas or rational.

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Speaker 2: Thought or god forbid atheism.

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Speaker 1: Right, you risked everything The Church saw that as heresy,

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and heresy meant serious organized trouble. You could be excommunicated,

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lose your job, get exiled, even thrown in prison.

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Speaker 2: It was such a restrictive climate that Wishoff simply couldn't

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teach or openly discuss the things he actually believed in.

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So he did what dissenters have done throughout history. He

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went underground. He formed a set of society.

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Speaker 1: Initially just a handful of people, right, his students, just.

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Speaker 2: Five students at first. Yeah, And the sources say they'd

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meet secretly, sometimes out in the woods near the university,

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just to discuss these radical enlightenment ideas that were totally

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forbidden in public.

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Speaker 1: And the name it's sell the Illuminati, It's Latin right,

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means enlightened exactly.

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Speaker 2: It wasn't some spooky name picked for effect. It was

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a direct political statement against the Church's dogma. They were saying, look, knowledge,

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reason that should shape society, not just tradition or religious authority.

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In that time and place, that was a seriously subversive

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thing to do.

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Speaker 1: So this wasn't about world domination from the get go.

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It was about survival, protecting ideas.

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Speaker 2: Precisely, the sources talk about complex initiation rights, oaths of secrecy.

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It sounds very cloak and dagger, but the structure, likely

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modeled on things like freemasonry, wasn't about controlling the world.

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It was about protecting the members, many of whom were

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actually influential people themselves, academics, officials who couldn't afford to

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be exposed.

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Speaker 1: And it obviously struck a chord because it grew fast.

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A lot of people were clearly looking for that kind

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of safe space to talk.

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Speaker 2: It did grow rapidly, but the leap from being a

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local university club to something spreading across Europe that really

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hinged on one key individual, the MVP, absolutely Baron Adolph

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Franz Friedrich Friar von nigg Quite.

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Speaker 1: A name sounds important.

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Speaker 2: He was a well connected nobleman, a diplomat, and crucially

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he was already a high ranking freemason. He knew how

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secret societies worked, how they scaled, so.

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Speaker 1: He brought the organizational know how totally.

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Speaker 2: Nigga's influence and connections basically took this small group of

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thinkers and turned it into a real underground movement. It

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spread across Europe, attracting writers, philosophers, reformers. People drawn to

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this idea of discussing rational government away from the prying

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eyes of the church. This was the period when the

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Illuminati became a genuinely organized, albeit small and secret force.

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Speaker 1: But keeping something like that secret, especially as it grows,

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that seems incredibly difficult.

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Speaker 2: It's inherently unstable. More members mean more risk of leaks betrayal,

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and the end when it came was actually pretty quick

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and decisive. Seventeen eighty four, what happened the ruler of Bavaria,

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Duke Carl Theodore. He got increasingly paranoid about these Enlightenment

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ideas bubbling up. He saw them as anti establishment, a threat,

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so he just outlawed all secret societies and specifically named

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the Illuminati full crackdown head quarters. Rated Weiss helped himself

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as banished, other key members arrested or forced to flee.

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By about seventeen eighty seven, for all intents and purposes,

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the historical order of the Illuminati was dead. It lasted

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less than eleven years.

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Speaker 1: Okay, so the actual historical club is finished. But this

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is where the myth really takes off, right, Yeah, how

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does a defunct debating society become this all powerful global conspiracy.

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Speaker 2: It needed a crisis, it needed a scapegoat, and it

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got one almost immediately. Yeah, the French Revolution. Ah, the

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sear of violence and upheaval of the French Revolution terrify

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the old powers of Europe, the monarchies, the Catholic establishment.

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They were desperate to find a single organized enemy to

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blame for it all, rather than systemic social problems.

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Speaker 1: Makes sense, find an external enemy exactly.

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Speaker 2: And this is where certain conservative writers, particularly Jesuit writers,

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according to our sources, really stepped up. They pointed to

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the recently dissolved I Luminadi and basically said, Aha, they

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didn't really disappear, they just went deeper underground. They're the

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ones pulling the strings behind the entire revolution.

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Speaker 1: Wow. So they resurrected a dead group to blame for

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current events.

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Speaker 2: It was incredibly effective propaganda. It shifted the blame away

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from societal issues and onto this invisible, sinister cabal. Perfect

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political tool.

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Speaker 1: And that story travels.

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Speaker 2: It crossed the Atlantic, landed in early America, which had

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just had its own revolution, so paranoia levels were already

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pretty high, and you had these fire and brimstone preachers,

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especially up in New England, who just latched onto these

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sensational stories coming out of Europe.

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Speaker 1: And they added their own spin.

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Speaker 2: Oh yeah, they started preaching that the Illuminati weren't just

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political masterminds, they were literally agents of Satan, controlling everything

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from the shadows, worshiping the Devil, the whole nine yards.

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Speaker 1: So the myth gets bigger, darker.

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Speaker 2: It metastasized. Yeah, it was the perfect bogey man because

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it was based on a real group, which he gave

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the fearsome grounding. But since they were supposedly secret and unseen,

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you could blame them for absolutely anything that went wrong.

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Speaker 1: And then there's a really weird twist. Much later in

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the sixties, this is just bizarre.

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Speaker 2: You have this group of counterculture pranksters basically called the Discordians,

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kind of philosophical gestures. Okay, they thought the whole Illuminati

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conspiracy thing was hilarious, so they decided to essentially troll

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society by deliberately feeding the myth. They started sending out

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fake letters, spreading disinformation, claiming they were the Illuminati and

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taking credit for all sorts of random, ridiculous events happening

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in the world. Laugh pretty much. But the incredible irony

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is that they're prank, they're satire. Actually helped cement the

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modern pop culture image of the Illuminati, as this all

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powerful shadow government became this weird feedback.

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Speaker 1: Loop that's wild. A group founded on enlightenment reason ends

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up becoming a for total irrational paranoia, partly thanks to branksters.

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Speaker 2: It's a remarkable trajectory. So the core of the myth,

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you know, it starts with a real historical attempt to

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organize intellectual resistance against oppression. But the thing that lasts,

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the image we have now is this political phantom conjured

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out of fear and frankly absurdity.

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Speaker 1: Okay, So that journey from organized intellectual secrecy to a

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global myth, it sets the stage for a much darker

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kind of organization, doesn't it, The kind that emerges from

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war desperation and leads to some really severe ethical compromises.

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Speaker 2: Absolutely. We're shifting now to the aftermath of World War

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Two and the Allies face this huge, morally complex question,

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what do you do with literally millions of former Nazis.

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Speaker 1: The answers were all over the map, weren't they.

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Speaker 2: Completely You have the top leadership, the architects the Holocaust

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facing trial at Nuremberg executions for figures like Gurring and Striker.

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Then you had the notorious ones, the manglely types whom

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managed to escape, often with help, slipping away to South America.

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Speaker 1: And then just regular party members.

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Speaker 2: Millions of lower level members who, after some denostification processes,

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were basically reintegrated back into West German society quietly faded

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back in.

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Speaker 1: But there's a fourth category, the one our sources really zero.

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Speaker 2: In on, right, The useful Nazis, the ones with specialized

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knowledge scientists, engineers, doctors, intelligence officers. These weren't the ones

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destined for trial or quiet reintegration. They were seen as assets.

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Speaker 1: Assets that sounds cold, It was cold.

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Speaker 2: They possessed skills deemed too valuable to the emerging Cold

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War struggle. So instead of facing justice, many of them

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got what amounted to a government sponsored get out of

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jail free card and a ticket to America.

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Speaker 1: Which brings us to Operation Paper Club. This wasn't some

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subtle thing, was it. The US government was actively recruiting

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former Nazis.

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Speaker 2: Not just recruiting. They brought over sixteen hundred German and

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Austrian former Nazi collaborators, scientists, engineers, and their families gave

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them new jobs, new homes, often wiping their slates clean.

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Speaker 1: Why what was the justification for bringing literal Nazis to

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the US after fighting a war against.

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Speaker 2: Them the Cold War? Simple as that the moment WWII ended,

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the wartime alliance with the Soviet Union just evaporated instantly.

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It became this new existential conflict, this decades long nuclear

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staring contest. As one source puts it, so, it was a.

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Speaker 1: Race tech race, space race, arms.

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Speaker 2: Race, exactly, and Washington decided that getting a leg up

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on the Soviets, especially in missile technology and aerospace, was

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the absolute top priority, more important than prosecuting war criminals.

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Speaker 1: Apparently, what was the official line. They couldn't just say

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we're hiring Nazis, could they.

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Speaker 2: The official spin was intellectual reparations. The idea was, we're

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just securing German technological know how before the Soviets scrabbit.

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President Truman even signed off on it in nineteen forty six,

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but he put in a condition.

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Speaker 1: What was the condition?

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Speaker 2: He specifically said they should screen candidates and exclude anyone

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who was a hardcore, committed member of the Nazi Party

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or an actual war criminal.

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Speaker 1: Seems reasonable, did they follow.

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Speaker 2: That Not really. The sources make it pretty clear that

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the military and intelligence agencies running paper Clip basically ignored

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that condition when it was inconvenient. They knew the most

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brilliant scientists, the ones they really wanted, were Austin, deeply

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involved with the Nazi regime, sometimes high ranking members.

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Speaker 1: So they faked the paperwork systematically.

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Speaker 2: They altered files, expunged incriminating details from intelligence reports, created

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completely sanitized backgrounds for these individuals. It wasn't a failure

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to screen, It was an organized effort not to screen

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too closely.

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Speaker 1: So people who had done, as the outline says, pretty

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horrific stuff. They got green cards, government contracts.

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Speaker 2: Absolutely, people with direct links to war crimes, slave labor,

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horrific acts. They were welcomed in, given security clearances, put

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to work on sensitive US military and space projects.

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Speaker 1: Was their pushback at the time, Surely people knew this

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was happening.

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Speaker 2: Oh, there was significant outrage, especially from people who understood

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exactly who these individuals were. The sources specifically mentioned Albert Einstein,

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you know, a Jewish scientist who had fled Nazi Germany himself.

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He was pulled by paper Clip. It was a huge

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ethical contradiction using Nazi expertise to fight the next war.

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It definitely cast a shadow over programs like NASA right

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from the start.

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Speaker 1: Let's talk about the most famous example of Werner von Braun.

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Speaker 2: Von Braun, the rocket genius, architect of the V two

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rocket for the nazis later a key figure in the

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US space program helping put Americans on the Moon. Undeniably brilliant.

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Speaker 1: But the V two program that wasn't built in a

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normal factory.

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Speaker 2: Wasn't it. No, It relied heavily on slave labor from

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the door Middelbow concentration camp, horrific conditions. Thousands died.

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Speaker 1: And what was von Braun's role in that? Was he

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just a scientist who looked the other way or was

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he involved?

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Speaker 2: This is where the organized whitewashing really comes in. The

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US government worked hard to present him as just a scientist,

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maybe naive, maybe forced into it. But the evidence gathered

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by Allied investigators after the war, much of which was

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conveniently classified or ignored by the paper clip handlers, strongly

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suggests he was directly complicit, complicit hack Well, the sources

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allege he wasn't just aware of the slave labor. He

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was actively involved in procuring it. There are accounts testimonies

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suggesting he attended meetings where labor quotas were discussed, that

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he even personally visited the camps and allegedly hand picked

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prisoners from places like Buchenwald specifically to work in the

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underground V two factories, knowing they would likely work to death.

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Speaker 1: He hand picked slave laborers.

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Speaker 2: That's the allegation, supported by significant evidence, though heavily contested

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during the push to make him an American hero. Estimates

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are that around twenty thousand prisoners died building his rockets.

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Think about that, more people died building the V two

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than were killed by it in attacks.

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Speaker 1: And the US government knew this, or parts of it.

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Speaker 2: The intelligence suggested they knew that depth of his involvement.

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They just decided his rocket expertise was more valuable than

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accountability for potentially overseeing mass death. It's a truly stunning

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moral calculation.

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Speaker 1: So they took this man, built his heroic American image,

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and he becomes a face of NASA.

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Speaker 2: Incredible, And he wasn't the only one, not by long shot.

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Take Auto Ambrose, who was he? Ambrose was a top

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chemist for ig Farbin, the company infamous for producing cyclon

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b gas used in the death camps. He specialized in

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nerve agents chemical weapons. He was personally involved in setting

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up a synthetic rubber and fuel plant at Monovitz, part

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of the Auschwitz complex, using slave labor. He actually stood

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trial at Nuremberg for using slave labor and was convicted

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as a war criminal.

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Speaker 1: Convicted, and he still got into paper Clip.

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Speaker 2: Despite his conviction, He was brought to the US under

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paper Clip not once, but twice, according to the records.

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Speaker 1: Why what expertise could possibly justify bringing over a convicted

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Nazi war criminal involved in chemical weapons and slave labor.

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Speaker 2: His knowledge of chemical weapons production, particularly nerve agents like Saren,

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which he helped develop. In the Cold War context, that

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knowledge was seen as a vital strategic asset against the Soviets.

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The US military and intelligence agencies decided that his expertise

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outweighed his war crimes conviction and the fact that recruiting

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him basically undermined the entire Nuremberg process they just participated in.

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Speaker 1: So Operation paper Clip wasn't just about grouting scientists. It

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was an organized system for prioritizing perceived national security needs.

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Over justice, even for convicted war criminals.

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Speaker 2: Precisely, it created a secret pipeline, a state sponsored mechanism

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to bypass legal and ethical barriers, all in the name

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of technological advantage.

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Speaker 1: Okay, if recruiting Nazi war criminals wasn't enough of a

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breach of ethics, the next section shifts the focus. It

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looks at organized secrecy and abuse within the US, specifically

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how government and public health bodies treated American citizens.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, this really hits home. We moved from importing foreign expertise, however,

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taint it to the direct systematic abuse of trust involving

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American citizens, often the most vulnerable and.

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Speaker 1: The prime exams to be. The Tuskegee syphilis experiment.

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Speaker 2: An absolute horror story and one that was incredibly organized

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and lasted for an astonishing forty years from nineteen thirty

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two all the way to nineteen seventy two down in Tuskegee, Alabama.

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Speaker 1: How did they even get people to participate in something

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like that for so long?

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Speaker 2: Through deliberate cruel deception, they recruited nearly four hundred black men,

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mostly poor sharecroppers, from the area who had syphilis. They

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lured them in with promises of social free treatment, free meals,

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free medical exams, burial insurance.

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Speaker 1: But they weren't actually treating the syphilis. No.

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Speaker 2: They told the men they had bad blood, which is

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this vague local term for a whole range of ailments.

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It wasn't a real diagnosis. The entire purpose of the study,

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run by the US Public Health Service in cooperation with

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the Tuskegee Institute, was not to treat these men. It

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was to observe the natural long term progression of untreated syphilis.

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Speaker 1: They just watched them get sicker over decades.

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Speaker 2: They watched them fall apart, essentially on purpose, documenting every

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stage of the diseases ravages, blindness, insanity, organ failure, death.

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They treated these men like labrats, not human beings. There

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were about six hundred participants total, three hundred ninety nine

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who had syphilis, and a control group of two hundred

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one who didn't.

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Speaker 1: And the most damning part comes later. Doesn't It would penicillin.

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Speaker 2: That's what makes it utterly unforgivable. By nineteen forty three,

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maybe a bit later to become widespread, but certainly by

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the mid forties, penicillin was discovered and proven to be

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a fast effective cure for syphilis a miracle drug really.

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Speaker 1: So they could have cured these men easily.

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Speaker 2: Easily, but the doctors running the Tuskegee study intentionally withheld it.

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They actively took steps to prevent the participants from getting

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penicillin treatment elsewhere, like through the military during WWII or

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from local doctors. They wanted their pure data set of

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untreated syphilis, even if it meant condemning these men to

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decades of suffering and death.

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Speaker 1: That requires an organized conspiracy, doesn't it. Doctors, nurses, administrators

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all having to be in on it the secret.

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Speaker 2: Absolutely think about the logistics. They had to maintain records,

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track participants for decades, conduct painful procedures like spinal taps,

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which they told the men were treatment, but were actually

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just for data collection and ensure. Generation after generation of

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staff of the Public Health Service kept the secret and

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continued the unethical study. It was a massive, organized betrayal

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of medical ethics.

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Speaker 1: How did it finally end?

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Speaker 2: It only ended because a whistleblower, Peter Buxton, finally leaked

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the story to the press in nineteen seventy two. The

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public outrage was immediate and immense, and the consequences well

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over one hundred of the original participants had died directly

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from syphilis or related complications. By then, many more suffered blindness,

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severe neurological damage, physical disfigurement, and unknowingly passed the disease

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to wives partners, heaving children born with congenital.

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Speaker 1: Syphilis just devastating.

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Speaker 2: The aftermath involved a ten million dollar lawsuit settlement in

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nineteen seventy four. More significantly, it led to major reforms

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and regulations governing human subject research. The National Center for

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Bioethics was established at Tuskegee University, and finally, in nineteen

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ninety seven, President Bill Clinton issued a formal apology on

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behalf of the nation.

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Speaker 1: But the damage to trust, especially in the Black community,

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towards medical institutions that lasts, doesn't it profoundly?

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Speaker 2: Tuskegee became the symbol of medical racism and exploitation. It

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created a deep seated mistrust that affects everything from participation

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in Clinton trials to vaccine hesitancy even today. It showed

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how an organized system could betray the very people that

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was supposed to serve.

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Speaker 1: And the really disturbing thing the sources highlight is that

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Tuskegee wasn't some bizarre, isolated incident. It was part of

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a wider pattern right.

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Speaker 2: Sadly, Yes, the pattern seems to be that if you

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were part of a vulnerable or marginalized population in the

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early to mid twentieth century, prisoners, mental patients, the poor,

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you were considered fair game for risky or unethical experimentation.

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Speaker 1: Blake. What other examples are there?

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Speaker 2: Oh, there are quite a few. Mentioned. Back in the

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nineteen twenties, there's a prison physician named el Stanley who

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was doing these bizarre surgeries grafting animal testicles onto prisoners

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thinking it would boost their vitality or something.

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Speaker 1: Animal testicles seriously.

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Speaker 2: Then, in nineteen forty two, flu vaccines were tested on

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patients in a Michigan mental institution without informed consent. There

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were studies where patients in Connecticut were deliberately infected with

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hepatitis to study the disease.

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Speaker 1: Deliberately infected.

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Speaker 2: Yes, And in the nineteen fifties, inmates at an Atlanta

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prison apparently volunteered the yet to question the nature of

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consent in prison, to have gunnerhea injected directly into their

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urethras for study. The goal wasn't treatment, it was observing infection.

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Speaker 1: So This wasn't just one rogue agency. It was a

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kind of institutional mindset that certain people were expendable for research.

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Speaker 2: It seems that way. These were organized medical projects, often

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funded by government or reputable institutions, but operating under a

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veil of secrecy or indifference when it came to the

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rights and well being of the subjects. It shows a

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systemic willingness to cross ethical lines when the subjects lacked

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power or public sympathy.

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Speaker 1: Okay, that willingness to use citizens as guinea pigs. It

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seems like it reached a whole new level of strangeness

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and maybe even danger with the CIA's Cold War obsession

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mind control.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, we're shifting now from unethical medical studies which were horrific,

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to outright psychological warfare research conducted by the US intelligence

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community on its own people and others.

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Speaker 1: This is mk Ultra. We're talking about.

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Speaker 2: Project mk Ultra, launched by the CIA in nineteen fifty three,

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and you really can't understand it without understanding the Cold

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War paranoia. It was this intense, almost existential fear. The

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US was convinced the Soviets, the Chinese, maybe the North

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Koreans were using sophisticated brainwashing.

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Speaker 1: Technique, brainwashing like in the movies.

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Speaker 2: Well, they believed it was real techniques possibly learned from

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captured Nazi and Japanese research on interrogation and manipulation. They

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feared these techniques could turn captured soldiers or even ordinary

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citizens in despise, assassins or defectors against their will.

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Speaker 1: So the logic was, if they might be doing it,

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we have to do it.

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Speaker 2: First and better. That was the driving force. If mind

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control is possible, American needs to master it before the

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enemy does. That fear fueled what our sources call the

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Crown Jewel of Insane experimentation MK.

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Speaker 1: Ultra, who is running this show.

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Speaker 2: The key figure was a CIA chemist named doctor Sidney Gottlieb.

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He became infamous, nicknamed the Poisoner in Chief, which sounds dramatic,

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but given what he oversaw, it's disturbingly accurate. He was

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obsessed with finding drugs or techniques that could unlock control,

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or even erase the human mind.

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Speaker 1: And a goal was literally mind control, like creating sleeper agents.

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Speaker 2: That was the ultimate fantasy. Yes, could they wipe someone's personality?

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Could they implant a new one? Could they create these

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Manchurian candidate type agents, people you could program, put out

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into the world and then activate with a trigger phrase

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to carry out a mission like an assassination without them

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even knowing why.

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Speaker 1: That sounds completely sci fi. How do they even try

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to achieve that?

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Speaker 2: Through systematic, illegal, and incredibly brutal methods. The sources detail

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a whole catalog of horrors. They conducted experiments, often on

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unwitting subjects, both in the US and abroad. They used

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intense psychological torture, sensory deprivation, hypnosis, extreme electroshock therapy, sleep deprivation.

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Speaker 1: And drugs. Wasn't LSD A big part of it.

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Speaker 2: LSD was central. Gottlieb was fascinated by its potential to

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break down personality. They administered high doses of LSD and

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other potent psychoactive drugs to people without their knowledge or consent, prisoners,

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mental patients, addicts, sex workers, even unsuspecting members of the public,

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and incredibly, their own CIA colleagues.

468
00:24:44,119 --> 00:24:46,440
Speaker 1: They dosed their own agents without telling them.

469
00:24:46,640 --> 00:24:50,240
Speaker 2: Yes, there are documented cases. The idea was to study

470
00:24:50,279 --> 00:24:54,400
the effects in unpredictable environments, and chillingly, the techniques they

471
00:24:54,440 --> 00:24:57,839
explored were often directly based on research learned from captured

472
00:24:57,920 --> 00:25:02,440
Nazi and Imperial Japanese war criminals experts in interrogation, torture,

473
00:25:02,440 --> 00:25:05,880
and breaking people down. They were adapting enemy torture techniques

474
00:25:05,920 --> 00:25:07,440
for use in CIA experiments.

475
00:25:07,559 --> 00:25:10,319
Speaker 1: So the CIA, which is supposed to operate overseas, was

476
00:25:10,359 --> 00:25:12,359
doing this inside the US. How is that legal?

477
00:25:12,720 --> 00:25:15,839
Speaker 2: It wasn't. That's a key point. The CIA is generally

478
00:25:15,880 --> 00:25:19,160
barred from domestic operations. So they set up this elaborate

479
00:25:19,200 --> 00:25:23,640
network of front organizations, shell companies, fake research foundations, using

480
00:25:23,680 --> 00:25:27,599
hospitals and universities as cover, often without the institutions even

481
00:25:27,640 --> 00:25:30,920
knowing that CIA was behind the funding. They created an

482
00:25:31,000 --> 00:25:35,319
organized system specifically to bypass US law and conduct these

483
00:25:35,359 --> 00:25:38,200
experiments on American soil using taxpayer money.

484
00:25:38,240 --> 00:25:41,319
Speaker 1: Can we talk about specific examples who are the victims?

485
00:25:41,640 --> 00:25:45,240
Speaker 2: One well known, though perhaps unusual case is James Whitey Bulger,

486
00:25:45,920 --> 00:25:46,920
the Boston.

487
00:25:46,480 --> 00:25:48,440
Speaker 1: Mob boss that Whitey Bulcher YEP.

488
00:25:48,559 --> 00:25:50,359
Speaker 2: Back in nineteen fifty seven, when he was in federal

489
00:25:50,359 --> 00:25:53,079
prison in Atlanta, he volunteered for what he thought was

490
00:25:53,119 --> 00:25:55,920
medical research into a cure for schizophrenia, but it was

491
00:25:56,160 --> 00:25:58,960
not even close. It was an emic ultra study. Instead

492
00:25:58,960 --> 00:26:03,319
of getting medicinely dosed with LSD not just once, but repeatedly,

493
00:26:03,519 --> 00:26:05,400
nearly every day for over a year.

494
00:26:05,519 --> 00:26:07,920
Speaker 1: A year of LSD doses, what did he report?

495
00:26:08,039 --> 00:26:13,319
Speaker 2: He later described it as nightmarish, constant, terrifying hallucinations, walls

496
00:26:13,319 --> 00:26:17,279
turning to blood, skeletons clawing at him, seeing people's heads

497
00:26:17,319 --> 00:26:21,400
turn into dogheads. He suffered severe paranoia and insomnia for

498
00:26:21,599 --> 00:26:25,319
years afterward. The CIA was basically seeing how much psychological

499
00:26:25,359 --> 00:26:27,880
stress they could induce, how close they could push someone

500
00:26:27,880 --> 00:26:28,640
to the breaking point.

501
00:26:28,759 --> 00:26:32,960
Speaker 1: That's horrific. And then there was Operation Midnight Climax.

502
00:26:33,519 --> 00:26:36,960
Speaker 2: That name alone, it's deliberately unsettling, isn't it. Yeah, this

503
00:26:37,079 --> 00:26:40,279
was maybe one of the most infamous subprojects. The CIA

504
00:26:40,440 --> 00:26:43,799
set up fake brothels, primarily in San Francisco and New York.

505
00:26:43,839 --> 00:26:46,640
Speaker 1: Fake brothels run by the CIA, run by the CIA.

506
00:26:46,839 --> 00:26:49,279
Speaker 2: They hired sex workers and when clients came in, the

507
00:26:49,319 --> 00:26:52,240
men were secretly dosed with LSD in their drinks without

508
00:26:52,240 --> 00:26:53,079
any consent.

509
00:26:52,920 --> 00:26:54,519
Speaker 1: And the CIA just watched.

510
00:26:54,559 --> 00:26:57,119
Speaker 2: They watched from behind two way mirrors with microphone set up.

511
00:26:57,319 --> 00:26:59,000
They wanted to see how the men would react under

512
00:26:59,039 --> 00:27:01,720
the influence of LSD in a real world setting with

513
00:27:01,920 --> 00:27:05,160
a spill secrets. Could the drug be used for blackmail

514
00:27:05,319 --> 00:27:09,000
or interrogation. It was systematic drugging and voyeurism, funded by

515
00:27:09,000 --> 00:27:09,480
the government.

516
00:27:09,559 --> 00:27:12,839
Speaker 1: This wasn't just some failed experiment with no consequences, was it.

517
00:27:12,839 --> 00:27:13,839
People were harmed.

518
00:27:14,160 --> 00:27:18,480
Speaker 2: Absolutely. The sources stressed this MK ultra wasn't just weird science.

519
00:27:18,640 --> 00:27:23,880
It destroyed lives. Some victims suffer permanent psychological damage. Some

520
00:27:24,000 --> 00:27:28,000
died under very mysterious circumstances, like Frank Olson. Frank Olsen's

521
00:27:28,039 --> 00:27:30,960
the most famous case. He was an Army biochemist working

522
00:27:30,960 --> 00:27:34,960
with CIA, possibly on biological weapons research linked to Gottlieb.

523
00:27:35,559 --> 00:27:38,640
In nineteen fifty three, he attended a CIA retreat where

524
00:27:38,640 --> 00:27:43,079
Gotlieb secretly spiked his drink with LSD. Nine days later,

525
00:27:43,319 --> 00:27:45,400
Olson fell or was pushed to his death from a

526
00:27:45,400 --> 00:27:46,440
hotel window in New York.

527
00:27:46,599 --> 00:27:48,640
Speaker 1: Suicide or something else.

528
00:27:48,519 --> 00:27:52,160
Speaker 2: Officially ruled a suicide for decades, but his family never

529
00:27:52,200 --> 00:27:55,559
believed it. They fought for years, suspecting the LSD experiment

530
00:27:55,640 --> 00:27:58,079
led to his death, or that he was potentially silenced

531
00:27:58,079 --> 00:28:00,680
because he knew too much or wanted out after witnessing

532
00:28:00,680 --> 00:28:05,039
brutal interrogations, possibly using MK Ultra techniques. The government eventually

533
00:28:05,079 --> 00:28:07,680
settled with the family, admitting the dozing, but not murder.

534
00:28:08,119 --> 00:28:09,960
It remains a deeply suspicious case.

535
00:28:10,079 --> 00:28:12,119
Speaker 1: And did the CIA just stop this when they realized

536
00:28:12,119 --> 00:28:13,000
how dangerous it was?

537
00:28:13,160 --> 00:28:15,920
Speaker 2: Well, the program officially ran until the early nineteen seventies.

538
00:28:16,519 --> 00:28:18,720
But the most shocking part might be the cover up.

539
00:28:19,440 --> 00:28:22,920
When details started to leak out during investigations into CIA

540
00:28:23,000 --> 00:28:26,039
activities in the mid seventies, the CIA director at the time,

541
00:28:26,160 --> 00:28:29,880
Richard Helms, ordered the destruction of almost all MK Ultra

542
00:28:29,960 --> 00:28:31,640
records in nineteen seventy three.

543
00:28:31,759 --> 00:28:33,400
Speaker 1: They destroyed the evidence.

544
00:28:33,079 --> 00:28:37,400
Speaker 2: Deliberately purged the files, thousands and thousands of documents detailing

545
00:28:37,440 --> 00:28:40,680
the experiments, the victims, the methods. It was a systematic,

546
00:28:40,839 --> 00:28:44,519
organized effort to erase this chapter from history, making full

547
00:28:44,519 --> 00:28:48,599
accountability almost impossible. We only know what we know because

548
00:28:48,599 --> 00:28:52,079
some documents were misfiled or survived by chance. It shows

549
00:28:52,119 --> 00:28:54,079
just how far an organization will go to bury its

550
00:28:54,160 --> 00:28:55,079
darkest secrets.

551
00:28:55,160 --> 00:28:59,240
Speaker 1: Wow. Okay, so we've seen organized secrecy enabling horrific experiments

552
00:28:59,279 --> 00:29:02,480
by institution. Now let's shift focus slightly again. Let's look

553
00:29:02,519 --> 00:29:06,240
at organized plots aimed directly at subverting or even dismantling

554
00:29:06,240 --> 00:29:08,759
political power structures. Starting with one of the most pivotal

555
00:29:08,759 --> 00:29:10,319
moments in American history.

556
00:29:10,079 --> 00:29:12,079
Speaker 2: The assassination of Abraham Lincoln.

557
00:29:11,839 --> 00:29:14,799
Speaker 1: Right, and the story we usually get is the loan gunman,

558
00:29:15,359 --> 00:29:19,480
John Wilkes, booth, angry actor, Confederate sympathizer ax alone.

559
00:29:19,559 --> 00:29:23,240
Speaker 2: That narrative is incredibly persistent, but it's just fundamentally wrong.

560
00:29:23,759 --> 00:29:26,720
The sources we looked at are crystal clear. The Lincoln

561
00:29:26,759 --> 00:29:29,480
assassination was not the act of one man. It was

562
00:29:29,519 --> 00:29:32,440
a complex, highly organized conspiracy.

563
00:29:31,839 --> 00:29:36,039
Speaker 1: A conspiracy involving multiple people with multiple targets exactly.

564
00:29:36,039 --> 00:29:39,799
Speaker 2: It was a full blown, multi target, multi assassin plot.

565
00:29:40,039 --> 00:29:42,720
The goal wasn't just to kill Lincoln, it was to

566
00:29:42,759 --> 00:29:46,240
decapitate the leadership of the Union government in a single night.

567
00:29:46,759 --> 00:29:50,359
President Lincoln, Vice President Andrew Johnson, Secretary of State William

568
00:29:50,400 --> 00:29:52,519
Seard all targeted simultaneously.

569
00:29:52,799 --> 00:29:55,680
Speaker 1: What was the hoped for outcome just chaos.

570
00:29:55,279 --> 00:29:58,680
Speaker 2: Chaos certainly, but potentially also to throw the Union government

571
00:29:58,720 --> 00:30:02,279
into disarray, even spark a revival of the Confederate cause,

572
00:30:02,559 --> 00:30:05,480
even though Lee had already surrendered. It was a desperate,

573
00:30:05,759 --> 00:30:10,119
last ditch effort organized by Confederate sympathizers and likely elements

574
00:30:10,119 --> 00:30:11,680
of the Confederate secret soonvists.

575
00:30:11,720 --> 00:30:14,160
Speaker 1: So Booth was just one piece of a larger machine.

576
00:30:14,319 --> 00:30:20,440
Speaker 2: A crucial piece, obviously, but just one. The plot involved coordination, planning,

577
00:30:20,680 --> 00:30:25,480
safe houses, escape routes. It was an organized operation. It

578
00:30:25,480 --> 00:30:29,759
had apparently evolved too. The original plan, hatched months earlier

579
00:30:29,799 --> 00:30:32,799
by Booth and his core group, was actually to kidnap

580
00:30:32,880 --> 00:30:35,720
Lincoln and trade him for Confederate prisoners.

581
00:30:35,480 --> 00:30:38,519
Speaker 1: But after the surrender it escalated to assassination.

582
00:30:38,960 --> 00:30:43,799
Speaker 2: Correct. The surrender at Appomatics made kidnapping pointless, so the objective

583
00:30:43,839 --> 00:30:46,599
shifted to outright elimination of the top leadership.

584
00:30:46,680 --> 00:30:49,319
Speaker 1: Let's break down the organization. Who were the key players?

585
00:30:49,359 --> 00:30:52,000
Besides Booth, you mentioned support networks, you.

586
00:30:51,960 --> 00:30:54,960
Speaker 2: Had people providing the infrastructure. A key figure here was

587
00:30:55,039 --> 00:30:58,240
John Surrat. He was a known Confederate courier and spy.

588
00:30:58,960 --> 00:31:02,240
He was instrumental in acting Booth with other conspirators, especially

589
00:31:02,319 --> 00:31:05,000
back when it was still a kidnapping plot. His mother,

590
00:31:05,200 --> 00:31:07,880
Mary Surrat, owned the boarding house in Washington, d C.

591
00:31:08,000 --> 00:31:09,319
Where they frequently met, so.

592
00:31:09,279 --> 00:31:10,599
Speaker 1: The meetings were organized there.

593
00:31:10,799 --> 00:31:14,359
Speaker 2: Yes, it was a central hub. After the assassination, John

594
00:31:14,400 --> 00:31:17,240
Surrat managed to escape. He fled to Canada, then Europe,

595
00:31:17,559 --> 00:31:20,759
even joined the papals waves fighting for the Pope in Rome.

596
00:31:21,440 --> 00:31:23,920
He was eventually caught in Egypt in eighteen sixty six

597
00:31:24,240 --> 00:31:26,839
and tried. He was tried in a civilian court later,

598
00:31:27,079 --> 00:31:30,799
but incredibly he managed to get acquitted on the conspiracy charges.

599
00:31:31,319 --> 00:31:34,680
Maybe because key witnesses were unavailable or the military tribunal

600
00:31:34,720 --> 00:31:37,799
fervor had died down. He was the one major conspirator

601
00:31:37,839 --> 00:31:38,720
who really got away.

602
00:31:38,839 --> 00:31:41,200
Speaker 1: What about the people who helped Booth directly at the theater?

603
00:31:41,480 --> 00:31:43,599
Speaker 2: You had Edmund Spangler, he was a stage hand at

604
00:31:43,680 --> 00:31:46,799
Ford's Theater, knew Booth well. He helped Booth with his horse,

605
00:31:47,039 --> 00:31:49,880
may have helped clear the escape path. He was arrested

606
00:31:49,920 --> 00:31:51,519
and sentenced to six years in prison.

607
00:31:51,599 --> 00:31:53,759
Speaker 1: Six years seems light compared to others.

608
00:31:53,839 --> 00:31:57,440
Speaker 2: It does, and interestingly he was pardoned in eighteen sixty

609
00:31:57,519 --> 00:32:00,480
nine by President Andrew Johnson, the man who was also

610
00:32:00,519 --> 00:32:01,279
a target.

611
00:32:01,000 --> 00:32:03,759
Speaker 1: That night, Wow and doctor Mudd, the doctor who treated

612
00:32:03,759 --> 00:32:05,759
Booth's broken leg, Doctor Samuel Mudd.

613
00:32:06,519 --> 00:32:08,880
Speaker 2: His role is still debated by some. Did he know

614
00:32:08,920 --> 00:32:11,799
who Booth was and what he'd done? But he definitely

615
00:32:11,799 --> 00:32:14,799
set Booth's leg after booth broke it jumping from the

616
00:32:14,799 --> 00:32:18,720
presidential box. Mud was arrested, tried by the Military Commission,

617
00:32:18,880 --> 00:32:21,759
and actually came within one vote of being hanged. He

618
00:32:21,799 --> 00:32:25,680
had life imprisonment instead, but like Spangler, he was pardoned

619
00:32:25,680 --> 00:32:27,799
by President Johnson in eighteen sixty nine.

620
00:32:27,880 --> 00:32:30,759
Speaker 1: So Johnson pardoned two people connected to the plot against

621
00:32:30,799 --> 00:32:31,599
his own life.

622
00:32:31,920 --> 00:32:36,359
Speaker 2: Strange politics make strange bedfellows, especially during reconstruction. And then

623
00:32:36,359 --> 00:32:38,799
there was Mary Sarat John's mother, the owner of the

624
00:32:38,799 --> 00:32:39,400
boarding house.

625
00:32:39,480 --> 00:32:40,200
Speaker 1: What happened to her?

626
00:32:40,279 --> 00:32:44,039
Speaker 2: Her fate was much harsher. The military tribunal convicted her,

627
00:32:44,319 --> 00:32:46,880
largely based on testimony about the meetings at her house.

628
00:32:47,519 --> 00:32:49,640
She was sentenced to death and became the first woman

629
00:32:49,640 --> 00:32:53,440
ever executed by the United States federal government, hanged alongside

630
00:32:53,440 --> 00:32:54,720
several other conspirators.

631
00:32:54,880 --> 00:32:57,480
Speaker 1: So who are the other assassins? The ones assigned to

632
00:32:57,559 --> 00:32:58,720
Johnson and Seward.

633
00:32:59,000 --> 00:33:02,359
Speaker 2: Lewis Powell sometimes called Lewis Payne. He was a young,

634
00:33:02,640 --> 00:33:07,240
physically imposing former Confederate soldier. His assignment was to kill

635
00:33:07,279 --> 00:33:10,640
Secretary of State William Seward, who was at home recovering

636
00:33:10,680 --> 00:33:11,599
from a carriage accident.

637
00:33:11,680 --> 00:33:12,519
Speaker 1: Did he succeed?

638
00:33:12,839 --> 00:33:16,519
Speaker 2: He came terrifyingly close. He forced his way into Seward's house,

639
00:33:17,079 --> 00:33:21,440
fought past Seward's son and bodyguard, reached Seward's bedroom and

640
00:33:21,559 --> 00:33:25,119
stabbed him repeatedly in the face and neck. Seward only survived,

641
00:33:25,559 --> 00:33:28,319
likely because he was wearing a metal jaw splint from

642
00:33:28,359 --> 00:33:31,400
his accident, which deflected some of the knife blows. Powell

643
00:33:31,440 --> 00:33:35,440
wounded several people badly, but didn't kill Seward. He escaped initially,

644
00:33:35,480 --> 00:33:37,559
but was caught a few days later and his fate

645
00:33:37,920 --> 00:33:40,759
hanged along with Mary Surratt and two others.

646
00:33:40,480 --> 00:33:43,160
Speaker 1: And the guy assigned to Vice President Johnson.

647
00:33:43,440 --> 00:33:46,559
Speaker 2: That was George Atsrod, a German immigrant involved in the

648
00:33:46,599 --> 00:33:49,880
earlier kidnapping plot. His job was to kill Vice President

649
00:33:49,960 --> 00:33:52,720
Andrew Johnson, who was staying at the kirkwood House hotel.

650
00:33:52,920 --> 00:33:56,319
Did he even try, No, He completely lost his nerve.

651
00:33:56,559 --> 00:33:58,200
He went to the hotel bar and got drunk and

652
00:33:58,279 --> 00:34:00,640
just wandered off. He never made made an attempt on

653
00:34:00,680 --> 00:34:01,759
Johnson's life, so.

654
00:34:01,799 --> 00:34:03,680
Speaker 1: He chickened out. Did he get away with it?

655
00:34:03,960 --> 00:34:07,000
Speaker 2: Not at all? Even though he didn't act. The fact

656
00:34:07,000 --> 00:34:09,559
that he was part of the organized conspiracy was enough.

657
00:34:09,880 --> 00:34:13,000
He was caught, tried by the military Commission and hanged

658
00:34:13,039 --> 00:34:15,199
along with Powell, Mary Surrat, and.

659
00:34:15,199 --> 00:34:17,320
Speaker 1: David Harold, who is David Harold.

660
00:34:16,960 --> 00:34:20,559
Speaker 2: Carold is another young conspirator. His main role was guiding

661
00:34:20,599 --> 00:34:23,760
Powell to Seward's house since Powell didn't know DC well.

662
00:34:24,559 --> 00:34:27,760
Then after the assassination, Harold met up with Booth and

663
00:34:27,840 --> 00:34:31,360
helped him escape through Maryland, eventually reaching doctor Met's house.

664
00:34:31,960 --> 00:34:32,800
He was captured with.

665
00:34:32,760 --> 00:34:34,079
Speaker 1: Booth and Booth himself.

666
00:34:34,639 --> 00:34:37,719
Speaker 2: Booth managed to have aide captured for twelve days, hiding

667
00:34:37,719 --> 00:34:40,360
out in Maryland and Virginia with Harold's help. They were

668
00:34:40,360 --> 00:34:43,159
finally cornered in a barn in Virginia by Union shoops.

669
00:34:43,760 --> 00:34:47,519
Harold surrendered, but Booth refused. The barn was set on fire.

670
00:34:47,880 --> 00:34:50,239
Booth was shot in the neck, either accidentally by a

671
00:34:50,239 --> 00:34:52,880
soldier or possibly by himself it's debated, and died a

672
00:34:52,880 --> 00:34:53,599
few hours later.

673
00:34:54,000 --> 00:34:56,119
Speaker 1: So when you lay out all the pieces, all the

674
00:34:56,119 --> 00:34:59,400
people involved, it's clearly not just Booth. It's an organized

675
00:34:59,440 --> 00:35:03,599
plot with multiple layers, targets, and participants, likely with roots

676
00:35:03,599 --> 00:35:06,480
in the Confederate intelligence apparatus exactly.

677
00:35:06,960 --> 00:35:10,199
Speaker 2: It fundamentally reframes the event from an act of loan

678
00:35:10,320 --> 00:35:14,639
madness to a calculated, coordinated political attack aimed at the

679
00:35:14,760 --> 00:35:18,960
highest levels of government, a chilling example of organized subversion.

680
00:35:19,280 --> 00:35:22,119
Speaker 1: Okay, so if the Lincoln assassination was an organized plot

681
00:35:22,159 --> 00:35:25,360
against the government from the outside, our next example is

682
00:35:25,400 --> 00:35:29,239
almost the inverse, the government itself organizing plots against its

683
00:35:29,320 --> 00:35:31,280
own citizens and political movements.

684
00:35:31,360 --> 00:35:34,400
Speaker 2: Right, we're talking about the FBI and specifically its program

685
00:35:34,519 --> 00:35:35,639
known as co in Tilpro.

686
00:35:36,199 --> 00:35:40,199
Speaker 1: Now, the FBI under j Edgar Hoover. He ran that

687
00:35:40,239 --> 00:35:42,559
place for decades, didn't he, And they did more than

688
00:35:42,679 --> 00:35:44,519
just chase gangsters, oh much more.

689
00:35:44,800 --> 00:35:49,360
Speaker 2: Hoover's FBI was obsessed with surveillance and infiltration across American society.

690
00:35:49,719 --> 00:35:52,760
Our sources mentioned them having informants everywhere, Hollywood figures like

691
00:35:52,760 --> 00:35:55,559
Walt Disney, even Ronald Reagan before he was president. They

692
00:35:55,599 --> 00:35:59,239
allegedly monitored Supreme Court justices, kept files on countless politicians

693
00:35:59,280 --> 00:36:03,480
and activists. They even apparently spent resources investigating claims of

694
00:36:03,480 --> 00:36:06,880
psychic phenomena. Hoover had a very broad definition of.

695
00:36:06,840 --> 00:36:10,239
Speaker 1: Threats, but co intail Pro was something specific, wasn't it more? Focused?

696
00:36:10,480 --> 00:36:15,159
Speaker 2: Cointail Pro short for counterintelligence program was Hoover's secret, undeclared

697
00:36:15,239 --> 00:36:18,440
war primarily waged from the nineteen fifties through the early

698
00:36:18,559 --> 00:36:22,360
nineteen seventies, and its main targets were domestic political groups

699
00:36:22,360 --> 00:36:26,760
that Hoover personally despised or feared, especially the civil rights movement,

700
00:36:27,000 --> 00:36:31,480
the Black Panther Party, anti Vietnam War groups, feminist organizations,

701
00:36:31,639 --> 00:36:35,719
Puerto Rican independence activists, basically anyone challenging the status quo.

702
00:36:35,920 --> 00:36:38,360
Speaker 1: And this wasn't just about watching them right. The goal

703
00:36:38,480 --> 00:36:39,800
was more aggressive.

704
00:36:39,360 --> 00:36:43,039
Speaker 2: Absolutely critical distinction. This wasn't passive surveillance co intel pro

705
00:36:43,199 --> 00:36:47,039
was about active sabotage. The FBI used informants not just

706
00:36:47,079 --> 00:36:50,679
to gather information, but to actively disrupt, discredit, and ultimately

707
00:36:50,719 --> 00:36:52,119
destroy these groups from within.

708
00:36:52,320 --> 00:36:54,159
Speaker 1: How what kind of tactics did they use?

709
00:36:54,199 --> 00:36:58,039
Speaker 2: The arsenal was extensive and often illegal wiretaps, burglaries, black

710
00:36:58,079 --> 00:37:01,639
bag jobs to steal documents, false evidence, spreading rumors and

711
00:37:01,679 --> 00:37:05,760
disinformation to sow conflict between groups or within them, bad jacketing,

712
00:37:06,039 --> 00:37:09,039
making members suspect each other of being informants. They used

713
00:37:09,039 --> 00:37:13,159
psychological warfare forged letters, instigated police raids, and in some

714
00:37:13,239 --> 00:37:16,079
cases were implicated in violence, even arguably.

715
00:37:15,719 --> 00:37:18,440
Speaker 1: Murder, and Hoover had particular targets.

716
00:37:18,480 --> 00:37:21,679
Speaker 2: His number one target arguably was doctor Martin Luther King Junior.

717
00:37:22,800 --> 00:37:26,800
Hoover seemed to have this intense personal animosity and paranoia

718
00:37:27,199 --> 00:37:28,280
about King, the.

719
00:37:28,280 --> 00:37:31,119
Speaker 1: Leader of the nonviolent civil rights movement. Why him.

720
00:37:31,480 --> 00:37:34,480
Speaker 2: Hoover was convinced King was either a communist himself or

721
00:37:34,519 --> 00:37:37,440
being manipulated by communists, and that the civil rights movement

722
00:37:37,519 --> 00:37:40,519
was a threat to national security. It's shocking, but the

723
00:37:40,559 --> 00:37:44,320
FBI officially designated King a major security threat the same

724
00:37:44,360 --> 00:37:46,880
week he gave his famous I Have a Dream speech

725
00:37:47,079 --> 00:37:48,199
in nineteen sixty three.

726
00:37:48,400 --> 00:37:50,000
Speaker 1: Wow, So what did they do to him?

727
00:37:50,079 --> 00:37:52,639
Speaker 2: They went all out extensive wire taps on his home,

728
00:37:52,679 --> 00:37:56,079
his office's, hotel rooms, wherever he traveled. They were desperately

729
00:37:56,119 --> 00:37:59,760
searching for proof of communist ties or financial impropriety, anything

730
00:37:59,760 --> 00:38:02,400
to do credit him. They never found any evidence.

731
00:38:02,039 --> 00:38:03,679
Speaker 1: Of communism, but they found something else.

732
00:38:03,960 --> 00:38:06,599
Speaker 2: They did find evidence through the illegal bugs, of King

733
00:38:06,679 --> 00:38:09,519
having extra marital affairs, and they decided to weaponize it.

734
00:38:09,880 --> 00:38:12,920
How In nineteen sixty four, a high ranking FBI official,

735
00:38:12,920 --> 00:38:16,760
William Sullivan, anonymously drafted a letter to King. It was

736
00:38:16,800 --> 00:38:19,519
sent along with a compilation tape containing excerpts from the

737
00:38:19,519 --> 00:38:21,000
bug hotel room recordings.

738
00:38:21,039 --> 00:38:22,840
Speaker 1: What did the letter say it was vicious.

739
00:38:23,079 --> 00:38:26,719
Speaker 2: It called King a fraud and an evil, abnormal beast.

740
00:38:27,440 --> 00:38:31,000
It threatened to expose the affairs publicly unless King effectively

741
00:38:31,039 --> 00:38:35,519
removed himself from public life. The infamous closing lines strongly

742
00:38:35,559 --> 00:38:39,519
implied King should commit suicide to avoid the scandal, telling

743
00:38:39,559 --> 00:38:41,639
him there was only one way out for him.

744
00:38:41,719 --> 00:38:45,159
Speaker 1: The FBI sent a letter suggesting a Nobel Peace Prize

745
00:38:45,159 --> 00:38:46,360
winner kill himself.

746
00:38:46,480 --> 00:38:50,239
Speaker 2: That's exactly what happened, an organized attempt at psychological destruction

747
00:38:50,320 --> 00:38:54,280
and blackmail by a federal agency against a major American leader.

748
00:38:54,840 --> 00:38:57,440
It's one of the most chilling examples of co intel

749
00:38:57,480 --> 00:38:58,119
Pro's depths.

750
00:38:58,280 --> 00:38:59,960
Speaker 1: Did King respond? Did it work?

751
00:39:00,239 --> 00:39:03,119
Speaker 2: King and his advisors correctly suspected it was from the FBI,

752
00:39:03,239 --> 00:39:05,119
though they couldn't prove it at the time. He was

753
00:39:05,159 --> 00:39:08,039
deeply disturbed by it, naturally, but he didn't buckle. He

754
00:39:08,039 --> 00:39:10,840
continued his work. But it shows the lengths the Bureau

755
00:39:10,880 --> 00:39:11,639
was willing to go to.

756
00:39:11,960 --> 00:39:15,079
Speaker 1: And this wasn't just about King. Co intel Pro tactics

757
00:39:15,119 --> 00:39:17,679
got even more aggressive with other groups right, particularly of

758
00:39:17,719 --> 00:39:18,559
the Black Panthers.

759
00:39:18,920 --> 00:39:22,679
Speaker 2: Yes, the Black Panther Party, with its more militant rhetoric

760
00:39:22,719 --> 00:39:25,599
and focus on self defense became a major focus for

761
00:39:25,679 --> 00:39:29,000
co Intel pro in the late sixties. Hoover famously called

762
00:39:29,000 --> 00:39:32,239
them the greatest threat to the internal security of the country.

763
00:39:31,960 --> 00:39:36,159
Speaker 1: And this led to violence actual physical harm it did.

764
00:39:36,679 --> 00:39:39,280
Speaker 2: The most notorious example is the case of Fred Hampton.

765
00:39:39,840 --> 00:39:43,320
He was the young, incredibly charismatic chairman of the Illinois

766
00:39:43,320 --> 00:39:46,760
Black Panther Party in Chicago, only twenty one years old,

767
00:39:47,039 --> 00:39:51,239
but already seen as a powerful leader capable of unifying different.

768
00:39:51,000 --> 00:39:52,880
Speaker 1: Groups, which made him a target a.

769
00:39:52,840 --> 00:39:56,159
Speaker 2: Prime target for the FBI. They saw his effectiveness as

770
00:39:56,159 --> 00:39:59,599
a major threat, so they orchestrated an operation against him.

771
00:39:59,760 --> 00:40:03,480
Speaker 1: Used a key informant, an informant inside Hampton's circle, yes.

772
00:40:03,320 --> 00:40:06,159
Speaker 2: A man named William O'Neill, who was Hampton's bodyguard and

773
00:40:06,239 --> 00:40:09,079
chief of security for the Chicago Panthers. He was secretly

774
00:40:09,079 --> 00:40:12,159
working for the FBI, getting paid well for information. O'Neill

775
00:40:12,239 --> 00:40:14,719
provided the FBI with a detailed floor plan of the

776
00:40:14,719 --> 00:40:17,559
apartment where Hampton and other Panthers lived.

777
00:40:17,280 --> 00:40:19,360
Speaker 1: And allegedly more than just a floor.

778
00:40:19,159 --> 00:40:23,400
Speaker 2: Plan, there are strong allegations, supported by later investigations and testimony,

779
00:40:23,719 --> 00:40:26,840
that O'Neill drugged Fred Hampton's drink the night before a

780
00:40:26,840 --> 00:40:30,519
planned police raid. He allegedly put barbiturates in his kool

781
00:40:30,559 --> 00:40:32,599
aid to ensure Hampton wouldn't wake.

782
00:40:32,480 --> 00:40:34,840
Speaker 1: Up easily, so they planned a raid and knowing he

783
00:40:34,960 --> 00:40:35,840
might be drugged.

784
00:40:36,000 --> 00:40:38,159
Speaker 2: The raid happened at four point four to five in

785
00:40:38,199 --> 00:40:41,760
the morning on December fourth, nineteen sixty nine. It was

786
00:40:41,800 --> 00:40:44,440
carried out by Chicago police officers working under the Cook

787
00:40:44,480 --> 00:40:47,920
County State's Attorney's office, but the intelligence, the floor plan,

788
00:40:48,000 --> 00:40:50,960
the timing, it all came from the FBI via O'Neill.

789
00:40:51,440 --> 00:40:54,480
Speaker 1: And what happened during the raid, it was essentially a massacre.

790
00:40:54,800 --> 00:40:58,000
Speaker 2: The police stormed in guns blazing. Forensics later showed they

791
00:40:58,039 --> 00:41:01,559
fired nearly one hundred shots into the apartment the panthers inside.

792
00:41:01,960 --> 00:41:04,960
They fired maybe one shot, possibly accidentally, after.

793
00:41:04,760 --> 00:41:05,880
Speaker 1: Being wounded and Hampton.

794
00:41:06,079 --> 00:41:08,719
Speaker 2: Hampton was asleep in his bed, likely due to the drugs.

795
00:41:09,199 --> 00:41:12,840
Initial reports suggest he was wounded in the first barrage. Then,

796
00:41:12,920 --> 00:41:16,360
according to eyewitness accounts from survivors and later forensic evidence,

797
00:41:16,639 --> 00:41:19,400
officers went into his bedroom and shot him again point blank.

798
00:41:19,400 --> 00:41:23,199
In they had another panther leader, Mark Clark, was also killed.

799
00:41:23,280 --> 00:41:24,920
Speaker 1: It sounds like an execution.

800
00:41:24,840 --> 00:41:27,800
Speaker 2: That's exactly what many called it an assassination disguised as

801
00:41:27,800 --> 00:41:31,320
a shootout. The official story initially was that the police

802
00:41:31,320 --> 00:41:35,599
were met with heavy gunfire, but the evidence overwhelmingly contradicted

803
00:41:35,639 --> 00:41:38,960
that ballistics showed almost all the bullets came from the police.

804
00:41:39,119 --> 00:41:40,480
Speaker 1: Was there any accountability for this?

805
00:41:41,280 --> 00:41:45,920
Speaker 2: Initially no, The state's attorney cleared the officers, but investigations continued.

806
00:41:46,079 --> 00:41:50,000
Lawsuits were filed. Eventually, years later, in nineteen eighty two,

807
00:41:50,400 --> 00:41:53,960
the city, county, and federal governments agreed to a massive

808
00:41:54,119 --> 00:41:57,320
one point eight five million dollars settlement with the survivors

809
00:41:57,360 --> 00:41:59,800
and the families of Hampton and Clark. It wasn't a

810
00:42:00,079 --> 00:42:02,480
mission of murder, but it was a tacit acknowledgment of

811
00:42:02,519 --> 00:42:04,840
government culpability in the raid and the deaths.

812
00:42:05,159 --> 00:42:07,679
Speaker 1: So co intel pro wasn't just dirty tricks. It was

813
00:42:07,719 --> 00:42:10,760
implicated in actual deaths, orchestrated, at least in part with

814
00:42:10,840 --> 00:42:11,400
the FBI.

815
00:42:11,800 --> 00:42:14,639
Speaker 2: That's the unavoidable conclusion in the Hampton case. And remember

816
00:42:14,679 --> 00:42:19,119
these tactics infiltration, disruption, bad jacketing, encouraging violence were used

817
00:42:19,119 --> 00:42:23,280
broadly against anti war groups, student activists, feminist leaders. It

818
00:42:23,320 --> 00:42:26,280
was a huge, organized campaign to crush domestic descent.

819
00:42:26,440 --> 00:42:28,679
Speaker 1: How did we even find out about co intel pro

820
00:42:28,760 --> 00:42:29,800
if it was so secret?

821
00:42:30,039 --> 00:42:32,840
Speaker 2: We found out because of another organized act, this time

822
00:42:32,880 --> 00:42:36,800
against the FBI secrecy. In nineteen seventy one, a group

823
00:42:36,840 --> 00:42:41,039
of anonymous activists calling themselves the Citizens Commission to Investigate

824
00:42:41,079 --> 00:42:43,840
the FBI broke into an FBI field office.

825
00:42:43,880 --> 00:42:45,079
Speaker 1: They robbed the FBI.

826
00:42:45,320 --> 00:42:49,440
Speaker 2: Basically, yes, it happened in Media, Pennsylvania. They chose the

827
00:42:49,559 --> 00:42:52,519
night of the big Muhammad al le versus Joe Fraser fight,

828
00:42:53,079 --> 00:42:56,639
figuring security might be distracted, which is ironic because Ali

829
00:42:56,719 --> 00:42:58,519
himself was under FBI surveillance.

830
00:42:58,559 --> 00:42:59,199
Speaker 1: What did they take?

831
00:42:59,519 --> 00:43:02,840
Speaker 2: They stole hundreds and hundreds of classified documents and then

832
00:43:02,880 --> 00:43:05,760
they meticulously copied them and leaked them to journalists and

833
00:43:05,800 --> 00:43:07,159
members of Congress.

834
00:43:06,800 --> 00:43:09,880
Speaker 1: And those documents exposed co intel pro they did.

835
00:43:10,400 --> 00:43:14,000
Speaker 2: The leaks revealed the wire taps, the burglaries, the psychological

836
00:43:14,039 --> 00:43:18,679
warfare campaigns, the specific plans to neutralize political groups. It

837
00:43:18,719 --> 00:43:21,920
was undeniable proof, straight from the FBI's own files, of

838
00:43:21,960 --> 00:43:25,480
this secret war against American citizens. The public outcry forced

839
00:43:25,480 --> 00:43:28,320
the FBI to officially terminate co intel Pro, though many

840
00:43:28,320 --> 00:43:30,239
believed the tactics just became more covert.

841
00:43:30,320 --> 00:43:32,960
Speaker 1: So it took an organized act of counter secrecy to

842
00:43:33,079 --> 00:43:35,039
expose the government's organized secrecy.

843
00:43:35,239 --> 00:43:38,719
Speaker 2: Precisely, it showed that the most paranoid fears about government

844
00:43:38,760 --> 00:43:41,920
overreach weren't paranoid at all. They were in many cases

845
00:43:42,199 --> 00:43:48,480
documented reality hashtagra autro cynthesis and final thought, So quite

846
00:43:48,519 --> 00:43:52,360
a journey we've taken, huh, from an eighteenth century Bavarian

847
00:43:52,400 --> 00:43:56,119
debate club, all the way through importing war criminals, unethical

848
00:43:56,119 --> 00:43:59,920
medical testing on citizens, CIA mind control experiments, and finally

849
00:44:00,199 --> 00:44:03,679
these organized plots both against the government like Lincoln and

850
00:44:03,760 --> 00:44:06,800
by the government like co intil pro and the Hampton execution.

851
00:44:07,199 --> 00:44:09,960
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a lot to take in. So boiling it

852
00:44:10,000 --> 00:44:12,119
all down, what does this deep dive really tell us?

853
00:44:12,119 --> 00:44:13,800
What's the big takeaway for you the listener?

854
00:44:14,039 --> 00:44:16,480
Speaker 2: I think it really stands out as the disturbing consistency

855
00:44:16,519 --> 00:44:20,480
across different centuries, different contexts. You see powerful institutions, especially

856
00:44:20,519 --> 00:44:23,960
governmental ones, resorting to organized secrecy and deception when they

857
00:44:24,000 --> 00:44:25,400
feel threatened, threatened by.

858
00:44:25,320 --> 00:44:28,440
Speaker 1: What ideas, rivals, polital change, all.

859
00:44:28,280 --> 00:44:32,119
Speaker 2: Of the above, whether it's the Church threatened by Enlightenment ideas,

860
00:44:32,440 --> 00:44:35,639
the US threatened by Soviet technology, or the FBI threatened

861
00:44:35,639 --> 00:44:38,880
by the civil rights movement, The response often involves creating

862
00:44:38,920 --> 00:44:42,360
these secret structures to bend or break the rules, to

863
00:44:42,440 --> 00:44:45,000
operate outside the bounds of law and ethics.

864
00:44:45,079 --> 00:44:50,000
Speaker 1: And the justification is always necessity, national security.

865
00:44:50,119 --> 00:44:53,320
Speaker 2: That's always the cover story, isn't it national security, political necessity,

866
00:44:53,360 --> 00:44:57,880
scientific progress. But underneath you see this consistent pattern of

867
00:44:57,920 --> 00:45:00,679
abusing trust, whether it's the public's trust to payations trust

868
00:45:01,039 --> 00:45:03,599
or the trust citizens place in their own government not

869
00:45:03,760 --> 00:45:07,119
to actively sabotage them. And the scale of the organization

870
00:45:07,199 --> 00:45:10,119
required to run paper Clip to keep Tuskegee going for

871
00:45:10,119 --> 00:45:13,280
forty years, to coordinate cointel pro it's immense.

872
00:45:13,360 --> 00:45:16,639
Speaker 1: These weren't just like minor slip ups or rogue agents.

873
00:45:16,679 --> 00:45:19,079
These were systemic organize failures and.

874
00:45:19,079 --> 00:45:24,119
Speaker 2: Plots, exactly long term operations that caused profound damage, destroyed lives,

875
00:45:24,119 --> 00:45:27,239
and fundamentally eroded public faith in the very institutions designed

876
00:45:27,239 --> 00:45:30,519
to protect us. And it often took decades or whistleblowers

877
00:45:30,599 --> 00:45:32,360
or even break ins just to bring them to light.

878
00:45:32,719 --> 00:45:35,800
Speaker 1: So the key thing for you listening is maybe understanding

879
00:45:35,840 --> 00:45:40,280
that organization and secrecy they're just tools, right, They can

880
00:45:40,320 --> 00:45:43,280
be used defensively like weishapt trying to protect.

881
00:45:42,920 --> 00:45:46,079
Speaker 2: Ideas, but as history shows us again and again, they

882
00:45:46,079 --> 00:45:49,920
are far more often used aggressively by established power structures.

883
00:45:50,599 --> 00:45:54,880
The real documented threat isn't always coming from some shadowy,

884
00:45:55,079 --> 00:45:56,320
mythical ball out there.

885
00:45:56,440 --> 00:46:00,599
Speaker 1: Yeah, often the most sophisticated, well funded, and frankly dangerous

886
00:46:00,599 --> 00:46:04,559
secret operations are happening much closer to home, sometimes within

887
00:46:04,599 --> 00:46:06,559
the official bodies themselves.

888
00:46:06,320 --> 00:46:09,679
Speaker 2: Which really leaves us with a final, maybe unsettling question

889
00:46:09,760 --> 00:46:12,719
for you to think about. Given everything we discussed today,

890
00:46:13,119 --> 00:46:17,840
the documented reality of organized government plots, recruiting criminals, experimenting

891
00:46:17,880 --> 00:46:22,159
on citizens, subverting democratic movements, should our main concern really

892
00:46:22,199 --> 00:46:25,920
be about those fantastical, anonymous manipulators we hear about in

893
00:46:25,920 --> 00:46:26,880
conspiracy theories

894
00:46:27,000 --> 00:46:30,000
Speaker 1: Or does the evidence suggest the more significant, provable threat

895
00:46:30,119 --> 00:46:33,840
often lies within the shadow operations, the classified programs, and

896
00:46:33,920 --> 00:46:37,360
the potential for abuse hidden inside the very official institutions

897
00:46:37,360 --> 00:46:39,039
we are fundamentally supposed to trust