From: Lawrie Williams <nemesis@fastinternet.net.au> Date: Tue, 12 Jan 1999 15:50:19 +1000 Fwd Date: Tue, 12 Jan 1999 10:45:06 -0500 Subject: BZ - Flying High For the US Army Hi all. Just arrived back on the list. Here is a potent "abduction drug" that may have been involved in the "abduction" I had in 1975. Has anyone any thoughts on BZ as it relates to abduction experiences. e.g. how much of this stuff, of which many thousands of tons was made, could be loose in our ecosystem? Lawrie Williams ___________________________________________________ Flying High for the US Army [New Scientist August 26 1976 Michael Carter] Long before the hippies of San Francisco indulged in their experiments with hallucinogens, the US Army was administering these drugs to thousands of subjects - some willing, many unwitting - to see if they could be used as chemical warfare agents. A US Army report, released this month, admits that the drugs were administered without the knowledge or permission of the subjects or their families. The reports also admits that the Army attempted to conceal its role in the research. At least two people were killed early in the research, more than 20 years ago. LSD, mescalin (and its modification STP) and psilocybin are all known as sympathomimetic hallucinogens. Effects are noted within ten or fifteen minutes after administration. At first there is slight nausea and trembling, combined with some apprehension. These autonomic effects soon pass and the predominant effects, on the sensory and psychic systems, soon begin. Perceptual distortion and enhancement plus eyes-closed imagery are the first to appear. Random lines on the wall assume recognizable patterns; objects become surrounded by a faint halo and their boundaries appear to shift and tremble. Detail in the visual field becomes a source of great fascination and it is easy to become deeply involved with what amounts to a sensory storm. Sense of time is completely distorted due to the great increase in information being received by the brain. These behavioiural effects suggested to the US military the possibility of subduing enemy forces and populations by a kind of "ethical warfare", and, as research quickly revealed, providing potential weapons with a wide range of potencies and duration of effect. The US was not the only power interested. Papers were published by researchers at the Chemical Defence Establishment at Porton Down on the effect of tryptamine (psilocybin) and mescaline analogues in animals. The US conducted a massive program of human testing with frequent disregard for ethical procedures on the part of both Army reserchers and civilian programmes funded by the Army. In the guise of blind and double-blind techniques many subjects were given hallucinogens with no knowledge of what the effects might be......the procedure can only be considered unethical..... The US military program also lacked any fixed goals. Army spokesmen, reported in a number of reports last year in the New York Times, variously said that the research programs were intended to find shorter-acting hallucinogens than LSD, to lower resistance to interrogation, to find suitable antidotes, to provide a combat tool, and to provide an alternative to nuclear war. As a result of this apparent lack of direction new drugs were tested in humans without sufficient animal data or full exploration of low dose levels before high doses were given. A clue to what the Army later came to seek was given by Dr Van M. Sim, the civilian director of the Army's programme at Edgewood Arsenal, Maryland. He is reported in the New York Times as having said that experiments with LSD were dropped in 1967 "because the Army decided it really wanted a drug that would stun an enemy, but leave it able to carry out orders". In the late 1950's a new group of hallucinogens was developed whose effects were far more disabling than the LSD type. These anti-cholinergic drugs are usually called deleriants. Plants containing anti-cholinergic alkaloids such as atropine and scopalamine have been used throughout history as narcotics and poisons. The search for drugs with the theraputic characteristics of atropine had led to the synthesis of a series of chemicals with the potency of atropine but with even more pronounced effects on the central nervous system. Most of these were derivatives of glycollic acids including diphenylglycollic acid, also called benzilic acid. The characteristic effects of the deleriants are almost always unpleasant. With the onset of symptoms autonomic symptoms are pronounced - dryness of the mouth, dizziness and muscular weakness. Shortly a state of apprehension, fear and deperson- alizaton appears. One or two hours after administratoin subjects are confused, agitated and suffer from motor and mental incoordination. Emotions range through anger, panic, paranoia and fear. Subjects soon lose all contact with reality and experience true hallucinations, conversing with imaginary individuals and engaging in tasks with imaginary objects. During this period of delerium, amnesia (particularly of short-term memory) occurs and persists for the duration of the drug effect. Asked a question the subject will respond correctly at frst but then may break off and discuss urelated matters, then stop, realizing that he has answered irrationally. Panic can occur when the subject realizes his confusion. Clearly these drugs would be more attractive than the sympatho- mimetic hallucinogens as chemical warfare agents. Significantly the only known hallucinogen to be stockpiled in US arsenels is the drug code-named BZ, reputedly 3-quinuclidinyl benzilate. Disturbingly this was one of the agents excluded from the ban on chemical and biological agents signed by President Ford in Januaray 1975. Its use, the Army claim, would be for protection of military zones and in civilian riots. Current goals and research programs are unclear. However it was revealed last year that the US Army was testing atropine and scopolamine on 55 military personnel at Edgewood Arsenel. The Army denied that either drug could cause hallucinations. This information only serves to confuse the Army's intentions - the ability of atropine and scopolamine to cause delerious states similar to the anti-cholinergic hallucinogens has been well known for many years. What seems further to confuse the situation is that researchers at Edgewood Arsenel published, in 1973, a comprehensive paper showing the behavioural effects of atropine, scopolamine, and Ditran, (an anti-cholinergic hallucinogen) to be indistinguishible from each other. [Psychoparmacologia (sic), vol 28 p 121]. The subjects were 158 Army enlisted men. The general properties of the drugs were described to subjects before testing. Any view on why a further experiment is being conducted must be purely speculative. However it is worth noting one feature of these drugs described in the paper. During the early effects "in spite of their confusion.....most subjects were curiously docile and tractable". One is reminded of the Army's declared desire for a drug to stun the enemy but leaving it capable of carrying out orders. In their present state of development these drugs can in no way be said to produce this effect alone, but such a goal may not be difficult to achieve...... __________________________________________________
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