The CIA Doctors: Human Rights Violations by American Psychiatrists [Paperback]

Colin A. Ross (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 2006

The C.I.A. Doctors, (Manitou Communications, 2006), uncovers the truth about violations of human rights by American Psychiatrists in the twentieth century. Documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act and cross-referenced research published in leading medical journals expose the existence of mind altering experiments on unwitting human subjects, paid for by the U.S. government, the U.S. Military and the C.I.A. These experiments which inlcude LSD experiments, sensory deprivation, electroconvulsive treatment, brain electrode implants, radiation experiments and prostitution rings were perpetrated not by a few renegage doctors but by leading psychiatrists, psychologists, neurosurgeons, universities, medical schools and maximum security prisons on American soil. Dr. Ross takes you on a mind-blowing fact finding adventure into the secret world of espionage and Manchurian Candidates. Given our situations in Guantanamo and Abu Graib the only question left unanswered is what are the U.S. Government, psychiatrists and medical schools doing today? The C.I.A. Doctors was originally published as BLUEBIRD: Deliberate Creation of Multiple Personality by Psychiatrists in 2000.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Colin A. Ross, M.D. is an internationally renowned clinician, researcher, author and lecturer in the field of traumatic stress and trauma related disorders. He is the founder and President of The Colin A. Ross Institute for Psychological Trauma. Dr. Ross has authored over 100 professional papers and books. He has reviewed for numerous professional journals, and is a member of the American Psychiatric Association and the International Society for the Study of Dissociation. In addition, Dr. Ross has served as expert witness in over 50 court cases, consulted on several television and video productions on trauma related disorders, and produced an educational video for mental health professionals on the treatment of trauma based disorders.

Product Details

• Paperback: 352 pages
• Publisher: Manitou Communications (February 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0976550806
• ISBN-13: 978-0976550808
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #709,298 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Colin A. Ross, M.D. received his degree from the University of Alberta in 1981 and completed his psychiatry training at the University of Manitoba in 1985. Dr. Ross is an internationally renowned clinician, researcher, author and lecturer in the field of traumatic stress and trauma related disorders. He is the founder and President of The Colin A. Ross Institute for Psychological Trauma. Besides his work at Timberlawn Hospital in Dallas, Texas, Dr. Ross consults to Trauma Programs at Forest View Hospital in Grand Rapids, Michigan and Del Amo Hospital in Torrance California. He has authored over 140 professional papers and 23 books. He has reviewed for numerous professional journals and is a member of the American Psychiatric Association and is a Past President of the International Society for the Study of Trauma and Dissociation. In addition, Dr. Ross has served as expert witness in over 50 court cases, consulted on several cable, movie and video productions and has produced six educational DVD's and CD's for mental health professionals on the treatment of trauma based disorders.

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33 of 33 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars HOW TO CREATE A TERRORIST, March 23, 2008

By 

Cheri Montagu "Writer" (San Francisco Bay Area, CA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The CIA Doctors: Human Rights Violations by American Psychiatrists (Paperback)

The stated aim of THE CIA DOCTORS by Colin Ross is an excellent and much-needed one: "to prove that the Manchurian candidate is fact, not fiction..." and that "the creation of controlled disassociation was a major goal of mind control research." (p. 10) As he says, he is not a conspiracy theorist and had no axe to grind against the CIA: his concern is that his fellow psychiatrists, including some of the most prestigious individuals and institutions in the country, have violated and are violating their Hippocratic oath by their participation in such experiments. There is however one major problem with the book. It was originally written in 2000, and although Dr. Ross revised it in 2006, he did not add any new material to speak of. Thus the connection between the experiments carried out by the CIA during the Cold War and the treatment of detainees in the so-called "War on Terror" is not made explicit, as it is in Alfred McCoy's A QUESTION OF TORTURE. Yet the similarity between the way that "Manchurian candidates" were created during the Cold War and the way that terrorist suspects are being treated today is alarming.

Take for example, Mohammed Al Qahtani, one of the "Guantánamo Six" on trial for his life under the Military Commissions Act of 2006. Mr. Al Qahtani is one of the few terrorist suspects who have been permitted civilian lawyers, in this case from the progressive Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR). A CCR information paper on Al Qahtani lists the abuses to which he has been subjected, in a manner which is at times confusing. For instance, he is described as being subjected to "forcible administration of numerous IVs during interrogation." Is it really possible that his captors thought that Al Qahtani would be severely affected by merely being poked repeatedly with hypodermic needles? Having myself been a victim of forced drugging and drug-induced torture, I could not help but wonder when I read this, "what was in those hypodermic needles?" One passage in THE CIA DOCTORS was invaluable in answering that question. It concerns "interrogations" (I shall put this word in quotes whenever the aim does not appear to be the acquisition of intelligence) of various individuals under the CIA program ARTICHOKE. During these so-called interrogations, subjects were given unspecified chemicals intravenously. Then, to quote a CIA document, "1. A false memory was introduced into the subject's mind without his concious control of the process, which took 15 to 20 minutes. 2 The procedure was repeated, this time taking 40 to 45 minutes. 3. The procedure was repeated again with interrogation added."

The possibility that Al Qahtani may have been subjected to the same regime is reinforced by the fact that both the ARTICHOKE victims and Al Qahtani were subjected to repeated strip searches, extreme solitary confinement, sleep and food deprivation, and exposure to severe cold. Abuses up to and including torture have a definite role to play in the creation of a new identity, whether that of a "Manchurian candidate" or a terrorist. That is to say, they are part of the process of DEPATTERNING. As Ross says, in the first phase of the creation of a new personality the subject is depatterned, which means reducing him to a vegetable state through a combination of massive amounts of electroconvulsive shocks, drug-induced sleep and sensory isolation and deprivation. When fully depatterned, patients are incontinent of urine and feces, unable to feed themselves, and unable to state their name, age, location, or the current date. (p. 124). As O'Brien says to Winston in the novel 1984, "We will empty you and fill you with ourselves." It is after this depatterning that the narco-hypnotic process begins, and the subject acquires a new identity and memory. The new identity could make subjects actually commit violent crimes which they had no inclination for, as well as confessing to crimes they did not commit. For instance, one woman subject of CIA experimentation who was afraid of firearms was induced to shoot another subject with a gun she believed was loaded. Others were able to set off time-bombs at the mere mention of a particular code-word. (pp. 46-47)

Of course, the fact that the subject has acquired a new identity has to be hidden from the subject himself or herself. One of the most puzzling thing to anyone who has done research on CIA abuses is why an agency ostensibly devoted to acquiring intelligence would be interested in procedures, such as electroconvulsive treatment (ECT), which are notorious for producing amnesia. Ross provide an explanation by quoting another CIA document: "Quite often amnesia occurs for events just prior to the convulsion, during the convulsion, and during the post-siezure period. It is possible that hypnosis or hypnotic activity induced during the post-siezure state may be lost in amnesia. This would be very valuable." Interrogation, including torture, was often conducted after the experiments, simply to determine if the amnesia surrounding the implanted memory could be breached. (p. 49) In other words, our government might be taking completely innocent individuals, reducing them to a vegetable state through torture, giving them a new identity as a terrorist by means of narco-hypnosis, and then torturing them again in order to see if they have sufficient belief in the new identity to confess, not just to their torturers but when they are trotted out before the public. Someone like Al Qahtani would have no recollection of the introduction of a false memory through chemicals and hypnosis any more than the subjects of ARTICHOKE did. Victims of ARTICHOKE methods believed that the memories implanted in their minds were true to the extent that they could pass a lie-detector test regarding them. (pp. 38-42).

As Alfred McCoy has stated, these CIA methods have "metastasized" to other segments of our government, for instance the military which controls Guantánamo. Given this fact, and the similarity of the treatment meted out to suspects in the "War on Terror" to those subjected to CIA experiments, it is easy to see why the Guantanamo Six are to be tried by military commissions which ignore all established rules of due process. If they were to be tried by a normal civilian court, their testimony would have to be dismissed, not simply because they have been tortured but because they have been subjected to what the CIA calls PSYWAR. Whereas traditional methods of interrogation, whether they use torture or not, aim at the discovery of truth, PSYWAR aims at the creation of falsehood-- false confessions, false personalities, false attribution of violent events (such as 9/11). To the inhumanity of torture it adds the supreme indignity of robbing the individual of his or her own free will. Men like Al Qahtani are victims of trauma beyond what most of us can imagine and unfit to stand trial before any court. They have been psychologically maimed to the extent that we will never know the truth. And these six have undoubtedly been chosen because they are the ones with whom PSYWAR has been the most successful. What indescribable horrors are being inflicted upon those who are still holding out against it?

23 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Disappointing, January 21, 2007

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Aaron A. Golub (Melrose, ma 02176) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The CIA Doctors: Human Rights Violations by American Psychiatrists (Paperback)

The CIA Doctors is little more than a brief summery of declassified CIA documents. While Dr. Ross may have done a service by presenting the information contained within 15,000 pages of declassified mk-Ultra research, he fails completely in connecting it with the greater issue of ritual abuse. Not only does he fail to mention this ongoing relationship, I'm left with the impression that he deliberately avoided it.

Given the ongoing nature of ritual abuse and trauma based mind control, Dr. Ross's book presents the impression that Mk-ultra abuses were something that happened in the past and have no connection to ongoing activity. He fails to express the connection between mk-ultra victims and our intelligence communities ongoing role in shielding perps. Those who continue to suffer at the hands of their abusers deserve better. For further reading I'd suggest; A Nation Betrayed by Carol Rutz.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Human Rights Violations, August 4, 2009

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Rank amateur (French amateur "lover of... (West Coast: U.S.A.) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: The CIA Doctors: Human Rights Violations by American Psychiatrists (Paperback)

Colin A. Ross, M.D. reminds us about the dark side of the intelligence community. We have all seen James Bond movies. First, he summarizes the historical background of the relationship between psychiatry and the intelligence communities during the cold war, including Project PAPERCLIP, the Tuskeegee Syphilis Study, and radiation experiments on human beings. In his second section, he describes cold war mind control experiments. Third, he gives a whole section alone to G.H. Estabrooks, the only mind control doctor who spoke publicly about "Manchurian candidates", special assassins. Fourth, he briefly tells the stories of seven case histories, including Sirhan Sirhan, in light of his theories of dissonance. Other books can fill in any blanks concerning any conspiracy evidence surrounding the assassination of Robert Kennedy. (Read the biography of Robert Kennedy by Arthur Schlesinger, Jr.) In the last section he concludes with a discussion of multiple personality disorder renamed dissociative identity disorder and explains how doctors or therapists can unwittingly cause this disorder while Manchurian Candidate Programs create the disorder on purpose. Finally, he sums up about the reality of the Manchurian Candidate. This book has pages of references and an extensive appendix filled with declassified documents. There is no index of terms, names, or subjects.