It's true that Secrets and Lies does not cover the entire scope and history of US government human experimentation within its pages. No single book can. The subject is still so extensive, complicated, and covert that - once the lid of secrecy is more completely lifted - we will probably need several series of books, each of them the size of a standard set of Britannica Encyclopedias, to sufficiently educate ourselves about the full scope of what has been perpetrated against humans in the US and Canada - via US government human experiments - since the early 50s.
Newer books will be written in the near future, due to the development of new coalitions and Commissions. They include: a new human rights coalition led by Physicians for Human Rights addressing Iraq detainee US government human experimentation; a new NATAC-HE addressing US and Canadian government human experimentation, and a US Truth and Reconciliation Commission that will, in part, address US government experimental AND OPERATIONAL abuse, torture, and enslavement of US and Canadian citizens and other humans.
At this time, however (July 2010), I believe that the best way to learn about the full scope of US and Canadian mind control experimentation and enslavement is to read the following books:
Secrets and Lies by Gordon Thomas;
A Nation Betrayed(The Chilling True Story of Secret Cold War Experiments Performed on Our CVhildren and Other Innocent People) by Carol Rutz;
The CIA Doctors: Human Rights Violations by American Psychiatrists by Colin Ross; and
A Terrible Mistake: The Murder of Frank Olson and the CIA's Secret Cold War Experiments by Hank Albarelli Jr.
Other information can also be found on the North American Freedom Foundation's "United States Truth and Reconciliation (US TRC)" webpage.
Having also read Journey into Madness, I must disagree that Secrets and Lies is just a rehash. Although Secrets and Lies contains the same information that was included in Journey Into Madness, Secrets and Lies also provides newer information that helps us to understand some of the crucial motivations behind the terrible government human experiments that have continued to be covertly perpetrated against human guinea pigs under the guise of national security.
I am grateful for Gordon Thomas's willingness to expose the truth about decades of US government human experimentation, long before it became fashionable and reasonably safe to do so. He is one of the few authors who flat-out refused to shut up and stop alerting the public about the terrible atrocities and human rights violations that have been perpetrated by our government for much too long.
I also appreciate his honesty in admitting that he was used - unwittingly and unwillingly - by at least one major government "mind control" expert, William Sargant, as a disinformation conduit. (See [...].) To-date, he is the only author I know of - who writes specifically about US government mind control experimentation - who has had the courage to make such an acknowledgement, clean up his work, and then keep on writing the truth as best as he can.
Most of all, I appreciate that author Thomas works hard to remain objective while daring to empathetically connect with his sources of information. That is a skill set that too many authors on government abuses and corruption do not possess. And yet, such skills are crucial in helping us and our readers to understand and accept the very real humanity behind the abusers' otherwise incomprehensible, seemingly monstrous behaviors, crimes and human rights violations.
By providing statements in Secrets and Lies that are directly from the lips of CIA Directors and other government operatives, employees and contractors; Gordon Thomas has provided invaluable insights into some of their motivations - for the abuses - that seem to have been hidden even from their own selves.
Perhaps most important, we can begin to understand - from their own statements - WHY and HOW such individuals gradually slipped and slid so drastically down a very steep, long slippery slope into great moral and spiritual darkness; while - in general - not even noticing that they'd done so!
I found two other gems of information in Secrets and Lies that gives it a prominent place on my shelves:
1) Author Thomas explains the background of the OFTEN program, which is usually downplayed or entirely overlooked by other authors who write about US government human experimentation. It appears that OFTEN was probably the basis, or inception, of the CIA's and US military's incorporation of occult beliefs and practices as they sought to find newer and more covert methods to effectively gain power over the minds and lives of others, and to also spy covertly on others.
This information can help us to understand WHY the majority of adult survivors of US government mind control experiments - particularly those who were forcibly recruited as young children - have consistently reported that they were forced to participate in gruesome, mind-breaking occult rituals; and were also trained to tap-into, and utilize, unusual psychic abilities.
(In
The Men Who Stare at Goats, Jon Ronson details some of the newer covert CIA/US Military programs that continued to teach, develop, and utilize natural psychic abilities in human subjects - this time, primarily adult military personnel.)
Perhaps most important, Thomas's information about OFTEN helps us to understand the motivation behind the fierce attempts in the US media and court systems - particularly by former CIA doctors and scientists who founded and were members of the misnomered False Memory Syndrome Foundation - to invalidate and deny the existence of serious occult crimes being perpetrated in the US.
The more we are able to connect the dots between the CIA, US military, and the occult practitioner network - as Thomas has already begun to do - the more we can understand why, beginning in the mid 90s, some of the same CIA employees and contractors - who had been involved in the CIA human experiments - actively and consistently testified, along with close associates in the FMSF, for the defense on behalf of "alleged" occult practitioners who were accused, usually by "alleged" child victims, of having committed occult crimes against the children and other victims. We may also eventually learn who funded their very expensive criminal defenses and legal appeals (if they were found guilty), which - over time - ensured that the vast majority of defendants accused of occult crimes against children went free.
Decades earlier, a similar massive US government cover-up effectively concealed and denied the existence of crimes committed by members of Sicilian and Italian Mafia families. We now know that that government cover-up was basically designed to protect the identities of Mafia family members and business associates who were employed or contracted by the US government as informants and more.
When our government cover-up of the Mafia families' crimes and very existence was in full swing; nearly anyone who tried to blow the whistle and expose the Mafia connections to specific crimes was quickly discredited by government employees and officials - particularly within the FBI.
Even now, we are astounded as we learn of how many high-ranking officials - including US Presidents - were on a personal first-name basis with some members of the Mafia organizations, and considered them friends.
After many years of ongoing government propaganda and cover-ups, serious changes were made, and the Mafia criminals started to be properly prosecuted.
One can only hope that as the public learns the truth of the CIA's (and FBI's?) cover-up of occult crimes in the US, the public will ensure that similar changes will be made, so that occult crimes cannot continue to flourish in a similar toxic environment of secrecy and government complicity.
2) Thomas also explains some of the history behind the US government's recruitment and use of Nazi and Japanese war criminals - specifically, doctors and scientists - in CIA and US military human experiment programs.
As the new human rights coalitions and Commissions work to provide new nontraditional venues for current and former US government employees, contractors, and associates - and their former victims - to tell the truth about what has really occurred in secret; many more truths will be made public, and many more books will be written.
Each new book will reach further down the rabbit hole and drag out other amazing-but-true facts that will stun, fascinate, and horrify the rest of the world.
Much has yet to be told; some of it will never reach the sunlight. Still, with each new disclosure, we move one step closer to ensuring that such atrocities will not be permitted, or enabled, to continue...at least, not in our name.
