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Not the first time. Hundred of tests like this.
Tests revealed by an unexpected source
Many of these experiments on the American public were first investigated by what we would consider questionable sources.
One 1979 Washington Post news story discusses open air experiments in the Tampa Bay area involving the release of pertussis, or whooping cough, in 1955. State records show that whooping cough cases in Florida spiked from 339 (one death) in 1954 to 1,080 (12 deaths) in 1955, according to that story.
But it's hard to trace how accurate the information about the whooping cough release is: The only documentation goes back to an investigation by the Church of Scientology.
The Church of Scientology formed a group called American Citizens for Honesty in Government that spent a significant amount of time investigating controversial experiments run by the Army and CIA, according to the Post. Through FOIA requests they uncovered a number of documents related to these experiments in the late 1970s.
Cole understands why some people are skeptical of those reports. "I certainly am not a member and I think a lot of what they do is quackery," he says, but "in this case, I have no reason to believe any of this isn't real."
Many of the documents Scientologists made public were the same documents he'd received doing his own research, redacted in the same places.
Perhaps the hardest question is how much information is still missing.
As Cole writes in the book:
Many details about the army's tests over populated areas remain secret. Most of the test reports are still classified or cannot be located, although a few of the earlier ones have become available in response to Freedom of Information Act requests and in conjunction with the Nevin case. Among those available, sections have been blocked out and pages are missing.
Military officials were called to testify before Congress in 1977 after information about these biological warfare experiments was revealed.
At the time, those officials said that determining just how vulnerable the US was to a biological attack "required extensive research and development to determine precisely our vulnerability, the efficacy of our protective measures, and the tactical and strategic capability of various delivery systems and agents," according to a record of that testimony quoted in "Clouds of Secrecy."
Cole too says it's hard to see these events now from the perspective that people had then.
There was "a different mindset in the country then … [a] Cold War mentality," he says. But, he argues, that doesn't justify glossing over the already known potential danger of the agents used.
At the same time, part of what the military knows about how clouds of chemicals spread comes from these experiments. Cole says that knowledge gleaned from these biological warfare testing programs helped inform the US reaction when reports came in on the potential use of chemical weapons in the first Gulf War.
Cole says that the obvious question that's on people's minds is what's happening now. After all, if secret tests could occur then, what prevents them from continuing? Are they, in fact, still going on?…
…In 2001, a New York Times report revealed projects testing biological weapons that began under the Clinton administration and continued under the second Bush administration. A 1972 treaty theoretically prohibited developing biological weapons, but this program justified it with the argument that new weapons needed to be studied in order to develop adequate defenses.
And the "War on Terror" raises other concerns, according to Cole.
After the 2001 anthrax attacks, funding for bioterrorism research spiked by $1.5 billion. Then in 2004, Congress approved another $5.6 billion bioterror research project.
These projects are meant to protect society from the dangers of biological agents, but they may have an unintended consequence, Cole says.
"Thousands and thousands of people became familiar with pathogens that they were not familiar with before," he says. "You now have many more people that could potentially do bad with these organisms, and it only takes one person."
https://www.insider.com/over-and-over-again-americans-have-been-subjected-to-secret-military-experiments-2015-9