The USA government spent millions on researching psychic powers. But why? And what were the results?
Psychic Powers: What the CIA Investigated
Psychic powers. Clairvoyance, ESP, Telekinesis. Is it true that the CIA investigated those psychic abilities? And if they did, what was the reason and what were the results?
In this blog, we tell you about the surprising, sometimes even shocking truth about the White House, the CIA and the investigations that really happened. Find out about their amazing journey into psychic powers here!
PSYCHIC POWERS: THE CIA INVESTIGATES
In 1996 the New York Times reported that the Pentagon has spent millions of dollars on research into psychic abilities. These were top secret projects to investigate extrasensory phenomena. They wanted to see if people could use the sheer power of the human mind for various acts of espionage and war. So, they looked into whether people with psychic powers could see into secret files. But also, they wanted to know if gifted people could recognise faces, locate submarines, or even to blow up guided missiles in mid-flight!
The CIA admit that a great amount of research on different types of parapsychology did take place. This happened from the 1970s onwards. There were investigations into ESP, Telekinesis and particularly experiments on remote viewing. Thus, they investigated if gifted people could “see” locations and objects around the world, without actually being physically present.
PRESIDENTS and PSYCHIC POWERS!
According to the New York Times, President Jimmy Carter ordered the CIA to conduct high-level investigations into psychic research behind the Iron Curtain. He instructed this in an attempt to assess and possibly counteract a possible Soviet threat.
Dr Russell Targ was a highly regarded physicist and he was heavily involved in the experiments. He had expertise in optics, light, lasers, and microwaves. Dr Targ joined the Stanford Research Institute in 1972. Here, he and his associate Harold Puthoff came up with the term “remote viewing.” This was the practice of picking up impressions about a distant or unseen target, purely by using psychic abilities.
Targ and Puthoff then worked on the US Defence Intelligence Agency’s Stargate Project. This was a a $20 million research program. This scientific research began in 1975 to investigate the potential military application of psychic phenomena.
REMOTE VIEWING EXPERIMENTS
The research investigated different types of psychic abilities, with remote viewing being at the top of the list.
The NY Times reports that “gifted individuals were said to be able to describe distant locations, events and objects. In 1976, for instance, a ”viewer” in California tried to pick up sensations Mr. Targ was experiencing thousands of miles away in New York City. The site was chosen only minutes before the test.
On a computer tied into the network of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the viewer in California reported their impression. ”The first image I got was of a cement depression – as if a dry fountain – with a cement post in the middle or inside. There seemed to be pigeons off to the right flying around the surface of the depression.” Indeed, writes Mr. Targ, the test site – the central fountain in Washington Square Park – was dry, had a post in the middle from which water could be sprayed, and was surrounded by pigeons.”
DETECTING MISSILES
In his book “Mind Wars”, Ronald M. McRae also reveals many details about the psychic research. One example was to evaluate the MX missile ”shell-game”. This was a $40 billion scheme. Each MX missile was secretly shifted between an array of concrete bunkers. Soviet planners would therefore never know which shelter to aim at in a first attack.
Mr. McRae quotes a former White House aide as his source. He says the Pentagon set up experiments in which psychics tried to pinpoint the position of the targets. The results were apparently positive enough to suggest vulnerability of the MX missiles.
His rather amazing book also has many other incredible scoops. For example it includes a report on a prediction of Israel’s attack on Iraq’s nuclear reactor, published ten months before it happened. There are also revelations about thought control using telepathic hypnosis, and even the enlistment of warrior/monk-psychics to counter terrorism!
BUT DON’T BELIEVE US, ASK THE CIA!
The experiments went on until the 1990s, so this was not an overnight case of “ have a quick look,” but a serious series of investigations. Interestingly, the CIA are openly happy to admit this research. Molly Hale on the CIA’s insider website tells us “ According to our historians, from very early in CIA’s history we had been interested in investigating whether “extra sensory perception” (ESP) or other paranormal phenomena (generally called “parapsychology”) exist and, if so, whether they had operational uses for intelligence.”
One issue the CIA had was finding so-called gifted people, especially those who would participate in long term experiments. And, one of their documents even mentions that participants came from advertising in women’s magazines.
THE CONCLUSION ABOUT PSYCHIC POWERS?
“That report’s conclusion—which echoed the assessments of the CIA officers involved in the program during the 1970s—was that enough accurate remote viewing experiences existed to defy randomness, but that the phenomenon was too unreliable, inconsistent, and sporadic to be useful for intelligence purposes. We decided not to restore the program.”
What is interesting is that all through the reports, there are some amazing incidences of psychic powers. But of course, not everybody the CIA selected would be right all of the time. This, as well as the huge amount of money involved, therefore led to the programmes coming to an end. But the research still remains a testimony that psychic powers really do exist, especially if you pick the best genuine psychics like we do!
