The Hidden Experiments--When Governments Tested On Their Own Citizens
The Hidden Experiments: When the U.S. Government Tested on Its Own People For decades, the American public has been reassured that medical ethics, federal protections, and the Nuremberg Code ensure that human beings will never again be used as experimental material without their informed consent. Yet history tells a different story. Across the 20th century—and even into the 1990s—there are documented cases in which U.S. agencies tested chemicals, biological agents, radiation, psychological techniques, and unapproved drugs on ordinary people who never agreed to participate. Many of these operations remained classified for years. Some still are. In this article, I explore two particularly disturbing cases—Frank Olson’s death and the Oakville, Washington “blob rain”—and place them within the broader, undeniable pattern of non-consensual human experimentation conducted by the U.S. government. 1. Frank Olson: A Scientist Who Knew Too Much Frank Olson was not simply a scientist who “fell” fr...