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Ask Molly: Did CIA Really

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Study Psychic Powers?

October 27, 2021
News

Dear Molly,
Did the CIA really study psychic powers?
~ The Future is Cloudy
*****
Dear The Future is Cloudy,
Unfortunately my Magic 8-Ball is broken, so instead I went to
the best source I know to find the answer to your question:
CIA’s History Staff!
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.
The earliest record our historians have found on this topic is a
1948 memorandum speculating on whether hypnotized people
could be used for long-distance communication.
We didn’t, however, conduct our own research into psychic
phenomena until the summer of 1972. We worked with
scientists and researchers to investigate whether certain
people could “see” locations and objects around the world,
without actually being there. This ability is known as “remote
viewing.”
CIA ended this research five years later in 1977, and we turned
the program over to the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA). The
project became known as STARGATE, which was actually DIA’s
initial name for this program. Later, it was renamed GRILL
FLAME.
In the mid-1990s, DIA handed the program back to CIA. We
agreed to take another look at the program on the condition
that an independent study group would evaluate it. Four
researchers from the American Institute for Research
published their findings in September 1995, and that report is
available on the Internet: a Google search on “An Evaluation of
Remote Viewing” will turn up the 183-page document.
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.
Soon after, at the request of Congress, we agreed to review
the program and declassify records for the public. We worked
closely with DIA and the U.S. Army to gather all relevant
records, and we placed the entire collection of declassified
records from all three organizations on CIA.gov in the FOIA
Electronic Reading Room, which you can access here.
If you’re interested in learning more, don’t consult a crystal
ball. Instead, go to our website and you can read the
declassified Studies in Intelligence article by Kenneth Kress,
“Parapsychology in Intelligence,” which sums up the CIA
program pretty well.
I hope I was able to shine a light on a spookier part of our
past.
Until next time,
~ Molly
Tags:

agency obscura, ask molly

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