MI6 payouts over secret LSD tests
24 February 2006
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/4745748.stm
Three UK ex-servicemen have been given compensation after they were given LSD
without their consent in the 1950s.
The men volunteered to be "guinea pigs" at the government research base Porton
Down after being told scientists wanted to find a cure for the common cold.
But they were given the hallucinogen in mind control tests, and some
volunteers had terrifying hallucinations.
The Foreign Office said the secret intelligence body MI6 had made the
settlements after legal advice.
The out-of-court settlements are thought to be under £10,000 for each of the
men.
In a statement issued later to the BBC News website, the Ministry of Defence
said it did not make any admission of liability in respect of the settlements.
The statement added: "The Ministry of Defence is very grateful to all those
whose participation in studies at Porton Down made possible the research to
provide safe and effective protection for UK Armed Forces."
A spokesman for the Foreign Office, which oversees MI6, said: "The settlement
offers were made to the government on behalf of the three claimants which, on
legal advice, and in the particular circumstances of these cases, the government
thinks it appropriate to accept."
The men had volunteered for experiments at the government's chemical warfare
research base at Porton Down in Wiltshire in 1953 and 1954.
Following the settlement, Don Webb, who was a 19-year-old airman at the time,
told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "I think they grudgingly acknowledged that
they did something wrong.
"They stick to the old maxim: never apologise, never explain. But I think in
this case they have decided to pay some money. I think that is as near to an
apology or an explanation I'll get."
Both he and fellow serviceman Logan Marr, a former shepherd from the Scottish
highlands, suffered hallucinations after they were asked to drink a clear
liquid.
The third man did not wish to be named.
The research was carried out after British and American governments thought the
Soviet Union had developed a "truth drug" which could compel spies and
servicemen to yield up important secrets.
MI6 scientists decided to test LSD, the closest thing they thought they had to a
truth drug, on volunteers to see how they reacted.
'Volunteers programme'
Alan Care, a lawyer who represented the three men, said: "As far as we are
aware, these are the first settlements by the secret intelligence services for a
personal injury action."
He added that a request that documents relating to the case be put into the
public domain had been refused.
Some volunteers at the base did not find out they had been given LSD until 50
years later. Thousands of servicemen and women have volunteered in the testing
of defences against chemical and biological attacks at the Wiltshire military
base.
Research began in 1916 using a "volunteers programme", and up to 20,000 people
took part in various trials in the 50 years up to 1989.
Last October, the government was found guilty of breaching the human rights of
former soldier Thomas Roche, who claimed he developed health problems as a
result of mustard gas and nerve agent tests in 1962 and 1963.