Quote · Lex Fridman Podcast
#481 – Norman Ohler: Hitler, Nazis, Drugs, WW2, Blitzkrieg, LSD, MKUltra & CIA
Where this was said
LSD, CIA, and MKUltra
At 3:56:38 · chapter starts 3:30:09
When Albert Hofmann accidentally discovered LSD at Sandoz in 1943, the company set up an 'intoxication room' where employees voluntarily tested it during the war — and everyone had transcendent experiences. Sandoz CEO Arthur Stoll recognized its potential as the first effective treatment for trauma at a time when millions had been traumatized by WWII. But Ohler discovered in the Novartis archive — after bribing the archivist with an LSD tab printed with the old Sandoz logo — that Stoll was simultaneously corresponding with Nazi biochemist Richard Kuhn, sending him ergotamine (LSD precursor) in October 1943. SS experiments at Dachau, which Ohler had documented while researching Blitzed, used mescaline and an unnamed hallucinogen (likely LSD). American forces liberated Dachau, debriefed Kuhn, flew a general to Basel, and obtained the LSD technology. The CIA then ran MKUltra, using LSD on unwitting subjects including Ken Kesey — who wrote One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest from his CIA trip. Sidney Gottlieb eventually pressured Stoll to restrict LSD to research only, and in 1966 it was prohibited. [1] — Norman Ohler "Documents in the Novartis archive proved that Nazi biochemist Richard Kuhn received LSD precursors from the Sandoz CEO in 1943 for SS truth…" 4:02:00
When the Novartis archivist refused to show Ohler the CEO correspondence he needed, Ohler produced a tab of LSD printed with the old Sandoz logo — made by an underground Basel chemist as an inside joke. The archivist took the tab, the ice broke, and Ohler found the smoking gun: a 1943 letter proving the Nazis received LSD from Sandoz.
