One of the recurring themes in modern political reform or investigatory activities is the development of aberrant behavior by key personalities, often after a long, unbroken history of competence and rationality. This seems especially prevalent among witnesses to high-level criminal or secret projects, or persons otherwise critical to exposure of something powerful people may want to keep covered up. The subject will exhibit such symptoms as the loss of focus, shortening of attention span, loss of coherence in sentence structure and logic, and the development of paranoid suspicions of others, including his own family, friends, and allied, often accusing them of betrayal or plotting against him, and turning more attention on them than on his real enemies. The subject may begin to say weird things that cause his supporters to lose confidence in him and in the other things he has had to say, thereby discrediting him and his evidence. At the same time, the subject may exhibit some or all of the following physical symptoms: fever, headache, delirium, aching joints, high blood pressure, numbness of extremities, and skin rash.
Subjects exhibiting these symptoms have had reported the presence in the area of mysterious vans parked nearby, often with license plate numbers that don't seem to be registered to anyone, or frequent overflights by black helicopters with no tail numbers.
We have a number of reports of methods used by intelligence agencies and criminal organizations to affect the minds of persons, ranging from contact poisons to infrasonic transmitters to psychotronic devices operating on microwave frequencies. Research programs in the MK-ULTRA series have been documented in hearings before the U.S. Congress, and a few researchers, like Jose Delgado, have openly published papers on mind-control research they have conducted under government sponsorship. Several investigators, notably Martin Cannon and Julianne McKinney, have documented much of this research, including material that can be found in public records.
Therefore, we must take seriously the possibility of a real threat to the mental soundness of key personalities involved in the exposure of high-level corruption or abuse, and to reformers generally. Parties who might be threatened by such reform activities and who may have access to and use of such mind-altering technologies could be expected to yield to the temptation to use those technologies, and such use may have become well-established.
There is a natural tendency on the part of ordinary people to discredit such concerns, and to dismiss them as paranoid, the evidence of delusional thinking rather than a matter of rational discussion and preparation. However, the public record cannot be ignored, nor can we ignore the susceptibility of powerful persons to use any methods they have available to them to protect their interests. We can hardly rely on the powerful to be decent, honorable people. History proves otherwise.
So how can activists and witnesses protect themselves from such threats without becoming paranoid by doing so? It is certainly not feasible to live in a Faraday cage (to protect from electromagnetic transmissions), or to subject everything we eat, drink, or touch to sophisticated chemical analyses.
The first thing to do is to recognize the symptoms. If our previously rational fellows begin to go weird on us, they may have become targets for mental disruption. At this point it may not be too late to take defensive actions. The subject might be removed to another environment where he will be less easily targeted. Faraday screens might be set up (wire mesh or screen wire). Precautions against poisoning might be taken, especially against contact poisons. Parked vans and overflying helicopters might be discouraged (by methods left to your imagination).
But there are two main things that can and should be done. The first is for supporters to recognize the possible threat and not to discredit the evidence that the subject presented during his rational period, even if he is no longer a credible witness. The second is for the subject himself to fight the symptoms. That is not easy, but there is good reason to think that such assaults can be resisted if the person learns to recognize them in himself, and to develop the kinds of mental training that can overcome them. He will need to learn to see his behavior as others see it, to take an external view of himself, and to counter any aberrant thoughts, feelings, or behaviors as they arise. By drawing from inner reserves of reason and objectivity, he can effectively resist almost any onslaughts of this kind.
The war for the future will be fought on many fronts, and on many battlefields. In the end, the most important of these are our own minds.