Central Intelligence Agency
                         Washington, D. C. 20505
                                    
                              13 April 1994
                                    
                                    
          The Central intelligence Agency's Search for Records
                        on Human Radiation Testing

     On 4 January 1994 the Central Intelligence Agency began
searching for records relating to any experiments that used
ionizing radiation on human subjects. As this search nears
completion, CIA has found no evidence that the Agency ever
deliberately exposed anyone to toxic radiation.

     The Agency's search took its initial guidance from
statements made in the reports of two probes of CIA conducted in
the 1970s. The Rockefeller Commission (1975) and the Church
Committee (1976) discussed the Agency's testing of drugs on
unwitting subjects in the 1950s and 1960s, particularly the
MKULTRA program. MKULTRA, according to the investigators,
authorized Agency officials to explore "additional avenues to the
control of human behavior," including "radiation, electroshock,
various fields of psychology, psychiatry, sociology, and
anthropology, graphology, harassment substances, and paramilitary
devices and materials" (emphasis added).

     Agency officials tried to determine whether MKULTRA
researchers actually experimented with radiation. No one
associated with MKULTRA or the investigations of the 1970s
recalled why the word "radiation" was used by the Rockefeller and
Church reports. We found no documents indicating MKULTRA
researchers used ionizing radiation on human subjects (most
MKULTRA documents have been in the public domain for over a
decade). Both reports used language from the CIA Inspector
General's 1963 investigation of MKULTRA, and we believe the
language might have originated in early documents mentioning
radiation as a potential research field for Technical Services
Division (which ran the MKULTRA program).

     CIA officers in all the directorates are searching relevant
Agency records for any evidence of radiation experiments.
Throughout this search, CIA has based its inquiries on the
broadest usage of the term "radiation." CIA officials have
queried dozens of current and former employees, ranging from
former DCIs to scientists and medical personnel most likely to
have conducted or been aware of radiation testing, if it
occurred. Without exception, Agency veterans knew of no such
experiments or operations. No documents found to date suggest
that CIA conducted experiments or operations using ionizing
radiation on human subjects.

     Since the 1970s, all Agency research involving human
subjects has been conducted in accordance with all relevant
guidelines issued by the Department of Health, Education and
Welfare and the Department of Health and Human Services.