---
category: Esoteric & Historical Concept
created: 2025-07-22
description: The USS Nautilus (SSN-571) was the world's first operational nuclear-powered
  submarine. It became the subject of a fabricated story about telepathy experiments
  that influenced Soviet psi research.
location: United States
start: 1954
summary: The USS Nautilus (SSN-571) was the world's first operational nuclear-powered
  submarine, launched in 1954, whose name was attached to a fabricated 1960 French
  magazine story about telepathy experiments that inadvertently accelerated Soviet
  psi research funding.
tags:
- vessel
- submarine
- ColdWar
title: The Nautilus
updated: 2025-07-22
---

The USS Nautilus (SSN-571) was the world's first operational nuclear-powered submarine, launched by the United States in 1954. It gained notoriety in the context of psychic research due to a fabricated story published in 1960.[^1]

In February 1960, the French magazine *Science et Vie* published an article titled "The Secret of the Nautilus," written by [Gerard Messadie](/people/gerard-messadie/) and allegedly sourced by [Jacques Bergier](/people/jacques-bergier/). The article falsely claimed that the U.S. government had successfully used telepathy to communicate with the Nautilus crew while the submarine was submerged beneath the Arctic ice cap.[^1]

Despite official American denials, the Soviet Union reportedly believed the story, which served as a significant stimulus for the expansion of their own parapsychology research programs. The Soviets even claimed to have replicated the entire Nautilus experiment successfully with one of their own submarines.[^1]

---

[^1]: Schnabel, Jim. *Remote Viewers*. Dell, 1997.