Victor Marchetti

Victor Marchetti was born December 23, 1929, in Hazleton, Pennsylvania, and joined the CIA in October 1955. He served as an analyst in the Office of Research and Reports and the Office of National Estimates before moving to the Office of Planning, Programming, and Budgeting in 1966. From July 1968 to 1969, Marchetti served as special assistant to CIA Deputy Director Rufus Taylor, giving him access to the agency's highest-level operations and budget allocations. He resigned from the CIA in September 1969, disillusioned with the agency's culture of secrecy and extralegal activities.¹²

The CIA and the Cult of Intelligence

In 1974, Marchetti co-authored The CIA and the Cult of Intelligence with John D. Marks, a former State Department intelligence officer. The book was the first manuscript ever subjected to prior review and censorship by the United States government under the intelligence employment secrecy agreement. The CIA initially demanded deletion of 339 passages; after legal proceedings, 168 deletions were enforced. The published book, with its prominent blank spaces where censored material had been removed, became a symbol of government overreach on secrecy and actually drew more attention to the redacted material than the original text would have. The legal fight established important precedents for government employees' First Amendment rights and the public's right to know about intelligence operations.²

Revelations About Continuing Black Programs

Marchetti revealed that despite the 1977 congressional ban on mind control research imposed after the Church Committee investigations, so-called "black programs" working with mind control still existed, only now they were better hidden. His disclosure was significant because it came from an insider with direct knowledge of the agency's operations and budget structures, contradicting the official narrative that all MKULTRA-related behavioral modification programs had been terminated. Marchetti's understanding of the CIA's budget and planning apparatus gave his claims particular weight, as he understood how programs could be concealed within opaque funding streams.¹

Synthetic Telepathy and LTL Weapons

Marchetti's revelation about continuing black programs provided context for subsequent developments in mind control technology, including projects working with "synthetic telepathy" that supposedly had the ability to remotely transmit microwave voices into the heads of targeted persons. Such devices, known as Less Than Lethal (LTL) weapons, were reported in an April 1994 article in Scientific American. During the NBC documentary The Other Side, Major Edward Dames of the Pentagon's Defense Intelligence Agency stated that "The U.S. Government has an electronic device which could implant thoughts in people," though he refused further comment afterward.¹

Later Life

Marchetti continued to write and speak about intelligence community abuses. He published a novel, The Rope-Dancer, in 1971, and contributed to newsletters and publications critical of CIA operations. He also participated in discussions about JFK assassination conspiracy theories. Marchetti died on October 19, 2018, in Ashburn, Virginia, at age 88.²