Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

CIA, MKUltra, and the cover-up of U.S. germ warfare in the Korean war (2022)

jeff-kaye.medium.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 172 posts

Re: CIA, MKUltra, and the cover-up of U.S. germ warfare in the Korean war (2022)

#31

Post by gjsman-1000 »

coldtea wrote: post #28
throwaway6734 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

If the comparison is the Holocaust and Gulags, you know yoy're near rock bottom

It’s a fair comparison. Frankly the Nazis are overrated.

Nazis: ~6 million

Soviet Union: ~20 million

China Cultural Revolution: ~30 million

Though the Soviet Union and China ones were more of a result of incredibly bad economic policies. The Soviets still killed ~1-2 million in Gulags directly.

Let’s also not forget the Japanese genocides against China. Nanjing, Unit 731…

There also is, of course, more recent ones that are little known. Cambodia took over a million and Rwanda close to that.

Re: CIA, MKUltra, and the cover-up of U.S. germ warfare in the Korean war (2022)

#32

Post by phpisthebest »

You can not have "Government by the people, for the people" when you allow some people to keep secrets from other people under the guise of "national security"

Self governance is incompatible with states secrets, and only leads to abuse, corruption, and tyranny.

History is full of known abuses, and for every known abuse there is the potential for LOTS of unknown abuse.

One can say "well congress will hold them accountable" but along time ago congress passed a law to declassify everything around JFK assassination, yet multiple presidents after bring pressured by the CIA for "national security reasons" have refused to release all kinds of document in direct violation of that law.

the CIA, any other agency with the power to "classify" things, is a direct and ever present threat to not only liberty but the underpinning of democracy everyone claims to support.

Re: CIA, MKUltra, and the cover-up of U.S. germ warfare in the Korean war (2022)

#33

Post by throwaway6734 »

gjsman-1000 wrote: post #31
coldtea wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the comparison is the Holocaust and Gulags, you know yoy're near rock bottom

It’s a fair comparison. Frankly the Nazis are overrated. Nazis: ~6 million Soviet Union: ~20 million China Cultural Revolution: ~30 million Though the Soviet Union and China ones were more of a result of incredibly bad economic policies. The Soviets still killed ~1-2 million in Gulags directly. Let’s also not forget the Japanese genocides against China. Nanjing, Unit 731… There also is, of course, more recent ones th…

[flagged]

Re: CIA, MKUltra, and the cover-up of U.S. germ warfare in the Korean war (2022)

#34

Post by discardedrefuse »

mytailorisrich wrote: post #13
the-dude wrote: post #12

This reminds me of a video I stumbled across on YT : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eMq-fApmzts This guy alleges that the US were 'kind' on Japan (only light tribunal?) after the war because they wanted to acquire the bio-warfare knowledge of the Japanese. And the Japanese tested bio-bombs.

The US had invaded Japan, they did not need to be "nice" to acquire any of Japan's knowledge. My understanding is that the US were worried about the communists and Japan's stability in general and decided not to unduly rock the boat.

There's some interesting analysis of WWII that posits that the nukes were completely unnecessary. Stalin was poised to invade Japan from the north so the US had to act fast.

https://foreignpolicy.com/2013/05/30/the-bomb-didnt-beat-jap...

I don't know how accurate this is, but its a good read.

Re: CIA, MKUltra, and the cover-up of U.S. germ warfare in the Korean war (2022)

#35

Post by coldtea »

gjsman-1000 wrote: post #31
coldtea wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the comparison is the Holocaust and Gulags, you know yoy're near rock bottom

It’s a fair comparison. Frankly the Nazis are overrated. Nazis: ~6 million Soviet Union: ~20 million China Cultural Revolution: ~30 million Though the Soviet Union and China ones were more of a result of incredibly bad economic policies. The Soviets still killed ~1-2 million in Gulags directly. Let’s also not forget the Japanese genocides against China. Nanjing, Unit 731… There also is, of course, more recent ones th…

At least the CPP and China only fucked their own people - plus, the numbers are hugely inflated BS as you note, adding results of bad policies, and famines etc in societies torn by wars and poverty. Regarding those, one could include the British genocide of Irish and Indian people which used those as explicit tools even (as opposed to mere incompetence, not to mention ruling India wasn't their job in the first place).

In contrast, imperialism and colonialism fucked people over all over the world. And some of the later impact is masked, because they enabled locals to do the dirty job for them - to the tunes of tens of millions affected.

Re: CIA, MKUltra, and the cover-up of U.S. germ warfare in the Korean war (2022)

#37

Post by krapp »

throwaway6734 wrote: post #23
alwaysthesame wrote: post #5

[flagged]

[flagged]

As far as the Holocaust goes, Hitler was inspired by America's white supremacy and genocide of native Americans, and the Holocaust was funded by numerous American companies (not just IBM.) So while Hitler and the Nazis definitely deserve the blame for that, the US' hands aren't entirely clean either.

Re: CIA, MKUltra, and the cover-up of U.S. germ warfare in the Korean war (2022)

#38

Post by nancyhn »

mistermann wrote: post #22
nancyhn wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even sooner, we could see RFK Jr. taking care of this in 2025.

I have a feeling this showdown would resolve much like it did last time.

That would be too obvious, don't you think?

Re: CIA, MKUltra, and the cover-up of U.S. germ warfare in the Korean war (2022)

#39

Post by brnaftr361 »

hackerlight wrote: post #25
the-dude wrote: post #12

This reminds me of a video I stumbled across on YT : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eMq-fApmzts This guy alleges that the US were 'kind' on Japan (only light tribunal?) after the war because they wanted to acquire the bio-warfare knowledge of the Japanese. And the Japanese tested bio-bombs.

That doesn't make sense. The US won and Japan lost, the US could have taken whatever information they wanted to.

That makes sense in a vacuum, but if some of, or all of the principal actors of a given institution run a tight ship it's entirely probable that there are various unknown secrets to which only they are aprised. There's nothing that forbids some key officer from literally burying information in a completely undocumented spot. In such a case, if the buried treasure is of any value whatever, it becomes a point of leverage. Some artifact that could be lost to the world forevermore or discovered, hinging on some nefarious negotiation.

Not to mention the reality that aside from some sense of justice, allowing any of these people their freedom is probably irrelevant in the larger scheme of things. Which is to say that it's a gambit for valuable, empirical knowledge which for all intents and purposes, I would surmise, couldn't be elsewise obtained due to the moral standards of the West, or some theatrics which will have little consequence.

Re: CIA, MKUltra, and the cover-up of U.S. germ warfare in the Korean war (2022)

#40

Post by 082349872349872 »

mytailorisrich wrote: post #13
the-dude wrote: post #12

This reminds me of a video I stumbled across on YT : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eMq-fApmzts This guy alleges that the US were 'kind' on Japan (only light tribunal?) after the war because they wanted to acquire the bio-warfare knowledge of the Japanese. And the Japanese tested bio-bombs.

The US had invaded Japan, they did not need to be "nice" to acquire any of Japan's knowledge. My understanding is that the US were worried about the communists and Japan's stability in general and decided not to unduly rock the boat.

see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reverse_Course
Post reply on HN