The Navy tested mescaline as part of its 1947–53 Project CHATTER. MK-ULTRA was first organized in 1949 by Richard Helms under the direction of Allen Dulles as Project BLUEBIRD. Two years later, it was renamed ARTICHOKE (after one of Dulles’s favorite foods) then termed MK-ULTRA in 1953, finally becoming MK-SEARCH in 1965 until the program's "official termination" eight years later. MK-ULTRA was directly responsible for the wide underground availability of LSD, phencyclidine (PCP – also called "angel dust"), dimethyltryptamine (DMT), 2,5-dimethoxy-4-methylamphetamine (STP) and other powerful synthetic psychoactive drugs in the 1960s. In the early 1950s, the CIA and the Army had contacted Sandoz requesting several kilograms of LSD for use in the test program. Dr. Hofmann and Sandoz refused this request, so Director Dulles persuaded the Indianapolis-based pharmaceutical luminary Eli Lilly (later the pioneers of and chief cheerleaders for the widely prescribed antidepressant Prozac) to synthesize the drug contrary to existing international patent accords – making the US government and Lilly the first illegal domestic manufacturers and distributors of LSD.

After an alleged terrorist unsuccessfully tried to detonate his explosive underwear on a Christmas Day flight to Detroit, current and former American officials are now using the failed attack to push for more airport scanners to spot such explosives — and a lot more.