100 Insane Classified Secrets US Government Didn't Want You To Know About !

These Top Secrets Information Will Shock You. For this list, we'll be looking at deep, dark government secrets that were declassified or leaked to the public. Our countdown of insane classified secrets they don't want you to know includes secrets from WWI, WWII, the Cold War, the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster, and more!

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15 Top Secret Places You're Not Allowed To Visit In The U.S.A. Explore the top 15 secret and off-limits locations across the U.S., from Area 51 to hidden NSA spy hubs. Perfect for travelers intrigued by America's most secretive spots.

Secret Places, Restricted Areas & Closed Cities In The U.S.A. There is nothing which sparks curiosity more than secret places and restricted areas...especially in the US.

The United States of America is a hub of secret and restricted places from Area 51, closed U.S Cities such as Mercury, Nevada and even NSA Spy hubs dotted around many U.S states from Los Angeles and New York City, to even Dallas and Seattle!

Is there an NSA spy hub in your state? Read on and you will find out later in this article.

What have they got to hide?
These secret and restricted places are the talk of many conspiracy theorists, with the same questions always being asked.

What have they got to hide?
Why can't I go?
Why is the place so secretive?
Then due to the lack of answers or contradicting answers given by the Government or officials, people start to make up there own theories, using the little evidence which can be gathered. "maybe it's Aliens" , "maybe its a UFO" , "is it a secret area for the rich & powerful?".

To help ease your curiosity here at Town and Tourist we have put a list of the 15 most secretive places and restricted areas across the U.S. As a bonus we have also included a section on the U.S.A's last "closed town" Mercury, Nevada.

1. Area 51, Nevada U.S.A
Area 51 has been the source of conspiracy theories for many decades now in the U.S.A.

It is one of the most Secretive places on earth and according to many conspiracy theorists the source of many cover ups! Officially ,the site is an Air Force Facility in the Nevada desert. However, it took the CIA till 2013 to publicly acknowledge it's existence!

Another name for Area 51 is Groom Lake, it was believed to have been originally setup to test & research top secret aircraft and advanced weapons technologies for the CIA back in 1955.

The official purpose or mission of the base is still covert and highly classified.

The secrecy which surrounds Area 51 has made many theorists believe a UFO or Aliens were once captured there!

Area 51 aerial shot. [Secret places] Photo by popularmechanics.com (Restricted Areas USA)

Area 51 is officially off limits with the area around the Groom lake area, controlled by Surveillance, security and even motion sensors.

The area above area 51 is a no fly zone for commercial and civilian aircraft.

On all government U.S maps it officially does not exist and is a secret place with no registered roads leading up to it.

Can you visit Area 51?
If you really want to get as close as you can to Area 51, head to the nearby town of Rachel, on the famous "Extraterrestrial highway" .

This area is pretty close to Area 51 and popular for tourists, Conspiracy theorists and UFO enthusiasts.

Area 51 sign 2019, No drones allowed! (Restricted Areas USA)

2. Coca Cola Vault, Georgia, U.S.A
What is more heavily guarded the some of the most prized jewels in the world? Only Coca Cola's secret recipe for immense success.

Some call it the "Billion Dollar Formula" and it's the secret to Coca Colas unique flavor and blend, which can not be found in nature.

Many have tried to replicate it over the years but it is never quite the same.

The closely guarded formula is one of the most highly regarded industry secrets and housed inside the Coca Cola Vault in the Word of Coca Cola Museum in Atlanta, Georgia, U.S.A.

Can I visit the Coca Cola Vault?
Coca Cola is an Iconic beverage with a timeless flavor...with the recipe closely guarded. However, this article has made your curiosity start to bubble you can still take a tour of the Coca Cola Vault inside the World of the Coca Cola Vault...you can even see the door!

However, be aware that it is restricted to enter inside the vault for anybody with high security surrounding the heavy duty vault.

3. Dulce Base, New Mexico, US
Dulce a small town Northern New Mexico, close to the Colorado border. The secret town of Dulce houses around 2,600 people, (mostly Native American).

However, this hidden little town is believed to hold many strange secrets.

Some people believe that Dulce, is home to Dulce Base a Giant underground facility, where weird experiments are done and advanced biological technologies were developed.

According a Huffington Post report. a former U.S government employed explosive engineer (With High level security clearance) named Philip Schneider took part in building a "Secret Underground Base" in 1979 at Dulce, New Mexico.

Schneider alleged he was suspicious of the standard engineering operation.

When he noticed the presence of Green Berets and Special Forces operatives.

He alleges that while drilling he actually came face to face with a 7 foot grey, slimy alien and shot it dead!

But wait it gets even crazier, according to reports from the engineers there was an underground battle, with 60 people losing their life!

Although this sounds like science fiction, many have pointed out that Philip Schneider, as an outspoken critic of the U.S government on their alleged Alien cover up,

faced an untimely death due to a Suicide...coincidence or did he see something down there.

(Secret places) (Restricted Areas USA)

Overall, this gigantic subterranean facility is believed to house, all sorts of weird gene mixing and splicing tests. From human clone creation to Freakish human-alien hybrids. Either way the Dulce Base is one of the U.S.A's most secret places.

4. Mount Weather, Virginia, US
A secret underground Military base, embedded inside a Mountain! No this isan't something from a James Bond Movie, it's in fact a real place! Mount weather is located just 74km or 46 miles from Washington DC.

Dubbed as a "Emergency Operations Center", this heavy duty fortress is used to house all the highest levels of U.S government should there be a national disaster.

Built during the Cold War era, Mount Weather is ran by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) for the purpose of protecting not just high level American politicians, but also some of the US's national treasures, such as the art currently in the National Gallery.

This is not your standard security bunker, with a vast array of facilities from hospitals and Cafeterias to power plants and event a mass transit station to allow communication to the nation should there be an emergency.

Mount Weather (Hidden Places) (Restricted Areas USA)

Mount Weather has been called the "Perfect place to go if there was an Apocalypse" .

As you have everything you need, security, food and advanced communication technologies at the highest level.

It was actually used during the 9/11 attacks with government officials being airlifted to the facility when the disaster struck.

Can I go if there is an Emergency?
Unfortunately, you can't just knock on the door during the next zombie apocalypse...the fortress has a perimeter set up with the most secure technology in the world, a host of armed guards and of course razor wire cladded fences! So you will struggle to find out what's inside this secret place.

5. Club 33, California
Located in Anaheim, California, Club 33 is a secret place inside Disneyland for the exclusive elite...with no kids allowed.

An an "Invitation Only private club" you need someone inside the club to get you an invite...oh and then I forgot to mention you have to pay $100,000!

Now that's "Mickey Mouse Money" as they say in the U.K.

Located at the intersection of Royal Street & Orleans Street in New Orleans Square, this club was setup in 1967 as a place to host investors, dignitaries and celebrities.

Club 33 Secret Place in Disney Land.

(Restricted Areas USA)

This design of Club 33 was done by Mr. Walt Disney himself as a perfect place for him to entertain business associates.

It is quite a secret as to what the inside of Club 33 is like, however we do know it's the only place in Disney to serve alcohol courtesy of the 1901 lounge...so at least that's something for the $100,000 price tag. Oh and after the initial cost members pay $30,000 per year to maintain the membership.

Membership perks at Club 33?
Apart from the Alcohol as a member of this secret place, you will have access to two fine dining halls, valet parking, VIP card and even a jazz lounge called the Le Salon Nouveau.

However, i think the real reason many will join the hidden place, is for the valuable business connections and subsequent business deals to be made here by the rich and powerful of the U.S.A.

6. North Brother Island, New York, US
North Brother island is one of the most infamous and secretive places in the U.S.A.

Located on New York City's East River, this abandoned & secret place has a dark past, which results in it being a forbidden area today.

What happened on the North Brother Island?
While, the state of New York purchased the island in 1885 as a place to build Riverside hospital.

This was a specialist hospital designed to house people with very contagious diseases like tuberculosis, typhus, yellow fever & even smallpox.

North Brother Island and the abandoned Riverside hospital. Abandoned NY. (Restricted Areas USA)

A famous patient at this hospital was "Typhoid Mary", the first American officially diagnosed with typhoid fever.

During World War 2, this quarantine facility was setup to help military veterans. After that it was setup as a rehab facility for heroin addicts!

These days it is a officially a "bird sanctuary" and the state of New York city has officially FORBIDDEN anyone from visiting!

What has North Brother Island got to hide?
This has sparked many questions from people wondering what have they got to hide?

Is there still patients in the Hospital? Is the ghost of "Typhoid Mary" on the Island? Some people say it's what the movie "Shutter Island" was inspired by with Leonardo Dicaprio.

Despite the urges to keep away by New York State, many people have tried to sneak on the secret island just to take one last glimpse of the hidden and infamous Riverside hospital!

7. Fort Knox - U.S.A
Fort Knox is dubbed the most secure place in U.S.A and even the world! As the largest gold Bullion depository in the United States, this place is a restricted fortress! So what is stored in Fort Knox?

Apart from precious metals, such as gold and silver (it is estimated that 2% of the worlds mined metals are stored here)...what other hidden treasures are here.

According to many sources, Fort Knox once held the royal crown of Hungary and even copies of the Magna Carta! Some theorists even believe Fort Knox is holding the holy grail of Mary Madelene for the Knights Templar! For more on this read the Da Vinci code by Darren brown!

Fort Knox - The a very secure and secret place. photo by the event chronicle (Restricted Areas USA)

As Fort Knox is the most secure place in the world it's pretty difficult to really know what secrete treasures are in there. For aspiring thief's, Fort Knox would be the ultimate haul.

However, with the building made up of 4200 cubic yards of concrete, 16,000 cubic feet of granite and 750 tons of reinforced solid steel...this would not be an easy "job".

This is not even accounted the security surrounding the actual vault...with some theorists stating they would have lasers, armed drones and even land mines!

8. Bohemian Grove, California.
An exclusive club for the elite, rich and powerful which controls America.
Bohemian Grove has been around for over 150 years. Nestled on 2,700 acres of California redwoods.

The secret club is believed to be a right wing hub of control for the elites of the U.S.A.

They are believed to have influence over everything from politics to industry and even trade...meeting two weeks every year.

How to become a member of Bohemian Grove?
To become a member of this secret club you have to be someone of the elite and of significance.

Then you need to be invited by a current member and then you must pay $25,000 plus annual fees.

Prominent members include Republican Presidents, high up politicians, business mogul's and even a few popular artists.

Notable Members of this Secret Place: Presidents Ronald Reagan and Richard Nixon were both members of Bohemian Grove. (A Secret place or an American institution, you decide about this (Restricted Areas USA)

9. Robins Island, New York
Robins Island is a 435 acre private island. Located off the coast of New Suffolk, New York. It is forbidden for public to enter Robin Island and is a restricted area.

Robins island has been plagued with many stories of failed ventures and many owners...it's quite a mystery.

Today it is officially a nature reserve and Sanctuary.

The owner "Mr. Louis Bacon" has spent lots on rebuilding the natural eco system of the island, bringing in mature oak trees and improving the wildlife.

As he does not want to see it destroyed by Commercialization.

There is a chance this could open in the future to public so keep your ears open for Robins Island - the jewel of the Peconic.

Fun Fact: Robbins Island has the healthiest population of turtles, in the state of New York.

10. NSA Hidden Spy Hubs Across the U.S.A
The NSA's most Secret Places to Spy on you!

Is the NSA spying on you?? This is a question which is on the minds of many US citizens these days, with the recent scandals and data protection laws being addressed, it can be a worry for many.

The truth lies behind the fortified walls of certain windowless skyscrapers all over many U.S states.

These fortress like buildings are restricted, secret and build to withstand terrorist attacks and even natural disasters.

You may walk past one of these buildings every day and not even notice it.

These are the NSA Spy Hubs. Is there one in your state?

The Fortress like and secretive NSA spy hubs are all over the United states, here are just some of the states which have being confirmed according to a source. States/cities with a confirmed NSA spy hub include: Atlanta, Dallas, Chicago, Los Angles, New York City, San Francisco, Seattle and of course Washington D.C.

NSA and AT&T Spying Partnership:
These NSA spy hubs, are part of the controversial National Security Agency Surveillance program and an Integral part of one of the worlds largest largest telecommunications networks. (AT&T).

This basically means that the NSA has access to every piece of data transmitted by it's citizens, across the United States.

The NSA regards AT&T to be one of its most trusted partners and has spoke previously of the company’s “extreme willingness to help" .

Many people have concerns about the ethics surrounding this spying and the secret power that the NSA has.

Due to the NSA's unique relationship with phone and internet providers across the U.S.A, you can be assured that they leverage this communications infrastructure and the Spying hubs across the U.S.A to monitors billions of emails, phone calls and even online chats!

According to our source (the intercept) , they have revealed a body of evidence including classified NSA documents, public records, and interviews with former AT&T employees which indicates that the secret buildings are central to an NSA spying initiative!

Full list of Restricted Access NSA Spy Hubs:
As you might of guessed these building have restricted access and what goes on inside is officially top secret. However, here are some of the exact addresses of the NSA spy hubs.

Seattle, Washington. 1122 3rd Avenue.
San Francisco, California, 611 Folsom Street
Chicago, Illinois, 10 South Canal Street
420 South Grand Avenue, Los Angles, California.
4211 Bryan Street, Dallas, Texas
51 Peachtree centre avenue, Atlanta, Georgia.
30E Street, Southwest, Washington D.C,
811 10T, New York.

11. Niihau, USA
This Hawaiian Island is a secret place, which acts sanctuary for many rare animal species and houses just 130 local residents.

With tourists having restricted access, it's no wonder that this place has been nicknamed the Forbidden island.

12. Diego Garcia, Indian Ocean, U.S.A occupied.
Legend has it that Diego Garcia has a secret prison and is even the landing place of the MH370!
Diego Garcia is a small Island in the Indian Ocean and is technically an overseas territory of Great Britain.

However, in 1966, the United States were given rights to use the island in return for cancelling a $14million debt owed by Great Britain.

As a restricted area and U.S military base it has been the subject of a wide range of conspiracy theories, from it housing a secret prison to the landing place of the MH370.

USGS/NASA Landsat data/Gallo Images/Getty images. (A secret place with a lot of controversy) (Restricted Areas USA)

It is public knowledge that Diego Garcia is a launching point for military flights to Afghanistan & Iraq.

It is also a ground station for the Global Positioning System (GPS) ran by the United States Air Force.

The actual base of Diego Garcia is home to 654 buildings and around 4,000 military personnel.

The secrecy of what really goes on at this military base was brought to light in 2009, with the United States military evicting several thousand of the islands local residents!

There was outcry by many, but the United states Military did not respond on the specific reason for the mass eviction...it's all top secret.

13. The Marshall Islands - Pacific Proving Grounds, U.S.A
Bikini Atoll - The Secret US Nuclear Testing Island.

The Pacific Proving Grounds was the name given by the United States government for number of sites in the Marshall Islands and the Pacific Ocean, which it conducted nuclear testing between 1946-1962 .

During this time the United States conducted 67 nuclear tests on the Marshall Islands, with the first on nuclear weapon test (codename able) launched on Bikini Atoll in 1946.

If the Nuclear power of all these tests were combined and then averaged out over that historically period it would be equal to 1.6 Hiroshima sized explosions per day!

The largest ever American Nuclear weapons test(15 mega tons) was detonated 280 miles northwest from Bikini Atoll.

As you can imagine, the fallout from such intense nuclear testing was immense, with radioactive fallout even detected on cattle in Tennessee!

“We located the one spot on Earth that hadn’t been touched by the war and blew it to hell,” Bob Hope reportedly once said.

Bikini Islanders Exiled?
During the Nuclear testing phase Bikini islanders were exiled and forbidden from the islands. In 1970's they were allowed to return, however then they were removed again in 1978!

The reason this time was it was noticed that the islanders had been ingesting dangerously high levels of radiation from eating foods, which were grown on the former nuclear testing site.

This forgotten ground zero, with never been the same and although the local islanders can return, many still worry about the radiation and other fallout from this dark period in history. Sources. Washington Post Guardian News

14. Menwith Hill Royal Air force Station - U.K [Leased to U.S.A]
Menwith Hill is a Royal Air Force Base located in the United Kingdom.

This is one of the most secretive places in U.K and thus subject to a vast array of conspiracy theories.

Back in 1954, the British War Office purchased 550 acres of land and leased it to the United States Military.

What goes on in Menwith Royal Air Force Base?
So what goes on in Menwith Royal Air Force Station?

While what goes on at Menwith Hill is top secret, it is thought that it was originally setup during the Cold war for spying and intelligence gathering.

These days on NSA and Echelon spies can enter the base, with what they are working on kept very secret.

This has even led to protests from the locals demanding what is going on so close to their homes...the battle continues, but for now whatever is going on will remain restricted.

15. Closed Cities, Hidden towns? Mercury, Nevada.
Are there any Closed cities still in the U.S.A?
One such type of area which is kept secret, restricted and closed of from the rest of society are U.S closed cities! So what is a "Closed city"?

It's like a normal city with people working and living there lives but it's closed off from other parts of society.

The first closed city ever built was in Washington State.

The city was restricted and closed with the closest thing to it being a high security military base.

But it get's even more secret and restricting...not only is no one allowed to enter, but no one is allowed to leave!

Why create a closed City?
Usually, the first question on everyone's mind is...why?

The official government report on closed cities such as this in the U.S.A was that it was closed off and a restricted area to prevent "sensitive military secrets and research being leaked out".

The train of thought is that the majority of these closed U.S Cities were created for the top secret "Manhattan Project", which main goal was to develop the first Nuclear Bomb.

Popular areas such as Los Alamos, Oak Ridge, Tennessee and New Mexico were closed to outsiders, made restricted areas and placed under control of the U.S.A military.

In January 2019 a Man was shot after he led Police on a Chase into the closed Town and Restricted Area of Mercury, Nevada. (Secret Places USA)

Back in 1941, the town of Dugway, Utah was made a closed city by the US Government. This was to be the hub research for biological and chemical warfare testing.

The idea of the town was to act as a place to house all the researchers, and their families.

This has three benefits, the first is the researchers are close to the testing facilities, the second is that is area is restricted and secret so that "No one comes in or out" without government approval.

This prevents secrets & sensitive military information being leaked out.

The third one and probably the most sinister, is that if there was a terrible accident and dangerous contamination via a biological or chemical weapon, then the area would be effectively quarantined.

From a common sense perspective this makes sense, however it's quite likely that the researchers and families who were worked in the secret restricted areas would also not be allowed to leave should such an accident occur.

Mercury, Nevada - The U.S.A's most closed, hidden and restricted town.
Although the majority of these historic closed cities are now no longer closed, there are still a few left in the U.S.A.

The first is the town of Mercury, Nevada. This was a thriving hub in the 1950's with a population of 10,000.

It was the home to everything a normal town has, schools, bars, restaurants.

However, it was also home to the scientists who tested the first ever nuclear bombs!

Mercury, Nevada Today?
These days it has restricted access and you are forbidden to head into the town without government clearance.

The exact numbers on the amount of people who still live there is classified, although it is rumored that around 500 people live there still who are mostly researchers.

Closed cities like Mercury, Nevada are not too common in the U.S these days, however in places like Russia and North Korea there are many and even North Korea as a whole is very restricted area.

Top 100 Insane Classified Secrets They Didn't Want You To Know
Welcome to New World Order and today we’re counting down our picks for the Top 100 Insane Classified Secrets They Didn't Want You To Know. For this list, we’ll be looking at deep, dark government secrets that were declassified or leaked to the public. We’ll be laying them out in the order that the events in question occurred, regardless of when they were made public. Where do you stand on government transparency? How about whistleblowers? Let us know in the comments.

#100: In 1917, during World War I, the German government sent a secret diplomatic message to the government of Mexico, proposing a military alliance if the U.S. declared war on Germany. Known as the Zimmerman Telegram after German Foreign Secretary Arthur Zimmermann, it was intercepted and decrypted by British intelligence.

#99: In 2011, the CIA made public its six oldest classified documents, dating from 1918. Included are formulas for secret ink and techniques for opening sealed envelopes without leaving a trace.

#98: In the The Tuskegee Syphilis Study from 1932-72, the United States Public Health Service (PHS) and CDC studied 400 Black men with syphilis. Wanting to observe the long-term effects, they didn’t inform the men of their diagnosis, or treat them, and over a quarter died. The study ended when a whistleblower within the PHS went to the press.

#97: In 1933, 6,700 Russian prisoners were sent to Nazino Island in Siberia and told they were to cultivate the island and build a settlement. In reality, they were abandoned with almost no supplies, leading to violence and cannibalism. The Nazino Tragedy saw around 4,000 die of murder, starvation, and disease.

#96: In 1936, Imperial Japan created a secret unit, Manshu Detachment 731, to research biological and chemical weapons. They conducted deadly human experiments and horrific war crimes in China, killing an estimated 200,000-300,000 people. At the end of WWII, the US gave captured researchers immunity in exchange for data.

#95: In Project Pigeon, which ran from 1943-44, American behaviorist B. F. Skinner was contracted by the U.S. military to train a unit of pigeons that could guide missiles from inside them. Another program around the same time, dreamed up by a dental surgeon, looked into using bats as bombers.

#94: During World War II, the Allies secretly housed their top codebreakers at the remote estate Bletchley Park in Buckinghamshire, England. The infamous Enigma and Lorenz ciphers were broken there.

#93: The Second World War saw the British Security Service MI5 create the Double-Cross System, capturing Nazi spies and flipping them into double agents who sent disinformation back to Berlin.

#92: Large swaths of Great Britain served as test grounds for germ warfare experiments by the British Ministry of Defense. From 1940-79, potentially dangerous chemicals and micro-organisms were released into local populations without their knowledge.

#91: From 1941-45, American and British intelligence agencies enabled the escape of Allied POWs with the help of the United States Playing Card Company. They embedded detailed escape maps between layers of playing cards and sent them in Christmas packages to prison camps throughout Europe.

#90: Declassified documents from 1942 reveal that British Prime Minister Winston Churchill had no intention of putting Adolf Hitler on trial after the war. Instead, he argued for summary execution of all top Nazis.

#89: Future cooking star Julia Child attempted to join the military during World War II but was rejected because of her height. In 1942, she was instead recruited into the Office of Strategic Services, where she helped create shark repellant to protect explosive devices and downed pilots.

#88: 29 Navajo men were recruited as Code Talkers by the U.S. Marines during World War II. They created a code based on the unwritten Navajo language that allowed them to keep important military secrets from the Japanese.

#87: From 1942-46, a team of military officers and physicists embarked on arguably the most significant R&D program in history: the Manhattan Project. It created the first nuclear bombs and changed the world forever.

#86: In 1944 and 1946, the U.S. army and a defense contractor dumped over 37 million gallons of radioactive waste from atomic bomb testing in shallow wells in Tonawanda near Buffalo, New York.

#85: Requested by British Prime Minister Winston Churchill after the end of World War II in 1945, Operation Unthinkable was a set of military plans in case of war with the USSR. One of the two plans envisioned a surprise attack with U.S. aid. The other prepared for a Soviet invasion of Scandinavia and U.S. withdrawal from Europe.

#84: It took some time after Germany’s surrender in 1945 for the Allies to find evidence of Hitler’s demise. Allied Intelligence thought it possible that the German dictator may have escaped, so the FBI launched a secret investigation into his whereabouts.

#83: In Operation Paperclip, which lasted from 1945-59, the U.S. recruited over 1,600 German scientists and engineers, many of whom had been members of the Nazi Party. They played a major role in the U.S. space program.

#82: After the Soviet style East German secret police, the Stasi, disbanded in 1990, it was revealed that they’d spent decades conducting covert surveillance on civilians, amassing a trove of intelligence and blackmail files.

#81: In 1950’s Operation Sea-Spray, the US Navy sprayed bacteria over the Bay Area in order to study San Francisco’s vulnerability to biological agents. While they deemed the bacteria harmless, it was correlated with an outbreak of infections that may or may not have been related.

#80: Project Artichoke, the precursor to MKUltra, was a 1951 CIA program researching interrogation and mind control methods. They tested drug cocktails, hypnosis, forced addiction, and LSD.

#79: After fighting the “Thousand Mile War” when Imperial Japan invaded the Aleutian Islands, the U.S. prepared contingencies for a Soviet paratrooper invasion of Alaska. In Operation Washtub from 1951-59, Alaskan fishermen and trappers were trained as spies to keep tabs on Soviet movements at sea.

#78: The Church Committee of 1975 revealed a number of government secrets. One was the CIA’s heart attack gun: a weapon from the 1950s that shot untraceable poison projectiles that would give a victim a heart attack without any physical evidence.

#77: In Operation Ajax, also known as Operation Boot, the CIA and MI6 orchestrated a coup against progressive Iranian Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh in 1953. Mosaddegh had led a movement to nationalize Iran’s oil industry. U.S.- backed Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi took power, until being overthrown by Ayatollah Khomeini in the Iranian Revolution of 1979.

#76: The long-term effects of radiation were unknown in the aftermath of World War II. The U.S. government enacted Project SUNSHINE in 1953-58, stealing the remains or parts of deceased children from around the world for tissue tests. Parents were not informed.

#75: From 1953-73, the CIA studied possible uses of psychotropic drugs in interrogation, torture, and mind control through Project MKUltra. While some participants volunteered willingly, many were experimented upon without their consent.

#74: The mid 20th century saw the CIA facilitating the replacement of democratically elected leaders in foreign countries with right wing dictators. In 1954’s Operation PBSuccess, they organized a coup against Guatemalan President Jacobo Árbenz to aid the United Fruit Company, resulting in decades of atrocities.

#73: In the 1950s, the U.S. military had a secret program to develop circular fighter jets, aka flying saucers, called Project 1794. The goal was to develop a fleet of supersonic planes that could easily take out Soviet bombers.

#72: From 1956-71, the FBI infiltrated virtually every major organization bent on changing American society, part of a program called COINTELPRO. They went after socialists, civil rights organizations and leaders like MLK, Vietnam protesters, the Black power movement, and far-right groups like the KKK.

#71: Project Gladio, which ran from 1956-90, involved NATO creating secret ‘stay-behind’ paramilitary organizations across Europe, in case of Soviet invasion.

#70: In Operation LAC (Large Area Coverage) in 1957 and 1958, zinc cadmium sulfide was sprayed over large sections of the U.S. and Canada to track dispersal patterns.

#69: To undermine Indonesian President Sukarno, the CIA created an adult film in 1958 starring a Sukarno lookalike or an actor wearing a mask. The Soviets had already taped Sukarno cavorting with operatives posing as flight attendants in Moscow. But the delighted Sukarno had just asked for more copies. Ultimately the CIA didn’t release their film, pursuing other covert operations until Indonesian General Suharto seized power.

#68: During the Cold War, the CIA distributed over 10 million copies of banned books and magazines inside the Soviet Union. Books like Boris Pasternak’s “Doctor Zhivago” were spread to undermine the government.

#67: In 1959’s Project Horizon, the Army, Navy, and Air Force joined forces to study the feasibility of a military research base on the moon.

#66: Lunik and Sputnik were the crown jewels of the early Soviet satellite program. Unbeknownst to the Soviet Union, the CIA managed to steal, study, and return the Lunik from an exhibition in 1959.

#65: The U.S.’s CORONA Spy Satellites managed to take photos of the Middle East and China between 1959 and 1972. Now declassified, the images are used by archaeologists, who can track changes over time to important historical sites.

#64: The Greenbrier luxury resort in West Virginia is the site of a massive underground bunker built in 1959 named "Project Greek Island "that was meant to serve as an emergency shelter for Congress during the Cold War. However, it was decommissioned after The Washington Post blew the lid in 1992.

#63: Francis Gary Powers, a pilot of the secret U-2 spy plane, was shot down and captured deep inside the Soviet Union in 1960. At first, American authorities said it had been a weather aircraft, but had to admit the truth just a few days later.

#62: In 1959, Cuban revolutionary Fidel Castro overthrew U.S.-backed dictator Fulgencio Batista and assumed power. The CIA tried to assassinate the communist leader hundreds of times. Many of the failures were so public that the Church Committee acknowledged eight that occurred between 1960 and 65.

#61: Acoustic Kitty was an aptly named CIA project in the 1960s that involved implanting microphones into the ears of cats, who were to spy on the Soviets. Unfortunately, the CIA found it difficult to train the cats, wasting millions of dollars on the attempt.

#60: Codenamed HERO, Oleg Penkovsky was a Soviet colonel and double agent for both MI6 and the CIA. It was Penkovsky’s key intel that clued the United States into the presence of Soviet missiles in Cuba. Without that knowledge, they would likely have been successfully deployed. The Soviets cottoned on and executed him in 1963.

#59: In the early 1960s, the U.S. built a nuclear-powered research facility in Greenland, called Camp Century. While it was not secret, it was part of a secret program - Project Iceworm, which aimed to dig 2,500 miles of tunnels beneath the tundra, allowing the military to secretly deploy nuclear missiles.

#58: Authorized by JFK in 1961, Operation Mongoose was a secret CIA campaign of sabotage and terrorism in Cuba. The intent was to destabilize and depose the Cuban government.

#57: In a far-fetched plan to overthrow Cuban leader Fidel Castro in 1962, Department of Defense special operations expert Edward Lansdale suggested firing star shells from a submarine over Havana on All Souls’ Day to stir “Cuban superstitions”.

#56: Operation Northwoods was a scrapped Department of Defense plan in 1962 for the CIA to conduct false-flag attacks against American military and civilian targets, in order to justify an invasion of Cuba. It was rejected by JFK.

#55: President Kennedy, furious with a series of government leaks, greenlit a CIA program called Project Mockingbird in 1962 to wiretap and spy on American journalists.

#54: In Project AQUILINE from 1965-71, the CIA attempted to create a fleet of small, bird-sized, nuclear-powered, remote-controlled aircraft. They could be used for spying or dropping covert packages to operatives in the field. The project was eventually scrapped.

#53: Through the Indian ‘Health’ Services in the 1960s and 70s, the U.S. government sterilized up to 70,000 Native American women, often through coercion or without their knowledge.

#52: Ayatollah Khomeini overthrew the U.S.-backed Shah of Iran in 1979. Declassified documents reveal that he’d secretly tried to negotiate the transition with both the Kennedy and Carter Administrations.

#51: While conducting covert maneuvers in the Gulf of Tonkin in August 1964, a U.S. destroyer came under attack. President Johnson used dubious reports of a second attack two days later as justification for deploying U.S. troops in Vietnam. But this second attack never happened. In 2005, the NSA admitted that it had skewed its intelligence report to Johnson.

#50: Operation CHASE or “Cut Holes And Sink ‘Em” was a D.O.D. program from 1964-72 carried out by the U.S. Navy. For the better part of a decade, unused surplus munitions were loaded onto empty ships and scuttled around 250 miles off the American coast. On four occasions, chemical weapons were disposed of as a part of Operation CHASE.

#49: In an attempt to spy on the Chinese nuclear program, the U.S. and India worked together to install sensors powered by plutonium in the Himalayas in 1965. Unfortunately, the mission was abandoned amidst bad weather, and the plutonium was lost. Locals accuse both governments of having inadvertently melted mountain snow with the sensors, causing deadly floods.

#48: In the mid-1960s, Indonesian General Suharto oversaw the mass murder of between 500,000 to 1.2 million people. The U.S. was complicit in the killings, framed as a anti-communist ‘purge’, even providing names to Suharto’s death squads. With Western backing, Suharto became President.

#47: In 1957, the Soviets had deployed new, effective surface-to-air missiles, known as S-75s. The CIA disguised ‘SAM Sniffer’ drones as U-2 planes, to collect data on the missiles as they were shot down. This strategy finally succeeded in 1966 over Vietnam; the data collected led to the development of a warning system.

#46: In 2010, United States Army soldier Chelsea Manning leaked 250,000 diplomatic cables to Wikileaks. Dating from 1966 on, the cables contained unflattering assessments of world leaders, and revealed that the U.S. and Britain had spied on the UN in the lead up to their invasion of Iraq in 2003.

#45: In 1967, during the Six-Day War between Israel and a coalition of Arab states, the Israeli Air Force and Navy accidentally attacked the USS Liberty. The spy ship was badly damaged, with 171 crew members wounded and 34 killed.

#44: The CIA looked into a scientist’s method for guiding lighting onto targets using artificial leaders in 1967, but the program was scrapped as less practical than conventional weapons.

#43: From 1967-72, the Air Force ran a covert cloud seeding project called Operation Popeye in Vietnam as an attempt to extend the monsoon season. Its intention was to disrupt North Vietnamese supply chains.

#42: 40 years after the fact, the NSA declassified documents concerning Project MINARET, a secret surveillance program in the 1960s and 70s. During the Vietnam War, the NSA had wiretapped anti-war activists, civil rights leaders, journalists, and two U.S. Senators.

#41: Operation CHAOS was another domestic espionage project during the Vietnam War years. Both Presidents Johnson and Nixon authorized surveillance of American citizens by the CIA, looking for foreign influence among left-wing movements.

#40: Fearing for his campaign, Republican presidential candidate Richard Nixon sabotaged peace talks between North and South Vietnam in 1968, promising South Vietnam a better deal once he was President. President Johnson’s declassified tapes reveal that he knew and considered Nixon’s actions “treason”. But he kept quiet rather than revealing FBI and NSA wiretaps.

#39: The U.S. Army maintained a base in Thule, Greenland, for much of the Cold War. One of their B-52s, armed with nuclear weapons, went down near the base in 1968. It was later revealed that the Army lied about its payload recovery: one nuclear bomb was never found.

#38: In 1968, American soldiers murdered hundreds of unarmed civilians, including children, in the small Vietnamese village of My Lai. At least 20 had also been sexually assaulted. A year later, photo journalist Ron Haeberle published photos of the event in a Cleveland newspaper, leading to global shock and outrage.

#37: In the wake of the My Lai massacre, the Pentagon created the Vietnam War Crimes Working Group to look into other American war crimes in Vietnam. They compiled a secret archive of documents alleging 320 incidents, including seven massacres.

#36: In Operation Condor, which ran from 1968-89, the U.S. backed a campaign of political repression, state terrorism, and coups in South America under right-wing dictatorships. Up to 60,000 people were killed. U.S. State Secretary Henry Kissinger was closely involved.

#35: 30 years after Apollo 11 landed on the moon in 1969, a historian discovered a contingency speech written by Nixon’s speechwriter, William Safire, which had been prepared in case the astronauts were stranded on the moon.

#34: A test rocket fired by the U.S. military in Utah, bound for New Mexico, went horribly off course in 1970. The rocket, containing radioactive isotopes that effectively made it a ‘salted bomb’, landed in Mexico’s Mapimi desert.

#33: The CIA took the term ‘surveillance bug’ literally in the early 1970s: they created a robotic dragonfly or ‘Insectothopter’ for eavesdropping. However, crosswinds rendered the device impractical.

#32: In a 25-year legal battle, journalist Jon Weiner wrested from the FBI documentation on federal efforts to investigate and surveil Beatle John Lennon. Fearing that Lennon’s anti-war activities could cost him re-election, Nixon had the Immigration and Naturalization Service issue a deportation order in 1972.

#31: In 1968, the Soviet submarine K-129 sank 1,600 miles northwest of Hawaii. After six years and the equivalent of $4.7 billion in modern terms, the CIA built an explorer to recover the ship. Project Azorian was the most expensive operation of the Cold War.

#30: Available within the FBIs archive of Freedom of Information Act materials, you can find the FBI file on Bigfoot from the late 1970s. They analyzed a hair sample, and concluded it came from a deer.

#29: We already mentioned the CIA’s role in Operation Condor. Well, we also now know that people who ‘disappeared’ from 1976-83 during the reign of Argentina's military dictatorship were assassinated. The efforts were so organized that the state assassination squads filed time cards and expense reports.

#28: In Project Constant Peg, a special squadron of U.S. fighter pilots trained on Soviet MiGs from 1977-88, in order to understand and develop combat tactics against them.

#27: In the late 1970s, CIA operatives in Moscow would use sex dolls, nicknamed jack-in-the-boxes, to give KGB tails the slip. While the view of KGB agents in the car behind them was obscured, operatives would jump out of their own car’s passenger seat, leaving the decoy to inflate in their place.

#26: The U.S. and U.S.S.R. had a psychic arms race throughout the Cold War. The U.S. Army created the Stargate Project, which ran from 1978-95, in an attempt to build a remote viewing psychic military unit.

#25: Robert Hanssen was a high level agent within the FBI with a long and storied career that spanned the 1980s and 90s. He was also one of the highest placed Soviet and Russian spies in American history.

#24: When the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan, the CIA put together Operation Cyclone from 1979-92, funding and arming mujahideen Afghan fighters to resist the Russians.

#23: CIA agents compiled jokes overhead in the Soviet Union in the 1980s. They were part of an assessment of Soviet morale.

#22: A Soviet lieutenant colonel named Stanislav Petrov saved the world from nuclear holocaust in 1983. When a nuclear early-warning system reported incoming American missiles, he decided not to tell his superiors, believing (correctly as it turned out) that it was a false alarm. His superiors would likely have launched a retaliatory nuclear strike.

#21: An expedition finally located the wreck of the Titanic in September 1985. But the expedition’s primary purpose was actually a secret mission to map out the wreckage of two American nuclear powered submarines that sank in the 1960s.

#20: The American public was told that the astronauts aboard the ill-fated Space Shuttle Challenger, which exploded in 1986, had died instantly. We now know that they were quite possibly conscious until impact, 2 minutes and 45 seconds later.

#19: Started in 1992, the NSA program RAMPART-A sucks communication data right out of the fiber-optic cables that form the backbone of the internet. It was revealed in 2013 when former NSA contractor Edward Snowden leaked information about the mass surveillance programs of the Five Eyes intelligence alliance, comprising Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the U.K., and the U.S.

#18: A U.S. Air Force laboratory produced a proposal to build a psychochemical weapon in the mid-1990s. The intent was to release sex pheromones on enemy troops, making them attracted to each other.

#17: Spying between allies is generally considered bad form. But the NSA listened in on the phone calls of French officials, including at least three Presidents, according to top-secret documents released by Wikileaks in 2015. Other documents revealed that the NSA had also tapped German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s phone.

#16: In 2000, the Iranian military purchased a team of dolphins trained to attack boats from the Russians.

#15: Under the Bush administration, the CIA established torture sites around the world in the wake of 9/11, where detainees - some innocent - were beaten, waterboarded, and sexually assaulted. In 2002, memoranda known as the “Torture Memos” advised the CIA on techniques that could be considered legal. One was leaked to the press in 2004.

#14: The trove of documents leaked by U.S. soldier and whistleblower Chelsea Manning also included the Guantánamo Files, or Gitmo files. These documents revealed that more than 150 innocent farmers, chefs, and drivers, were held for years without charges inside Guantanamo Bay detention camp, established in 2002.

#13: Also leaked by Chelsea Manning, the Iraq War Logs included U.S. army field reports from 2004-09 that recorded 66,081 civilian deaths out of 109,000 recorded deaths. It represented the biggest leak in U.S. military history, larger even than the Afghan War documents, which had revealed the deaths of hundreds of civilians in unreported incidents.

#12: In a mid-2000s program called Devil Eyes, the CIA made figurines of Al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden. When heated, the face peeled off to reveal a demonic visage. The intent was to distribute the doll in Afghanistan and Pakistan, but it’s unclear how many were actually shipped, if any.

#11: A former engineer for Apple claims that in 2005 the company created a classified iPod for the Department of Energy that doubled as a Geiger counter.

#10: From 2005-10, the U.S. and Israeli cyber intelligence services joined forces with Stuxnet, a virus sent to Iran to disrupt their nuclear program.

#9: In 2007, two American Apache helicopters carried out a series of air-to-ground attacks in Baghdad, Iraq. They received global attention in 2010 when Chelsea Manning released gunsight footage to Wikileaks that revealed the crew laughing as they killed several men, all civilians, including two Reuters journalists.

#8: Initiated in 2007, PRISM was another NSA program revealed by whistleblower Edward Snowden. It allows the NSA to collect communications matching court-approved search terms from companies like Microsoft, Yahoo, Google, Facebook, YouTube, and Apple.

#7: The Advanced Network Technologies department with the NSA has a classified catalog, the ANT catalog, listing hardware and software available for spy operations. A version written in 2008-09 was leaked and published by German magazine Der Spiegel in 2013.

#6: Since at least 2009, the FBI has had a civilian air force surveilling U.S. cities from above, registered under fake companies, according to a 2015 report by the Associated Press.

#5: Edward Snowden also revealed a program called Dishfire, run by the NSA and the U.K.’s GCHQ, that collects about 200 million text messages every day around the world. Another NSA program, MYSTIC, can record the metadata and content of phone calls from entire countries.

#4: In a series of documents dating back to 2013, and released as ‘Vault 7’, Wikileaks revealed CIA capabilities to compromise various devices and software, including cars, smart TVs, web browsers, and the operating systems of smartphones and computers.

#:3: U.S. Cyber Command launched Operation Glowing Symphony against ISIS in 2016. One of the largest cyber attacks in history on ISIS in 2016, it caused major disruption to the terrorist group.

#2: After they were leaked, the Pentagon formally released three recordings of UFOs taken by United States Navy fighter jets in 2004, 2014, and 2015.

#1: In 2022 and 2023, hundreds of classified foreign intelligence documents, primarily related to the Russo-Ukrainian War, were leaked on Discord. The culprit was allegedly 21-year old gamer and airman Jack Teixeira, of the Massachusetts Air National Guard.

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