2023-11-18 09:11:59
Published18. November 2023, 10:11
Heart attack pistol: The CIA’s most perfidious weapon
The US secret service CIA is trusted to do a lot. But even US senators were amazed when they learned about the heart attack gun that could fire frozen poison balls.
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The moment when US politicians saw the heart attack pistol for the first time: Frank Church, the head of the CIA investigative committee in the US Congress, received the pistol in his hand on September 16, 1975, while he was CIA director William Colby explained how they work.
20min/C-Span
That’s what it’s about
The CIA developed a heart attack gun during the Cold War.
The heart attack gun fired a frozen bullet containing poison.
The poison led to cardiovascular failure within minutes.
Then it dissolved and could no longer be detected.
The Central Intelligence Agency CIA is probably the most notorious of all US secret services. For a long time during the Cold War, the American foreign intelligence service was able to act and act in the name of national security with virtually no restrictions. In 1954, the CIA financed the overthrow of President Jacobo Árbenz Guzmán in Guatemala because he acted against US economic interests. In 1961, it sent Cuban exiles to Cuba to overthrow revolutionary leader Fidel Castro – which went terribly wrong. The Bay of Pigs Invasion is now one of the most embarrassing episodes of John F. Kennedy’s presidency. The list could be extended indefinitely.
But after almost three decades on a long leash, the CIA finally had to face the political reality in the USA in 1975. More specifically, a House committee led by Senator Frank Church of Ohio. After the Watergate scandal, which cost President Richard Nixon his office, and a series of exposés by the New York Times about the CIA’s operations, the US public had enough of the secrecy and demanded answers. And she should get it.
Senator Frank Church presents the heart attack gun during the hearing in September 1975.
imago/ZUMA/Keystone
Frozen mussel poison
During the hearings in the US Congress, they not only learned about plans to assassinate foreign heads of state and how American citizens were being spied on. They also heard for the first time about the heart attack gun, a weapon that could cause death in minutes without leaving a trace.
The development of the heart attack gun took place at Fort Detrick in the US state of Maryland, where the US officially operated its biological weapons program until 1969. Mary Embree, who came to the CIA straight out of high school at the age of 18 and made a career in several departments, played a key role in this. One day she was given the task of finding an undetectable poison. After extensive research, Embree discovered that shell poisons were the ideal choice – without initially knowing what the poison would be used for.
Mary Embree gave information about her role in the development of the heart attack gun in a TV interview.
Screenshot Youtube
Battery operated Colt
Building on Embree’s findings, CIA experts mixed the mussel venom with water and froze the mixture into a small projectile. To fire this, they modified a Colt M1911 pistol. They equipped it with a scope and a battery in the handle (see video above). Thanks to the electric trigger mechanism, the projectile could be fired practically silently. The weapon had an effective range of around 100 meters.
According to Embree, the weapon was tested by the CIA on animals and prisoners. If the projectile penetrated the victim’s skin, it instantly melted and released the shell venom. It spread throughout the body and caused death within minutes. Then-CIA Director William Colby told Congress that all that was evidence of the assassination attempt was a small red dot that looked like a mosquito bite. The poison dissolved so quickly that it could no longer be detected during an autopsy of the victim. The only plausible cause of death was a heart attack.
It is unclear whether the CIA ever used the heart attack gun. Embree only knew about the experiments on humans and animals. That was also the official line Colby took during the hearings. In 1976, US President Gerald Ford finally banned all members of the authorities from “taking part in or conspiring to commit political assassinations”. The heart attack pistol was officially obsolete.
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