Jonestown, and the Army Chemical Warfare Division

You ever hear the phrase, "Don't drink the Kool-Aid"? A comical turn of phrase that makes light of a tragedy.

I've come before you to raise a few questions about Jim Jones.

But before we delve into the events that took so many lives, let's talk about the man himself.

Jones was born into a middle class family, his father was a klansman, and by all accounts, Jim Jones was an outcast.

It was this feeling of being an outsider from society that led him to create a church, the People's Temple. Now, the People's Temple was about equality. It was about creating a community free from the racism and fascism that he perceived as having plagued 1960s America.

Jones wasn't always a monster, it seems. He fought hard for the rights of the African American community, perhaps to defy his father's legacy of being a member of the Ku Klux Klan. In fact, when the Klan burnt a cross in the lawn of a house in a black community, Jones went from house to house consoling African Americans, and counseling white families not to move as to prevent white flight.

In another example, at one point he collapsed from exhaustion, and was brought into a segregated hospital which accidentally placed him in the black section. He awoke, and refused to be moved to the white section, and went around changing linens, and cleaning bedpans.

What happened to him? What caused a man so passionate about civil rights to become a monster, one who would destroy the people who trusted him?

I've been piecing together the events like a jigsaw puzzle, and one sticks out to me as being quite peculiar.

One of the few survivors of Jonestown was a man named Larry Layton. Layton was the man who shot U.S. representative Leo Ryan.
Layton was also the son of a very high ranking military man. His father was Doctor Laurence Layton, head of the Army Chemical Warfare Division. Now, we all know about MKULTRA, and the CIA experiments with mind control and various chemical subversion of the population, and it got me to wondering... Is it possible that the events that took place at Jonestown were some sort of sick CIA experiment?

There's a lot of things that don't add up. I can't figure out the why, but I can connect several members of the CIA to Jones. For example, Dan Mitrione, an advisor to the CIA in South America, was a police officer in his early days. Him and Jones were friends, and this friendship may or may not have continued on into later in his life.

Leo Ryan was a vocal opponent to the CIA in his political career, and it is my suspicion that he was put on the trail of Jones in order to set him up to die.

Now, there's a lot I've left out, but the odd connections still stand out to me.

So, what really happened? Was Jim Jones able to convince 900 people to commit suicide all by himself? Or is it possible that there was some outside force that set the stage, so to speak?

a reply to: Grifter42

I think you're definitely on to something here, but first, isn't it true that many, many of those there didn't commit suicide, but were killed?

I read some kind of theory that claimed similar circumstances way back.......
It basically claimed Jones was a childhood MK victim, and the church was a controlled exercise in mind control and psychological warfare.......
The theory went that the deaths were partly due to a US hit squad that staged from some us base in proximity to Jonestown.....
The evidence presented made a few points...but had insufficient weight to support the theory....I think....
I forget the details but it did sound plausible if a little overreaching.....
There has always been a suspicion in my mind that we don't know the real story yet......
good on ye for investigating it.......

a reply to: stirling

I remember that too. Is there anyone else out there that might have done enough research on this to add some details? I'm going to start digging now to see if I can find anything. This is one of those cases that always is in the back of my mind that I need to find out more about.

originally posted by: wtbengineer
a reply to: Grifter42

I think you're definitely on to something here, but first, isn't it true that many, many of those there didn't commit suicide, but were killed?

That is possible and probable, given that according to some accounts, many of them were found with injection marks in their backs. Seems to point towards murder, yes. Which strikes me as bizarre considering the official narrative. These were supposed to be people creating a new society. Why would they destroy all of that, and forcibly slaughter anyone who disagreed?

originally posted by: stirling
I read some kind of theory that claimed similar circumstances way back.......
It basically claimed Jones was a childhood MK victim, and the church was a controlled exercise in mind control and psychological warfare.......
The theory went that the deaths were partly due to a US hit squad that staged from some us base in proximity to Jonestown.....
The evidence presented made a few points...but had insufficient weight to support the theory....I think....
I forget the details but it did sound plausible if a little overreaching.....
There has always been a suspicion in my mind that we don't know the real story yet......
good on ye for investigating it.......

The shame is that there are many pieces of the puzzle missing. Dead men tell no tales, and most of the people who truly knew what went on at Jonestown are deceased.

I don't mean to make light of the dead, and the people who died at Jonestown didn't deserve to go out like that. The conventional narrative just seems so fundamentally bizarre, and unlikely. It defies human nature. I've listened to a few of Jim Jones's sermons, and the man is charismatic, yes, but not to the point where I would follow him to Guyana. If it was just one man, by God, he was the devil. But I just have a real problem believing that one single man could convince that many people.

a reply to: Grifter42
As to one man convincing all those people to give up their lives…..I have this much to say.
Do you remember how all those young girls screamed their heads off over the Beatles, back in that day? Do you remember (a more recent recollection, here) Obama's first campaign, how people reacted to him overseas, even, the spell that seemed to surround him, and yet what did he really say of substance to engender such devotion at these speaking events…..

These are just two examples of the same thing at work. And yes, I believe the phenomena to be artificially produced, or aided. It's become quite obvious to me, in fact. I have no links to back that up, but perhaps I'll start researching this particular phenomena more, and return with someone else's opinion.

As to the rest, a good subject that needs more research, but difficult now. I read, as well, that autopsies showed people had injection sites in suspicious areas of their bodies, denoting foul play.

It was a horrible tragedy, and shocking. I think Jones lost all hope of a life of the equality and fairness he sought, and all faith. But yes, the hallmarks of alphabet ag. and military are all over this one. Determining a direct link will be hard, but it seems pretty obvious, regardless. It's become one of those horrible events everyone knows we don't know the whole truth about, but no way to prove what is suspected.

a reply to: Grifter42

You brought some interesting things to the table about Jones that i had not read before .

I did some research a few years ago on Jonestown and it stinks to high heaven how all those people died that day and were taken home in body bags

Research is one of my little specialties, and Jim Jones and the Peoples Temple is one of the things I have alot of material on around here at the house. I've spent a lot of time studying this case, so I'll tell you that yes there was some government connections to Jones. There was dubious meetings early in his career with possible CIA ties, and his years in San Francisco were certainly well connected (Harvey Milk,George Monroe..etc). This however is more the result of the networking that takes place amongst politicians, religious leaders, and public figures all throughout the world.

Jones from his early days was a narcissistic, manipulative human being. His early days in the Temple were wrought with the seeds of what eventually led to Jonestown all while his public profile was rising. To say that he was just a good man manipulated into as a CIA front is selling it all short really. The U.S. government was the cause of his downfall indeed, but it more has to do with Leo Ryan, concerned families, and a little child named John Victor Stoen combined with Jones own paranoia and descent into drug abuse and delusion. There also were survivors (including Jones own son) who tell a story of a man unhinged by his own power and delusion, not government mind control.


It's all quite neat to wrap it up in a little bow and call it an evil government experiment(for chemical weapons, socialism..whatever), but years of eyewitnesses and reports from Jonestown itself tell a much different story: a man whose good deeds and humanistic tendencies were erased by a lust for power and control that dates back to his childhood that ended in one last fatal"white night". For those wishing to look deeper into Jones and dis abase yourself of these CIA conspiracy thoughts a nice primer is Tim Reiterman's book Raven. Reiterman is an LA times reporter who went to Jonestown and survived the airstrip shooting that killed Leo Ryan and it's meticulously researched. jonestown.sdsu.edu is another nice place to dig around..hope this helps

He didn't do that by himself, and the people who killed the ones that refused to drink weren't alone either.

An excuse to make religion and those who can gather large people together look crazy and dangerous.

To test mob mentality and how many are willing to submit to such an act. It's insane but useful to TPTB.

Thanks for the info I've never heard of this.

a reply to: Grifter42

Evidence shows that not everyone drank the koolaid. Many were injected with drugs. There was enough drugs to kill everyone twice or three times over. Oh and ol Jim was a speed freak too.

Nor do I see how, he could without the use of some possible " assistance".....from who or what......I cant say....
But there seems to be sub levels at play in the story......certainly the "helpers" with the m16s who did the killing could have gotten away clean enough.......

originally posted by: Grifter42
You ever hear the phrase, "Don't drink the Kool-Aid"? A comical turn of phrase that makes light of a tragedy.

Yeah, comical. There actually was one good joke about Jonestown, but it never caught on. You see, the punch line was too long...

a reply to: Grifter42

Jim Jones was far from a good man in his early life. Do some research. He exhibited pathological/sociopathic behavior long before the formation of the People's Temple and Jonestown. He wasn't a victim, he was a victimizer. Was the CIA somehow involved in the formation of the People's Temple and Jonestown? Quite possibly, but Jones wasn't a dupe. Have you considered the possibility that those stories you repeated about Jones were made up by Jones?

originally posted by: wtbengineer

I remember that too. Is there anyone else out there that might have done enough research on this to add some details? I'm going to start digging now to see if I can find anything. This is one of those cases that always is in the back of my mind that I need to find out more about.

Hey, Brudda! There is some really excellent material on all this I'll try and dig up. It doesn't paint the whole picture, but the documentation that exists is pretty damning and suggestive of cult building by the alphabets.

There's an EPIC documentary series on youtube that put together old rare news clips and documents that covers everything from JFK, RFK, MK, etc and a whole episode on Jim Jones saga.

What is the name of it, grrr? Anyone know what I'm talking about? It demonstrates not through rhetoric but through historical films and more that history has been been rewritten before our very eyes. Most eye-opening material I've ever come across.

Anyway: Good thread, OP.

David Icke covered Jonestown quite well in his book "And the truth shall set you free"...

There is also evidence that Jonestown was a mind control experiment and a part
of MKUltra. Large quantities of psychiatric drugs were found there, enough to drug
200,000 people a year, and the members were known to wear identification tags
similar to those that people are given in hospital. Indeed, the Jonestown complex
included a substantial and sophisticated hospital while conditions in the rest of the
compound were poor. The mix of blacks, women, and prisoners, mirrored the
victims chosen for MKUltra mind experimentation. The blacks were bound and
gagged when they arrived in Guyana and taken to the compound to work 18 hours
a day. The links between Jonestown, MKUltra, and Nazi-style ideology are explored
by Michael Meiers in Was Jonestown A CIA Medical Experiment? A Review Of The
Evidence. He argues that Jonestown was the final field experiment of MKUltra and
that Jim Jones was a long-time CIA asset who had been secretly supported by
Ronald Reagan's California administration in the years before the operation moved
to Guyana. Meiers says the mind control story can be traced back at least to 1965
when Jones and the People's Temple first moved to Ukiah, California. He reports:
"...the group immediately infiltrated the Mendocino State Mental Hospital which would
provide not only test persons [TPs as the Nazis called them] for his [Jones's]
preliminary medical experiments, but also a training ground for medical technicians
needed for the ultimate experiment. Within a very short period of time, every employee
at the hospital was a member of the People's Temple. From nurses to therapists, from
counsellors to cleaning women, every worker on the facility was replaced by a Temple
member. California virtually gave the Mendocino State Mental Hospital to Jim Jones."

a reply to: The GUT

Ahh, Gut, you haven't replied directly to me in... eons I guess! Thanks man! I would really appreciate it if you could come up with some of that material. That youtube doc sounds really interesting if you can find it! Anyway, nice to have some convo with you brother!

I've read Meier's book and found it to be very interesting but what possessed you to bring up David Icke? That's like citing --actually, I can't think of anyone nuttier than Icke.

a reply to: Tangerine


That doesn't mean the info sited is inaccurate ...

JEEZ,... you people with your aversion to David Icke , the guy does some real research into ALOT of subjects and, GUESS WHAT? he is actually pretty accurate in his analysis AND his references... get over it...

The documentary that you were talking about is called Jonestown:The Life and Death of People's Temple:

it just makes me feel all warm gooey inside knowing that people get experimented on just like lab rats....

interesting OP thanks for sharing