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ZERO SIGNAL. This is Zero Signal and we're changing
things up today. Instead of weekly news recaps,
these short episodes will now spotlight one story
at a time. The kind that leaves scars in history
and fuels decades of conspiracy talk. Each one
runs under 10 minutes, but everyone drops you
right into the heart. of the mystery. Tonight,
we start with a program buried in the Cold War
shadows, MK Naomi. It was the CIA's secret project
to stockpile toxins and build covert weapons.
And in 1975, in front of the US Senate, the CIA
director revealed one of those devices, a dark
gun designed to deliver poison and mimic a fatal
heart attack. Stick around for this story. And
don't forget, if you want a deep dive, our full
-length episodes drop every Tuesday at 6 a .m.
Does this pistol fire the dart? Yes, it does,
Mr. Chairman. The round thing at the top is obviously
the sight. The rest of it is what is practically
a normal .45, although it's special. However,
it works by electricity. There's a battery in
the handle and it fires a small dart. So that
when it fires silently? Almost silently, yes.
Very little. What range does it have? 100 meters,
I believe. About 100 yards, 100 meters. About
100 meters, Ray. And the dart itself, when it
strikes the target, does the target know that
he's been hit and about to die? That depends,
Mr. Chairman, on the particular dart used. There
are different kinds of these flechettes that
were used in the various weapons system, and
a special one was developed which... potentially
would be able to enter the target without perception.
Without perception, right. And did you find such
darts in the laboratory? We did. What you just
heard came from the 1975 Senate hearing, a part
of what became known as the Church Committee.
In this session, CIA Director William Kobe revealed
a strange, almost cinematic weapon, a pistol
designed to fire a frozen dart coated in shellfish
toxin. The dart would enter the body, melt away,
and leave little to no trace. To outside doctors,
the victim might look like they have suffered
a sudden natural heart attack. This wasn't science
fiction, though. This was an actual device engineered
in the shadows of the Cold War. And it was connected
not to the famous MKUltra program of mind control
and LSD experiments, but in the quieter sibling,
MK Naomi. MK Naomi was a joint effort between
the CIA and the US Army Special Operations Division
at Fort Detrick, Maryland. While MKUltra chased
the ideal of psychological control, MK Naomi
focused on the physical. toxins, pathogens, and
covert delivery systems. Its purpose was to maintain
and stockpile of lethal and deadly agents to
design ways of using them without leaving fingerprints.
Official documents describe it plainly. Keep
exotic substances ready to go and develop special
and unique items for clandestine missions. It
was the CIA's Chemical and Biological Weapons
Toolkit. tucked away behind layers of secrecy.
By the early 1970s, President Nixon signed international
agreements banning biological weapons, and MK
Naomi was supposedly shut down. But that 1975
hearing revealed otherwise. Along with the weapon
you just heard about, investigators discovered
vials of a poison called saxotoxin, which is
a deadly shellfish poison, still in CIA storage
years after the ban. The question wasn't just
whether these weapons existed, but whether the
agency had quietly kept them on standby long
after. They were ordered to destroy them. This
is where the conspiracy deepens. Allegations
surfaced that biological agents linked to CIA
projects had been tested or even used in the
field. One of the most controversial claims came
from a 1977 Newsday report that tied the agency
to a devastating outbreak of swine fever in Cuba,
an outbreak that forced the slaughter of half
a million pigs. The CIA has denied the allegations,
but the timing and the secrecy of MK Naomi me
make the story impossible to dismiss outright.
And that's the legacy of this program. Even when
it was dragged into the daylight, the evidence
that survived was only partial. Most records
were destroyed. The rest heavily redacted. What
we're left with are glimpses. A dark gun shown
to senators. toxins found in storage and whispers
of operations we may never fully confirm. Now
here, listen to the rest of this Senate here.
My first question is, why did the agency prepare
a shellfish toxin for which there is no practical
antidote, which attacks the nervous system and
brings on death very quickly? Why did the agency
prepare toxins of this character in quantities
sufficient to kill many thousands of people?
What was the need for that? in the first place,
long before the presidential order came down
to destroy them. I think the first part of the
answer to that question, Mr. Chairman, is the
fact that the L pill, which was developed during
World War II, does take some time to work and
is particularly agonizing to the subject who
uses it. Some of the people who would be natural
requesters of such a capability... for their
own protection and the protection of their fellow
agents, really would not want to face that kind
of a fate. But if they could be given an instantaneous
one, they would accept that. And that was the
thought process behind developing the capability.
Now, I cannot explain why that quantity was developed,
except that this was a collaboration that we
were engaged in with the United States Army.
And we did develop this particular weapon, you
might say, as a possible, for possible use. When
CIA retained the amount that it did, it obviously
did it improperly. This quantity and the various
device administering the toxin that were found
in the laboratory certainly make it clear that
purely defensive uses were not... what the agency
was limited to. In any way, there were definite
offensive uses. In fact, there were dart guns.
You mentioned suicide. I don't think that the
suicide is usually accomplished with a dart,
particularly a gun that can place the dart in
a human target in such a way that he doesn't
even know that he's been hit. No question about
it. It was also for offensive reasons. No question.
While the better -known cousin, MK Ultra, focused
on drugs and mind control, MK Naomi was the darker
side of the coin. Its mission was to stockpile
toxins, pathogens, and tailor -made delivery
devices, the kind of tools that could kill silently,
incapacitate a target without a trace, or even
sabotage an enemy's food supply. Declassified
summaries describe the program bluntly, maintaining
operational readiness, special and unique items
for dissemination of biological and chemical
materials, that melt vials of lethal poisons
hidden in sprayers, powders, and weapons like
the one shown in the hearing. Officially, the
program was wound down in the early 70s after
President Nixon signed treaties banning biological
warfare. But at that time, senators were asking
these questions. Investigators somehow found
the vials of this toxin, one of the deadliest
natural poisons known. We're still setting on
CIA storage years later after the program was
already done. I think what made MK Naomi so chilling
wasn't just the gadgets like the dark gun. It
was the toxins himself, the most Infamous was
the saxotoxin, a poison derived from shellfish
that can paralyze the nervous system. and kill
in microscopic doses. In 1975, hearing senators
revealed the vials of the toxins were still sitting
in CIA storage, years after President Nixon had
signed treaties banning biological weapons. Officially,
MK Nomi was supposed to have been shut down,
but those vials proved that the agency had not
completely dismantled its stockpiles. Declassified
summaries describe the program's purpose bluntly,
to stockpile severely in gas updating and lethal
materials, and to keep special and unique items
in operational readiness. That meant lethal poisons,
incasubating agents, and biological organisms
that could be used to sabotage food, animals,
or even whole populations. William Kobe, then
director of CIA, explained it matter -factly
to Congress, as if keeping a poison designed
to mimic a heart attack was just routine. That
calm testimony, set against the reality of what
was being described, is part of why the heart
attack gun and the toxins behind it remind some.
of the most disturbing artifacts of the Cold
War hidden arsenal. So what else was MK Naomi
doing besides stockpiling toxins and building
exotic weapons? Declassified records and testimony
gives us glimpses of what they were doing. Alongside
this shellfish toxin, the CIA and the Army Special
Operations Division as Fort Detrick were experimenting
with ways to contaminate food supplies, destroy
crops, and spread disease among animals. Documents
described incapacitating agents meant to temporarily
disable people, evidence that could disorient
or confuse, and specialized delivery system,
things like disguise sprayers. powders hidden
in everyday objects and covert darts. The program's
mission wasn't just to have poison in a vault.
It was to design practical tools for sabotage
and assassination that could be used in the field
without leaving a trace. The stockpiles were
supposed to be destroyed and oversight committees
were told the program was no longer active. But
history teaches us that Terminated doesn't always
mean gone. In fact, the 1975 revelation that
vowels of that toxin were still setting in CIA
phrasers years after the shutdown. How can you
be in compliance if it's setting in a freezer?
I'll never know. They say it was too expensive
and too much money and we can never replicate
it. We couldn't simply get rid of it. I think
that's a lie and that's a lie that they're feeding
us. But it also makes us ask a better question.
Are programs like this still running today? The
official answer is no. International treaties
like the Biological Weapons Convention of 1972
banned the development of bioweapons, and the
U .S. has repeatedly reaffirmed its compliance.
The CIA no longer admits to anything resembling
MK Naomi, but the secrecy surrounding intelligence
operations leaves much room for suspicion. Modern
labs still research toxins and pathogens, but
they do so under the banner of defense, creating
countermeasures, vaccines, and detection systems.
Whether that line has ever been crossed back
into the offensive, Is it question hidden behind
classified stamps and that uncertainty is what
fuels the conspiracy theories? If the government
was willing to keep a dark gun designed to fake
a heart attack in the 1970s, what tools might
exist today that we simply haven't been shown?
That's where we'll leave MK Naomi, a Cold War
program that officially ended 50 years ago, but
still haunts the records. A dark gun. Hidden
Toxins and a paper trail full of gaps reminds
us that when governments build weapons designed
to leave no trace, the truth is easier to bury.
Thanks for listening to this short episode of
Signal Zero. For the full deep dives, our long
-form episodes drop every Tuesday at 6 a .m.
Make sure you're subscribed. Listen. Follow.
Until next time, question everything. Have discernment.
Believe in Christ.