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The remote viewing program supposedly did. They identified a new type of Soviet nuclear submarine before it was deployed and before any other intel sources knew about it. They also found the location of an American general that had been kidnapped by a left-wing paramilitary in Italy. They were used to locate Iraqi surface to air missile sites during the Gulf War, with partial but incomplete success.
The occult warfare program (MK OFTEN) is more heavily classified and we know less about it. Probably for good reason: based on the personnel it employed it likely involved human sacrifice. In any case, it was probably being used for missions that would be illegal or violations of international law regardless of the method used to achieve them.
Both of these programs have ostensibly been shut down. That could definitely be true, but there are a lot of intelligence agency programs that get “shut down” and moved somewhere else before the congressional subcommittee hearings can kick into gear.
I don’t really know anything specific about the Soviet program if they had one.
Do you have a source for the remote viewing program?
Isn't the more parsimonious explanation that the CIA discovered the new Soviet submarine, the location of the general etc by other means, and attributed them to their remote viewing unit as a cover story? (See also the British Department of War covering up the existence of radar, using the cover story that British anti-aircraft gunners were able to spot Luftwaffe planes because they had exceptional eyesight as a result of eating lots of carrots.)
There’s an entire non-fiction book about it called The Men Who Stare at Goats. Regarding your point, I definitely don’t rule it out, but I would think if they were going to do that they would pick a less ridiculous cover explanation.
Doesn't sound significantly more ridiculous to me than "eating lots of carrots enables you to spot fighter jets from miles away, at night".
The other possible explanation is that after the A-Bomb, both the US and the USSR were willing to throw a lot of money at things that sound like bunk on the small off-chance that they’re not. A lot of Nazi German higher ups thought that nuclear weapons were fanciful sci-fi bullshit or intentional misinformation planted by Jewish physicists, and they got screwed out of a potential war-winner as a result. And magic might be especially tempting in that regard, since you don’t need a gigantic, Manhattan Project-tier investment to give it a try.
Yes, I think is is precisely what happened.
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