MEDIA ILLUSIONS

Who Plants Conspiracy Stories? From Operation Denver to the Online Amplification Machine

In July 1983, an Indian newspaper published a story claiming that AIDS had been created in a United States military laboratory. The article offered no virus sample, research name or military document. It linked a new disease to Fort Detrick, a real American site associated with biological-weapons research, and asked whether Washington was testing a weapon on civilians. A rumour that seemed to come from a small new…

⬛ CONFIDENTIAL CDMediaKhamPha 9/2/2026 1 min read
Read in Vietnamese →

In July 1983, an Indian newspaper published a story claiming that AIDS had been created in a United States military laboratory. The article offered no virus sample, research name or military document. It linked a new disease to Fort Detrick, a real American site associated with biological-weapons research, and asked whether Washington was testing a weapon on civilians. A rumour that seemed to come from a small newspaper was carried into other countries, repeated on Soviet-aligned radio and in newspapers, and then cited as “the truth they were hiding.”

Classified content

Sign in to read this classified document.

LOGIN TO CONTINUE READING
End of document⬛ CONFIDENTIAL