Acoustic Kitty

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Acoustic Kitty was a CIA project launched by the Directorate of Science & Technology in the 1960s attempting to use cats in spy missions. A battery and a microphone were implanted into a cat and an antenna into its tail. Due to problems with distraction, the cat's sense of hunger had to be removed in another operation. Surgical and training expenses are thought to have amounted to over $20 million.

The first cat mission was eavesdropping on two men in a park outside the Soviet compound on Wisconsin Avenue in Washington, D.C.. The cat was released nearby, but was hit and killed by a taxi almost immediately. Shortly thereafter the project was considered a failure and declared to be a total loss.

[edit] In music

The cat has been featured in several songs.

John Mann produced an album in 2002 entitled Acoustic Kitty.
My Acoustic Kitty Is an Alternative/Rock/Punk band formed in San Diego, California in 2007.
"Acoustic Kitty", by Brooklyn's The Larch was featured on 2003's Only Pop Music Can Save Us Now! (Dent Resistant Records)
Acoustic Kitty Project is a Folk-Rock / Americana band based in Bucks County, Pa. Featuring Carter Lansing on guitar and vocals and Rebecca Altmann on vocals.

[edit] In print

It is featured in a novel and in a children's book.

Acoustic Kitty by Bob Rybarczyk, ISBN 9781601453976.
A Horse in the House by Gail Ablow, ill. by Kathy Osborn, ISBN 9780763628383.

[edit] References

CIA recruited cat to bug Russians, Charlotte Edwardes, April 11, 2001, telegraph.co.uk.
Edited CIA memo, dated March 1967 (PDF format).
Project: Acoustic Kitty, Julian Borger, September 11, 2001, Guardian Unlimited.
The Agency: The Rise and Decline of the CIA, John Ranelagh, rev. ed., New York: Simon & Schuster, 1987, at p. 208.