story identification - Cold-war telepathic super-soldiers

On an elementary school field trip to the local library, I had just started reading this book when the teacher took it away claiming that the content was not suitable. When I returned to the library later on, the book wasn't where I had picked it up and I couldn't remember the title. So basically I haven't slept since... and that was a good 15 years ago.

I remember the synopsis and the book's cover-graphic pretty well (A person reclined in a chair wearing a what looked like a fighter pilot helmet)

Synopsis: It's the cold war, Soviets vs the USA. Both sides have been developing a way to create a telepathic super-soldier. One of the obstacles in creating this telepathic machine/soldier is melding the mind and the machine, which the soviets do via removing the optical nerve or eyeball. (Can see why the teacher took the book away).

I distinctly remember there being a part where the Americans, via spying discover a Soviet facility testing their telepathic weapon. They discover a pile of deceased prisoners that have had their eyes removed. The Americans have found a way to utilize their telepathic weapon without removing the optic nerve, however the connection is unstable.

The last bit that I remember is a scene where there are some Soviet leaders walking in the snow and they are attacked by a telepathic monster (presumably one of the inmates who had been tested upon). Blood in the snow, telepathic monster was hard to see or invisible...

That is about all I can remember… The closest I have come to it was the book by Fredrick Pohl, A Plague of Pythons/The Demon in the Skull, but nope, this was a different book.

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