Drunk Romans and drugged Americans: the chemical arsenal used to
dull the horror of war
Without drugs, how can fighters tolerate the barbarity of combat? …
Charlie Sheen in scene from Platoon. Photograph: YouTube
Antony Loewenstein
In October 2015 a Saudi prince was arrested at Beirut international
airport accused of trying to smuggle nearly two tonnes of the amphetamine drug
Captagon through the country. Two months later, Lebanese officials claimed to
have confiscated 12 million Captagon pills heading to the Gulf. The synthetic
drug, invented in 1961, has become a major recreational drug of choice in the
Middle East and favoured stimulant in the Syrian civil war. Kurdish survivors
from the Syrian city of Kobane reported Islamic State fighters being “filthy,
with straggly beards and long black nails. They have lots of pills with them
that they all keep taking. It seems to make them more crazy if anything.”
In this compelling book about the history and prevalence of alcohol
and drugs throughout the history of warfare, Lukasz Kamienski reveals in
copious detail the countless ways “intoxication, in its various forms, has …
been one of the distinctive features” of human life.
Rather than focusing on the draconian methods used by governments
to restrict and regulate drugs in the modern age, Shooting Up examines how
“warriors have always dreamt of gaining superhuman abilities that would bring
them estimable victory, particularly when meeting their enemy in a decisive
clash”. Without some tool to distract or mask the horrors of war, how can
fighters tolerate the barbarity, fear, stress and intensity of combat?
Alcohol remains the most commonly used drug during and after war.
Kamienski explains that the ancient Greeks and Romans probably went into battle
drunk. The Roman method also involved getting their opponents inebriated before
battle. By the late 19th century, the British army was regularly and proudly
drunk. Its 36,000 men required 550,000 gallons of rum annually plus allowances
for more booze to celebrate victory. Soldiers expected to be provided with
alcohol by the army. Without it, their morale, determination and camaraderie
would suffer. Japanese kamikaze pilots in the second world war were known to
drink heavily as their final day approached.
American forces in Vietnam were given government rations of two
cans of beer per man per day but the open secret was that destroying the Viet
Kong should be rewarded. It’s a war that still remains mired in mystery;
American journalist Nick Turse’s 2013 book Kill Anything That Moves made a rare
departure from secrecy by highlighting the extreme violence unleashed on
Vietnamese civilians by US forces. Kamienski powerfully shows how “alcohol was
issued as a reward for proven proficiency in enemy kills. This largely explains
why soldiers cut off the ears and penises of their dead enemy, because showing
the trophies on their return to base camp entitled them to more reward –
alcohol.”
This book details the Nizari Ismaili, founded in the 1080s as a
radical group of Shia Muslims. Its members were accused of smoking hashish to
claim supernatural powers, but it’s possible that their “truly powerful
intoxicant was their deep religious faith, coupled with crazed fanaticism”.
In the 21st century many Islamic extremists are surviving thanks to
the drug industry. The Taliban’s main source of income is from Afghanistan’s
opium trade, the world’s biggest. Militants, child soldiers, narco-guerrillas
and terrorists all often raise revenue while also using the product themselves.
But what turns some soldiers into monsters? Kamienski tries to
answer this question with evidence that the use of intoxicants contributes to
the propensity of extreme violence on the battlefield. However, it may not that
be that simple – racism is a curious omission in the book’s argument. For
example, there are countless examples of American forces in Iraq and
Afghanistan treating local people with contempt because of their different skin
colour, religion or belief. This mentality was bred long before arriving for
combat.
Nonetheless, the book questions the generally accepted belief in
almost all societies that soldiers are brave warriors and act like “rabid
dogs”. It may often be true, with magic mushrooms and marijuana being part of a
soldier’s arsenal, but it’s also an effective myth different nations tell
themselves about the invincibility of their armies.
During the cold war, many governments searched for the most
effective use of increasingly powerful and disabling drugs. Washington
considered the idea of dispersing LSD over enemy forces, “paralysing even the
best trained and disciplined units without killing or injuring them”. After the
second world war Army Chemical Corps Major General William Creasy imagined the
use of psychoactive substances for a “war without casualties”. He told This
Week magazine in 1955 that Washington should consider using chemical weapons,
asking “would you rather be temporarily deranged, blinded or paralysed by a
chemical agent, or burned alive by a conventional fire bomb?” It was a question
that few Americans ever knew their government was considering at the highest
levels.
From developing truth serums to elicit answers from enemies during
the cold war and distributing stimulants during the Vietnam war, drug
development, use and abuse have always been central to humankind’s pursuit of
conflict. Kamienski details the devastating civilian toll that drug abuse by
soldiers can cause. In Vietnam, amphetamine use “was to blame for some
incidents of friendly fire and unjustified violence against the civilian
population”.
There’s no blatant anti-war message in this book, written by an
academic and published here in a solid translation by the author, but its
position is clear: that “soldiers are often doped by war in a twofold manner –
not only can war itself be a true narcotic for them but an engagement in combat
may also result in their becoming addicted to real drugs.”
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/jun/10/shooting-up-history-drugs-warfare-luke-kamienski-review
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