Nazi Germany - Drugs
The Nazi regime preached an ideology of physical, mental, and moral purity. But the Third Reich was saturated with drugs. Hitler was on drugs, and Hitler's troops were on drugs. Accounts of battle during World War II frequently speak of the savagery, fanaticism, and toughness of the individual German soldier. Typically this is attributed to the ideological indoctrination of young German boys in the Hitler Youth in the years before the war. There is probably some truth to this. But such fanaticism of symptomatic of the use of methedrine.
On the eve of World War II, Germany was a pharmaceutical powerhouse, and companies such as Merck and Bayer cooked up cocaine, opiates, and, most of all, methamphetamines, to be consumed by everyone from factory workers to housewives to millions of German soldiers.
The Temmler company in Berlin developed methamphetamine in the mid-30s and brings it onto the market in 1938. Pervitin was a German product patented in 1937 that contains methamphetamine, which is known today as crystal meth. It was not even on prescription. It's not conceived as a drug, it was conceived as something that lifts mood and that lets users be a little more alert and happy. Methamphetamine was even mixed into chocolates.
It was freely available as a medicine until 1939. In Berlin, it became a drug of choice, like people drink coffee to boost their energy. People took loads of Pervitin, across the board. The company wanted Pervitin to rival Coca Cola. So people took it, it worked and they were euphoric - a mood that matched the general mood before the war. In the beginning no one realised that methamphetamine was an addictive substance - until the German "Gesundheitsführer," the Health Führer, Leo Conti, realized that Pervitin was causing a problem in the German civilian population.
Because they suppress appetite, increase wakefulness, and increase focus and attention, they are frequently abused for purposes of performance enhancement. Because they may produce euphoria, these drugs are also frequently abused for recreational purposes (i.e., to get high). Repeated abuse of stimulants can lead to feelings of aggressive or hostile behavior, irritability, hyperactivity, and paranoia.
Substance-induced disorders are distinct from independent co-occurring mental disorders in that all or most of the psychiatric symptoms are the direct result of substance use. Symptoms of substance-induced disorders run the gamut from mild anxiety and depression (these are the most common across all substances) to full-blown manic and other psychotic reactions (much less common). The “teeter-totter principle” — i.e., what goes up must come down — is useful to predict what kind of syndrome or symptoms might be caused by what substances. Month-long methamphetamine binges followed by week- or month-long alcohol binges, a not uncommon pattern, might appear to be “bipolar” disorder if the drug use is not discovered.
Mild to moderate intoxication from methamphetamine, or other stimulants is associated with euphoria, and a sense of internal well-being, and perceived increased powers of thought, strength, and accomplishment. In fact, low to moderate doses of amphetamines may actually increase certain test-taking skills. As dosage increases, the chances of impulsive dangerous behaviors, which may involve violence, promiscuous sexual activity, and others, also increases. Unlike schizophrenic psychotic states, the individual experiencing a paranoid state induced by methamphetamine more likely has intact abstract reasoning and linear thinking and the delusions are more likely paranoid and less bizarre.
A long-discussed report is that Hitler’s Nazi soldiers were addicted to Pervitin, a pill form of crystal meth. US Military Intelligence Service Special Series No. 7 "Enemy Airborne Forces" of 02 December 1942 reported that German "Parachute troops are not doped. But the following "drugs" are used: (1) energen or dextro-energen, in white tablets, a dextrose or glucose preparation, to produce energy; (2) pervitin, a drug allied to benzedrine, to produce wakefulness and alertness. Pervitin is said to create thirstiness."
The Nazis used drugs to enhance the performance of soldiers. Sleep was the enemy of the soldier in battle. With drugs, the Nazis sought to win that battle and passed out "uppers" to troops on a massive scale. Troops regularly took rations of a form of crystal meth — the elevated energy and feelings of invincibility associated with the high even help to explain certain German military victories. The drug was used specifically for Blitzkreigs, including the invasion of Sudetenland, Poland, and France. The Nazis found Pervitin effective at keeping them awake for “days at a time,” allowing them to hike as many as 36 miles in a day. In 1941, it was outlawed and declared an illegal drug. In the army, distribution was then kept under wraps, but the records of the war against Russia aren't as clear as those from the war against France.
The fact, long discussed in Nazi lore, resurfaced with new details in a book by German writer Norman Ohler titled Der Totale Rausch (The Total Rush). Ohler, an award-winning novelist and screenplay writer, spent years sifting through German and US records. Nazis relied on what was essentially a pill form of crystal meth, called Pervitin. Synthesized by a chemist in Berlin and marketed for alertness, the drug was initially sold over the counter in pharmacies across Europe. Just one pill, says Ohler, gave the Nazis the alertness they needed to remain awake for hours. Thanks, in part, to the ease with which they could obtain it, the Nazis believed it to be just “like coffee.”
A major report in Der Spiegel from 2005 told the story of how the drug was initially introduced to the German military force (Wehrmacht) after a military doctor’s experimentation of it on 90 college students led him to the conclusion that it would “help win the war.” Less than six months later, millions of the pills were flown to the front lines and handed out to the Nazis before invasions. One of the first large-scale attempts to enhance soldiers involved the German Wehrmacht. Andreas Ulrich describes how the German military provided a stimulant called Pervitin to soldiers in combat. Pervitin, a methamphetamine, was generally viewed as a proven drug to be used when soldiers were likely to be subjected to extreme stress.
Ulrich reports that a memorandum for German navy medical officers stated, "Every medical officer must be aware that Pervitin is a highly differentiated and pow- erful stimulant, a tool that enables him, at any time, to actively and effectively help cer- tain individuals within his range of influence achieve above-average performance." Ulrich also reports, between April and July of 1940, more than 35 million tablets of Pervitin and Isophan (a slightly modified version) were shipped to the German army and air force. Some of the tab- lets, each containing three milligrams of active substance, were sent to the Wehrmacht’s medical divisions under the code name OBM, and then distributed directly to the troops. The packages were labeled “Stimulant,” and the instructions recommended a dose of one to two tablets “only as needed, to maintain sleeplessness.”
Ulrich states that although Pervitin had begun to be available only by prescription by the end of 1939, it still was consumed in enormous amounts. Serious health damage resulted, including fatal heart attacks in some German soldiers. Therefore, in June 1941, Pervitin was designated as subject to the opium law. After that, illicit consumption and illegal sale of Pervitin were punished as a crime. Medical officers had to follow strict orders concerning the use of Pervitin and its distribution to soldiers. Eventually, the German medical officers were told about the danger of addiction to amphetamines, and use declined. However, this does not mean there were no more problems with Pervitin. Officers and common soldiers were punished for misusing it or remained addicted, some even years after the war had ended.
Drugs seeped all the way up to the Nazi high command and, especially, to Hitler himself. It has been common knowledge that Hermann Goering, the Number Two man in Nazi Germany, was a notorious morphine addict. It has also been common knowledge that Adolf Hitler himself had a drug problem too, mainly, it was thought, for legitimate medical issues. Over the course of the war, Hitler became increasingly dependent on injections of a cocktail of drugs—including a form of heroin—administered by his personal doctor [there was the famous Dr. Feelgood in Manhattan, who treated John F. Kennedy and Marilyn Monroe].
Hitler didn't use Pervitin; he was into steroids - animal hormones got injected into his bloodstream. And later he used Eukodal, a pharmaceutical cousin of heroin. Hitler loved Eukodal. Especially in the fall of 1944, when the military situation was quite bad, he used this strong drug that made him euphoric even when reality wasn't looking euphoric at all. The generals kept telling him: "We need to change our tactics. We need to end this. We are going to lose the war." And he didn't want to hear it. He had Dr. Morell give him the drugs that made him feel invulnerable and on top of the situation.
While drugs alone cannot explain the Nazis’ toxic racial theories or the events of World War II, if drugs are not taken into account, any understanding of the Third Reich is fundamentally incomplete. The Nazis were overwhelmed by their ideology to conquer the whole world then start to use methamphetamine. They give it to their troops - 35 million doses before France is attacked. They pushed themselves over their limits and this led to a society going off the rails and a really hard crash in the end.
The Germans started with drugs in the military, but other countries followed suit. The British used amphetamines. Basically, the Germans used crystal meth and the Brits used speed. Many of the American soldiers who joined the war effort went through Britain to get to the war theater and received amphetamines in Britain. The Americans took the drug to keep up with these crazed German soldiers.
The US Army became interested in amphetamines and caffeine for soldier enhancement. Some of the earliest evaluations were conducted at the Harvard Fatigue Laboratory and involved caffeine comparisons with the amphetamine called Benzedrine. This interest was stimulated by the use of methamphetamine by the Germans during the early years of the Blitzkrieg. Harris R. Lieberman, Jessica Cail, and Karl E. Friedl report that the U.S. Army issued Benzedrine to servicemen during the war, mainly as 5-mg tablets, though inhalers were also available. The Army continued to use amphetamines even after other countries such as Germany and the United Kingdom were beginning to recognize problems from unrestricted use of the drugs. It took root in the American military: the Korean War in 1950, it was an amphetamine war where all the pilots were doped up.
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