In Vietnam, the water buffalo have always shunned the local opium plants. They don’t like them. But when the American bombs started to fall all around them during the war, the buffalo left their normal grazing grounds, broke into the opium fields, and began to chew. They would then look a little dizzy and dulled. When they were traumatized, it seems, they wanted — like the mongoose, like us — to escape from their thoughts.

kamakiri

I've been reading an account of the Manhattan Project. It's not news to me; I've been well acquainted with the story of the making of the atomic bomb and all its intricacies for many years now. Still, I like to seek out different points of view of the same historical events -- no two are the same. In this case, the story doesn't focus on the atomic bomb really, at all. Instead, it focuses on the people who came, and dwelled, at Los Alamos, from a social perspective; like, the constant parties thrown all over the base for sheer relief from the unrelenting pressures. The fact that most of the scientists were actually prevented (and followed the rules) of telling their own wives what they were doing.

This is not new news. But what strikes me here is just how many, and much, scientists, all the way to Robert Oppenheimer, were pretty much fucked out of their skulls on most weekend nights. They would put modern partying to shame; "Oppie" was "renowned" for his martinis. I am assuming that these martinis, in addition to the lab alcohol -- 200-proof, and I am not making that up -- were handed out like candy. And consumed like candy. The hangovers on Sundays were all part of the jollity; in those days, it was "hair of the dog" rather than recriminations on "how fucked up you were last night and what hateful remarks you said to that woman" blah blah blah.

Need I remind anyone that these people constructed a nuclear fission weapon within the space of zero to 28 months? On a project that at one time supposedly consumed ten percent of ALL THE ELECTRICITY USED BY THE UNITED STATES? One that, if conducted today, would cost in excess of $40 billion?

And most -- at least a lot -- were fucked up beyond belief a lot of the time. At the Trinity test, one scientist was asked by a colleague what he was going to do while watching the test, and he replied, "Well, I'm going to drink from my bottle of scotch." When asked what he would do if the test were a dud, he replied, "Well, that's why I'm going to bring two bottles of scotch."

Kamikaze pilots got so blitzed the night before their missions that they could hardly be thought of as functioning pilots when they got into their planes. The Russians, and the Nazis, mostly fought the entire war so fucked up on alcohol that many -- perhaps most -- major tactical decisions were made in a haze of drunkenness, and carried out in a haze of drunkenness.

The only person who can actually be exempted from this group is Hitler, but he was so juiced by his doctor on what to most of us would be an almost mind-numbing brew of depressants/stimulants/tranquilizers that it would be the equivalent of us injecting a hit of heroin upon waking up, followed by half a gram of coke, followed by a large dose of Valium, followed by a few snorts of meth . . . well, need I go on? Goering conducted almost his entire war smashed on morphine. To be a drunk -- which to me would mean consuming a quart or more of hard alcohol a day -- was so commonplace amongst the populations of all the nations -- Roosevelt "enjoyed his martinis," Churchill by all accounts woke up to several glasses of brandy before he even got out of bed -- and Stalin, well, 'nuff said.

So . . . this is not new news. Any kind of "temperance" movement is so doomed that I'm amazed at the monumental hypocrisy that underlies them. Richard Nixon was, by all accounts, fucked up beyond belief most nights. This was the leader of the Free World. Mao-tse-tung -- same story. Most of human history can be summed up by just one sentence: most of the movers and shakers were so fucked up most of the time that we can pretty much attribute all the events since the Pharaohs to have been conducted Under The Influence.

Now I think I will have another rum and coffee and take a couple of Dilaudid.

GilbertWham

kamakiri:
injecting a hit of heroin upon waking up, followed by half a gram of coke, followed by a large dose of Valium, followed by a few snorts of meth

Aaaaah, youth...

1Reply

robulus

robulus
If you give hash to male mice, they become horny and seek out females — but then they find “they can barely crawl over the females, let alone mount them,” so after a little while they yawn and start licking their own penises.

Aaaaah, youth...

Raita
Because it makes them feel good or funny?

The Sami (the ingenious people of Lapland) apparently used to feed Amanita muscaria -mushrooms to reindeer and then collect and drink their pee, because reindeer metabolizes the more poisonous components, leaving the "good stuff" in their pee. This is believed to have affected the image of flying reindeer in the myth of Father Christmas; the Sami people were high and thought the reindeer were flying through the air.

Source: http://h2g2.com/edited_entry/A60842181

The Santa Claus part is all a theory, of course. But it is known for sure that reindeer eat Amanita mushrooms. Why? Well, why not.

j9c1d
I thought that the Nazis were chemically propelled using amphetamine (which were consumed by Allied forces too) and morphine. And Pervitin (crystal meth).

I realize that the extent of my scholarship (Neal Stephenson novels,
the Daily Mail http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... -METH.html
and Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amphetamin ... nd_culture are not ideal first sources.
Quick--someone interview the last surviving WWII vets from all sides of the war before they die and take their secrets with them!

More than 200million pills were dolled out to the Wehrmacht and Luftwaffe between 1939 and 1945. German soldiers nicknamed it 'Panzerschokolade' - meaning 'tank chocolate'.


Junkies: Even Hitler himself took intravenous methamphetamine

In Britain, newspapers reported how the enemy was using a 'miracle pill.' Even Hitler himself was given intravenous methamphetamine by his physician Theodor Morell.

potty wrote:i rather believe, that drug-users have an underlying disease.

potty wrote:yes, a compensation for some "physical deficits" ppl have. imo.

what do you think?

that everyone is a gambler by nature, and only "free will" stops us to gamble the house at the casino ?

frank lee bent wrote:You all think too much.