Tom’s Reviews > Blitzed: Drugs in the Third Reich > Status Update

Today I learned: US intelligence MK Ultra mind control experiments had their Genesis with a Nazi doctor testing mescaline on prisoners at Dachau.

I'll bet you're wondering if the Nazis did experiments on concentration camp prisoners to try and create a super drug for their soldiers.

Of course they did.

Hitler began demanding cocaine from his new favorite physician to the degree that the man started resisting his demands. But he was the Fuehrer so he ultimately got his way. In October 1944 Hitler was given such a high dose that he passed out. That's right, Adolf Hitler nearly OD'd on cocaine.

After Operation Valkyrie, the assassination attempt on Hitler, Der Fuehrer had two separate physicians treating him. One was giving him regular hydrocodone injections, the other was giving him pure cocaine!

"When the Reich aviation minister [Goering] and his Generalluftzeugmeister talked together, they liked to reminisce about the good old days, when they had fought aerial battles together in the First World War, high on cocaine."

"...the adversaries watched each other, motionless, for months. No one wanted to fight. The shock of the First World War, with millions of soldiers slaughtered, was still lodged in the memory. Banners were hung at the front lines: “We won’t shoot unless you shoot first.”"

I've been interested in this book since it was announced but I was actually skeptical that Hitler and the third Reich were basically all on drugs. I thought there might be a danger of cherry picking evidence and jumping to conclusions. But this book is HEAVILY foot noted. This is not a scatter shot argument. I'm already pretty convinced. The Nazis were hopped up on coke and meth, man!

Oh my goodness, this was an actual song in Germany in the 20's!

"And if we snort ourselves to death
Or into the asylum,
Our days are going downhill fast—
How better to beguile ’em?
Europe’s a madhouse anyway,
No need for genuflecting;
The only way to Paradise Is snorting and injecting!"