Psycho-pharmacological warfare in Iraq?
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by Cassandra, Unknown News
Aug. 17, 2006
In an article called "Agent Buzz" in the British periodical Fortean Times (#213, Sept. 2006), journalist David Hambling states that he first became interested in the
idea that chemical agents were being used in Iraq when he read a weblog
called The Green Side. The blog had an entry on June 2, 2004, reporting that "These
'holy warriors' [the Iraqis] are taking drugs to get high before attacks... Recently
we
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have gotten evidence of them using another drug, BZ, that makes them
high and very aggressive."
Hambling learned that the blog was written by
Lt. Col Dave Bellon, the Intelligence Officer for the First Regimental
Combat Team. It is now tucked safely and inaccessibly behind a USMC "security screen" at this address, where you need a password, and we don't have one.
The Fortean Times article is not available on-line, so I've summarized it here. The author, Hambling, who has also written for The Guardian, and his final footnote
in the article made my neck prickle.
The chemical name for BZ is 3-quinuclindinyl benzilate. It was among the drugs created in the US in 1950s with the idea of
disabling rather than killing enemy troops. A low dose is
required to disable the subject/victim, and it can be delivered undetectably. BZ was tested on 2,800 US
soldiers between 1959 and 1975, and it was the inspiration for the movie
Jacob's Ladder, in which a troop in Vietnam goes berserk. There's a
presumably non-fiction note of it at the end of the film.
BZ has also been developed by South Africa and the Serbian army. The
South African who "masterminded" BZ, Wouter Basson, combined it with
another chemical because he learned that it produced uncontrollable
aggression. Basson claimed that he had seen signs of an attack using BZ during the
first Gulf War, and said he found it during urine testing. There is no
independent verification of his claims.
The Serbs also found that it could cause a violent reaction: "It can be
expected that such individuals or groups will subsequently, under the
effects of [this chemical agent], inflict great damage and losses on
their own forces."
The British Ministry of Defense
reported that
Iraq had produced a chemical similar to BZ, but a later CIA report
reached the opposite conclusion.
Hambling speculates that an agent like BZ would be useful in
"softening up resistance in an area like Fallujah," and notes that no-one
would believe insurgents who claimed to have been the victim of an
invisible drug attack. BZ appears to be a drug that nobody would administer to their own troops, due to its unpredictable and violent
reactions, but nobody has accused the Bush administration of common sense. Some US troops have said they were on 'go pills', like when the US guys accidentally gunned down some Canadians early in the war.
Here's something especially frightening from the Fortean Times article, something I don't remember reading in the news:"Last year, the US
Senate passed the Ensign Amendment, which changes the definition of
chemical agent and allows US forces to use riot control agents that were
previously considered illegal. A campaigning organization called the
Sunshine Project has uncovered secret Pentagon research into new types
of psychoactive chemical agents, which they call 'calmatives'. This is a
military rather than a medical description, as calmatives include
opiates, antidepressants... and BZ." The author cites
Pentagon program promotes psychopharmacological warfare, a frightful report from the Sunshine Project, the group campaigning against biological weapons.
Hambling concludes that there's no way of knowing whether BZ has been used
in Iraq, as suggested by Lt. Col. Bellon in that weblog you and I are not allowed
to read. If they were under the influence of BZ, there's no way to know whether
the insurgents had taken it, been given it by their leaders, or
if it had been a
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The chemical name for BZ is 3-quinuclindinyl benzilate.
It was among the drugs created in the US in 1950s with the idea of
disabling rather than killing enemy troops.
A low dose is
required to disable the subject/victim, and it can be delivered undetectably.
BZ was tested on 2,800 US
soldiers between 1959 and 1975, and it was the inspiration for the movie
Jacob's Ladder, in which a troop in Vietnam goes berserk.
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There's much more than this at Unknown News.
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