Drug Use in the Vietnam War

Use and Abuse Drug use by American soldiers reached epidemic proportions in the late 1960s Department of Defense Survey (1971): –Marijuana/Hash: 50% use, 14% everyday –Heroin/Opium: 29% use –Psychedelics: 31% use Before 1968, marijuana use was largely ignored by the Army Widespread publicity led to a comprehensive program to eradicate its use –Arrests for marijuana possession reached as many as 1,000 weekly It was the attempt of the U.S. military command to suppress the use of marijuana that caused to the switch to heroin as well as methamphetamines, barbiturates, psychedelics "By mid 1971 Army medical officers were estimating that about 10 to 15 per cent... of the lower ranking enlisted men serving in Vietnam were heroin users.“ --The Politics of Heroin, Alfred McCoy (1972)

Consequences of Drug Use Cause or consequence of disciplinary breakdown? Conflict between officers and enlisted men (sometimes resulting in fragging) Drugs bore a major responsibility for poor US military performance and low morale ***Drug use among U.S. troops in the Vietnam War was recognized as so serious a problem that it stimulated a larger antidrug effort, with President Nixon appointing a drug czar and declaring drug abuse to be “public enemy number one in the United States”

Soldier Excerpts Taken from The Perfect War, James William Gibson (1986) “We got the word day that the whole battalion was going into the Arizona and we’d be there in a couple months. The Arizona’s the only place you can’t get grass, and if he ran out, Tony knew he’d go nuts, so he bought five hundred joints to take with him. Half his pack was filled with grass. A week after he went in, we got a new guy in our squad, also named Tony. It was kinda confusing so we started calling Tony 5, Tony 5. He was stoned the day we went into the Arizona, the day we came out, and all the days in between.” There was a sense that drugs bore a major responsibility for poor U.S. military performance. And there are some stories supporting this position. Lieutenant Colonel Anthony Hebert reports that an entire infantry company got “stoned on marijuana and hashish and was overrun by the Vietcong, with few survivors.” For example, one soldier testified how drugs made the destroy part of search-and-destroy easier. “And like there was a big squabble, you know, and like the next thing I know they told me, some cat told me, that we best go out and smoke, because we might have to be doing something… [The sergeant said] “We’re going to get them, we’ve got to finish them all”… The next thing I know it was a few people, there was a platoon of us with them M-16s, and I don’t know who started it off, somebody started firing. So I started firing…” When heroin use became commonplace, one Army commanding officer rationally described the implications of marijuana use. "If it would get them to give up the hard stuff, I would buy all the marijuana and hashish in the Delta as a present."

Golden Triangle One of Asia's two main opium-producing areas located in Burma, Vietnam, Laos and Thailand

CIA Complicity? Air America –covertly owned and operated by the CIA –transported opium and heroin around SE Asia on behalf of Laotian rebel leaders –Distributed by South Vietnamese civilian and military leadership "It is transported in the planes, vehicles, and other conveyances supplied by the United States. The profit from the trade has been going into the pockets of some of our best friends in Southeast Asia. The charge concludes with the statement that the traffic is being carried on with the indifference if not the closed-eye compliance of some American officials and there is no likelihood of its being shut down in the foreseeable future." --The Politics of Heroin, Alfred McCoy (1972) Clip:

Video Clips Video Clip #1 Video Clip #2 “Platoon” Clips: Scene 10: The Feel-Good Cave Scene 11: Talkin’ Trash --running time 6:24