History: Military troops' secret weapon

It's been nearly two years that word first came that my first cousin, Brian, had been found dead in a Chicago hotel room.

Brian, 15 years my junior, had been a substance abuser for a long time, since a catastrophic knee injury suffered in Air Force basic military training got him hooked on pain meds.

He was clean, or so we thought, on Thanksgiving 2017. What we did not know then is that Brian, possessing a remarkable mechanical mind, able to fix nearly anything with a gear, a lever or an engine, had about a week left to live.

A trip to Illinois' largest city brought him into contact with people in a position to supply him with opioids. It's never been clear how he got the heroin laced with fentanyl that took his life.

Since the nation has just marked Veterans Day, an occasion to remember and thank all those who wore the uniform, Brian's passing has caused me to think about the pervasiveness of drugs.

In the interest of complete transparency, I've never been in the military. I'm part of the vast majority of Boomers who did not enter the service. I'm not proud of this nor do I apologize for the fact that the military -- for me -- has been the road not taken.

Even a cursory reading of the Old Testament, a subject I've taught for seven years at Southeast Missouri State University, reveals many occasions of war. One of more memorable battles, detailed in Joshua Chapter 10, has the Israelite army fighting the Amorites long into the evening. This was possible because the text says God, at Joshua's request, stopped the sun in the sky -- meaning Israel had nocturnal sunshine for an indefinite period in order to defeat its enemy.

Something I'd not considered before is the certain fatigue of Joshua's soldiers. How did they maintain readiness at a moment in which their bodies must have been weary from fighting all day?

The biblical narrative doesn't provide this kind of detail, but it's a worthwhile question. How do armies keep the aggressive posture necessary for victory when bone-tired?

Author Norman Ohler has an answer. Ohler wrote in his 2017 book, "Blitzed: Drugs in Nazi Germany," that Hitler's solution -- in part -- was drugs.

German soldiers in the Second World War, Ohler writes, were given Pervitin tablets as if though they were Halloween candy.

Pervitin has a different name today: crystal meth.

"The Nazis in May 1940 were pushing into western Europe," Ohler writes. "They took Pervitin, powerful enough to make you feel superhuman and consequently dull (any) feelings of empathy."

Dosed with the WWII-equivalent of methamphetamine, the Nazis were able to fight for three days straight, not needing the sleep so necessary to their Allied enemies.

"Once you take meth," Ohler suggested, "your morale becomes quite high."

"You become," the German scholar writes, "a fighting robot."

I don't know what kept Joshua's troops awake and fighting long into a night supernaturally lit up by a stationary sun.

I do know any discussion of mind-altering narcotics, even the more socially accepted marijuana, usually makes me cringe. Fully cognizant of the likelihood of being labeled a throwback, my mind goes to a comment once made by my maternal grandmother.

"I will not put a thief in my mouth," she said, "to steal my brain."