What if the Germans literally overdosed their troops?

ravenscroft

Something that popped up recently was a suggestion that the German troops who invaded France in 1940 were hopped up on crystal meth (or something along the same lines). This drug boosted their endurance and gave them superhuman abilities, at least for the decisive part of the campaign, but there was almost certainly a severe cost for the brief advantage. The troops might well have become addicted to the drug, and the withdrawal symptoms would have been extremely unpleasant, and in the long term it will probably have had extremely negative effects even if the Germans had won the war. It would be an interesting twist on the Fatherland story if people are not looking into what happened to the Jews, after the Holocaust was erased from history, but how a large number of German soldiers suffered the same symptoms a few years after the Battle of France.

What if the Germans literally overdosed their troops? Crystal meth was not very well understood at the time, to the point I believe the Nazis thought they had a wonder drug, and it was quite possible they might accidentally poisoned their own men. If they miscalculated the dose, they might wind up with a great many troops dropping dead, having withdrawal symptoms in the middle of the campaign, or even having their men go berserk, charging at the French in a drug-fuelled frenzy.

What would happen then, if the blitzkrieg timetable dissolves into utter chaos?
 

M35Mako

I'm not sure where you are getting the idea that the German troops in 1940 were so drug ridden they had "superhuman abilities", that sounds like complete nonsense.

For the record all militaries issued "stay awake" drugs, and most still do today. You don't want your bomber crews or tank drivers falling asleep.
 

The Banker

M35Mako said:
I'm not sure where you are getting the idea that the German troops in 1940 were so drug ridden they had "superhuman abilities", that sounds like complete nonsense.

For the record all militaries issued "stay awake" drugs, and most still do today. You don't want your bomber crews or tank drivers falling asleep.
Click to expand...
Some drugs like Chlorpheniramine give you a surge of adrenalin that helps you stay awake for weeks on end, work 2x faster and harder and you also grow more muscles in short term
also it improves short term awareness and general IQ

Thats what my friend told me. Idk
 

The Tai-Pan

The Banker said:
Some drugs like Chlorpheniramine give you a surge of adrenalin that helps you stay awake for weeks on end, work 2x faster and harder and you also grow more muscles in short term
also it improves short term awareness and general IQ

Thats what my friend told me. Idk
Click to expand...
Start here- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drug_policy_of_Nazi_Germany


There has been some interesting new research done on this. Sadly, soldiers and drugs go together like ham and eggs. Makes sense, considering the dangerous and stressful world around them.
 

M35Mako

The Banker said:
Some drugs like Chlorpheniramine give you a surge of adrenalin that helps you stay awake for weeks on end, work 2x faster and harder and you also grow more muscles in short term
also it improves short term awareness and general IQ

Thats what my friend told me. Idk
Click to expand...

en.wikipedia.org

Chlorphenamine - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org

Chlorphenamine (CP, CPM), also known as chlorpheniramine, is an antihistamine used to treat the symptoms of allergic conditions such as allergic rhinitis (hay fever).[2] It is taken orally (by mouth).[2] The medication takes effect within two hours and lasts for about 4–6 hours.[2] It is a first-generation antihistamine and works by blocking the H1 receptor.[2]

Common side effects include sleepiness, restlessness, and weakness. Other side effects may include dry mouth and wheeziness.[2]
Click to expand...

I think you need to stop listening to your friend.
 

Hammerbolt

Afaik, the german army used drugs to "help" their troops keep fighting for longer than the enemy, allowing for longer marches, night combat, etc. Keep them awake and alert... for a while. The crash was nasty; soldiers could take days to recover. So you got a few days of "gogogogdon't stop" and then you had to rest the entire unit because they just colapsed.

If they started to die? The germans weren't stupid; the dosage would be imediatly cut by half or more, or even stopped completely.

PS: no, there would be no massed "banzai beserker efect". A few might go complely bonkers, but they would also just loose most of the conscious focus. None of of these would be able to use a gun, so... try to charge a maching gun on your own, see what result that gives...
 
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ravenscroft

M35Mako said:
I'm not sure where you are getting the idea that the German troops in 1940 were so drug ridden they had "superhuman abilities", that sounds like complete nonsense.

For the record all militaries issued "stay awake" drugs, and most still do today. You don't want your bomber crews or tank drivers falling asleep.
Click to expand...

An overstatement, but basically they kept fighting well past the point of normal collaspe.
 

jlckansas

Germany had already done studies on Pervitin and knew what dosages to issue and what amounts were too much on the human body. Even in the last days of WW2 the Germans didn't issue heavier doses to make them "Super Soldiers" because they knew how the drugs affected the human body and understood what happened when it wore off and long term usage of larger doses.
 

oberdada

The Banker said:
Some drugs like Chlorpheniramine give you a surge of adrenalin that helps you stay awake for weeks on end, work 2x faster and harder and you also grow more muscles in short term
also it improves short term awareness and general IQ

Thats what my friend told me. Idk
Click to expand...

In the Germany, a proper response would be: "Dude, we lost the war!"
 

Explorers' Corner

Banned
As far as I know, the story of "the Germans were full of crystal meth" is largely a myth, popularized in recent decades but never really extensively substantiated.

Perhaps there were slightly more drugs used than in the Allied armies, but that's about it. So, an interesting story but not more.
 

RanulfC

At work so I can't currently look it up but YarnHub has a video on a Finnish soldier who had a 'stimulant' tube of pills given to him. He later found that the pills had gotten wet and were now stuck together in a mass. Well, he had to keep going so he took the entire mass, at once. It's about as bad as you imagine with constant hallucinations and nervous energy so bad his squad ended up dispersing to get rid of a Soviet trailing force. Dude was so hopped up that at one point he speed-skied right through a Soviet Army encampment so fast they didn't even have time to really process what had just happened!

Try and find it when I get a chance, it's interesting

Randy
 
RedSword12

RedSword12

The German troops were not given significant doses of methamphetamines. Many veterans didn't even recall them ever being issued. At any rate, the briefest of looks between the amount of pervitin tablets and amount of overall troops reveals that the amount of tablets per soldier was exceedingly small. What pervitin was mainly used for was drivers during long road marches, not so much the combat troops. The idea that blitzkrieg was powered in any way by pervitin is just sensationalist pop history, not a credible assertion in the slightest.
 
DrakonFin

DrakonFin

jlckansas said:
Germany had already done studies on Pervitin and knew what dosages to issue and what amounts were too much on the human body. Even in the last days of WW2 the Germans didn't issue heavier doses to make them "Super Soldiers" because they knew how the drugs affected the human body and understood what happened when it wore off and long term usage of larger doses.
Click to expand...
I've read that by Barbarossa, the Germans had come to understand the risks of using too high doses of Pervitin. As they had large quantities of the drug, much of what they wouldn't use, it's said that they dumped some of those supplies to their allies, which then led to the Finnish military coming to have ample amounts.
 
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