How do you turn a normal man into a berserk killer, with apparent superhuman strength and stamina?
With drugs!
Drugs turn the already indoctrinated and physiologically bent into killing machines. Sadly, such drug usage is standard practice amongst most fighting units, whether those are of states, revolutionaries or terrorists. Drugs are a modern scourge with a long history, going back into ancient times. Scythians burned hemp to get high. Vikings went berserk on amanita mushrooms. Morphine use is recorded in the American Civil War, and of course alcohol and opium have fuelled troops throughout history.
The German blitzkrieg was powered by pervitin, a substance similar to crystal-meth. Otto Ranke introduced the widespread use of 'panzerschokolade', (tank-chocolate), known by the Luftwaffe as pilot's salt. Ephedrine was used by Allied pilots. Germany was developing a stronger combat drug, D-IX, a mix of cocaine, oxycodone and pervitin as war ended. We can go on. Sometimes these products are official pushed, as was pervitin by the Nazi, and sometimes a blind-eye is turned, such as the use of drugs in the Vietnam War. But always, there are drugs in war. The history of drugs to make killing machines is as long as civilisation itself.
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