The Hashassim Return?

As a commenter pointed out (but, being a dork, of course I already knew it), the word "assassin" derives from hashassim, killers who were given hash in order to make them... I don't know, really mellow during hits or somethin'. To be honest, I never really got that. The last thing you'd want in an assassin is a bad case of the munchies and a well-nigh irrestible desire to watch Ren & Stimpy cartoons (and then insist, despite all available evidence, that the show is "sick-funny").

It's already been noted that many Iraqi insurgents are meth-heads. Noah Shachtman's always-interesting Defense Tech notes that some are now taking a potent synthetic hallucinogen, too, a drug first developed as a chemical weapon:

The story starts over a year ago with a Marine blogger in Iraq....

“We could not understand why they kept coming but they did.� The reason, it turned out, was drugs: “…these ‘holy warriors’ are taking drugs to get high before attacks. It true, as we pushed into the town in April many Marines came across drug paraphernalia (mostly heroin). Recently, we have gotten evidence of them using another drug BZ that makes them high and very aggressive.�

BZ is not your typical substance of abuse. It’s a hallucinogenic chemical weapon. This weird concept originated in the 1950’s when “better living through chemistry� was a slogan to live by and warfare without blood was the goal.

...

BZ or "Agent Buzz" is the military name for 3-quinuclidinyl benzillate, an extremely powerful hallucinogen. After experimenting with a whole stash of mind-altering substances including cocaine, heroin and LSD, the Pentagon selected BZ for weaponizing. Its major advantages are that it can easily delivered in an aerosol cloud, and it is very safe.

So, for all you libertarians out there: your continued purchases of weaponized, aerosolized 3-quinuclidinyl benzillate for "recreational purposes" are funding the terrorists.

Stupid, selfish libertarians.

posted by Ace at 01:51 PM

| Access Comments