Adolf Hitler’s 1936 Berlin Olympics propaganda bonanza was not just an exceptional showing of athletic talent. With a book of newly revealed facts in hand, Hitler, famous for his unpredictable moods, was potentially a system intoxicated by a “supremely mighty “drug cocktail.
Footage of Adolf Hitler at the 1936 olympics where he is thought to be high on drugs.
Author Norman Ohler claims that Hitler relied heavily on a mixture of cocaine and opioids.
“Hitler needed those highs to substitute [for] his natural charisma, which … he had lost in the… PIC.TWITTER.COM/6VIQPI10GH
— Morbid Knowledge (@Morbidful) MARCH 23, 2024
According to historian Norman Ohler ‘s Blitzed: Drugs in the Third Reich , he was not an exception: Drug usage, particularly Crystal meth, was a German Nazi regular.” Besides, German soldiers were issued Pervitin , a methamphetamine tablet, to avoid losing consciousness in battle and sailing through massive crusades.
Yet drug usage did not remain limited to Hitler and was a widespread evil throughout Nazi Germany. The German chemist Friedrich Hauschild, influenced by the victory of the American amphetamine named Benzedrine utilized in the Berlin Olympics in 1936, invented the pioneer German methyl-amphetamine .
Shortly after 1940, the German forces spread the drug named Pervitin among the Wehrmacht troops before they triumphantly overcame France. Pervitin functioned as the miracles pill for wakefulness and anti-depressant, maintaining soldiers lucid and preventing them from sleeping for several days.
Ohler, with reference to Dr. Theodor Morell, Hitler’s personal doctor, presents the portrait of a drug-addicted dictator. Among his fought after substances, journalists name crystal meth, barbiturates , morphine, and the bull’s semen . Hitler took a mixture of these substances depending on his state that day. Whether this affected his behavior is a matter of dispute. Ohler suggests that in the early years of the war, he often had an excessive tremble, which could also be related .
He also cites the case of a 1943 meeting with Mussolini, in which a Meth-fed Hitler ranted for two hours . Was he really clouded and distorted, which inevitably led to fatal mistakes? The question remains open.
It did not stop at Hitler. The chemist Friedrich Hauschild created Pervitin; for the first time, he tried the American amphetamines in Germany. Such popularity begs the question of what role drugs played in the insidious development of Nazi Germany.
The drug discovery of the Nazi regime adds another terrible dimension to the awful era of horror. Whether or not most people have made most of the use of it is still a question, but it did provide a glimpse into the evil side of Nazi Germany. Perhaps more studies will show how the substances affected the course of events.
Did Hitler’s drug use make him a puppet grasp on a chemical excessive, or become it a determined try and deal with the pressures of main a nation to warfare? The solution can also lie buried inside the records, ready to be unearthed.
