Among the great deceptions that the ruling classes and the elites - the kings (today's political leaders), priests and businessmen - subject the rest of the world to is the illusion that the armed forces are created, and exist, to protect the people. The truth is that the armed forces exist solely to protect the interests of the elites - the fossil fuel and allied industries, the synthetic pharmaceutical industry, the global trade in opium, the arms industry, the black market - and other industries that enable the elites to fatten themselves on the toil of the majority, and suck the life out of the earth. Most often, the armed forces are used to ensure that the people within a country do not rebel against their masters and overturn the established social order. It is seldom that the armed forces are used to perform what is claimed to be their primary role - to defend the nation from external threats to national security. On the rare occasions when such an external threat arises, it is almost always from the elites of another nation seeking to use its own armed forces to loot the wealth and resources of the nation being attacked. Leo Tolstoy writes in his Kingdom of God and Peace Essays 'Armies are needed by all governments first of all to keep their subjects in submission and to exploit their labour. But a government is not alone; besides it there is another government exploiting its subjects by violence in the same way and always ready to rob its neighbour of the toil of its already enslaved subjects. And so every government needs an army not only for use at home but also to protect its booty from neighbouring brigands. Every government is thus involuntarily led to increase its army in rivalry with others, and the increase of army is infectious as Montesquieu already remarked a hundred and fifty years ago. Every increase of the army in a State, though directed mainly against its own subjects, is dangerous to its neighbours also and evokes an increase of their forces. The armies have reached their present millions not merely because the governments were threatened by their neighbours, but chiefly from the necessity of subduing any attempt at revolt on the part of their own subjects. The increase of armies arises simultaneously from two causes, each of which reciprocally evokes the other: armies are needed both against enemies at home and to maintain the position of a state against its neigbours. The one conditions the other. The despotism of a government at home increases in proportion to the increase and strengthening of its army and its external successes; and the aggressiveness of governments grows in proportion to the increase of their internal despotism.' He further writes 'So long as governments continue to distrust one another, and instead of disbanding or decreasing their armies always increase them in correspondence to augmentations made by their neighbours, and by means of spies watch every movement of troops, knowing that each of the Powers will attach its neighbour as soon as it sees a way to do so, no agreement is possible, and even conference is either a stupidity or a pastime, or a fraud, or an impertinence, or all of these together.' In modern times, such attacks on another nation are generally rare (though not rare enough), given the power and might of the armed forces of each nation today, and the weapons of mass destruction that most nations possess today. The world, in general, frowns upon such blatant attempts by the rich of one nation to loot another nation, unlike in the past when this kind of thievery was viewed as gallant and heroic behavior.
The existence of the armed forces itself, however, serves to further the interests of the rich. Not only are the masses employed to defend the elites and kill anybody that poses as a threat, the armed forces itself serves as one of the biggest markets for the industries that make the elites rich and powerful. The arms industry, fossil fuel industry, synthetic pharmaceutical industry, alcohol and tobacco reap immense profits from the sale of their products to the armed forces. The money that governments use to pay these industries for their products is taxpayer money contributed by the masses. Governments pay the industries prices on par, or even greater, than market value and then sell these products to the armed forces at subsidized rates to encourage consumption. The armed forces become wholly dependent and addicted to these products, thus not only contributing manpower, but also creating the markets for these industries. Nobody questions budgetary allocation for defense, as this is viewed as essential for national security.
Governments recruit gullible persons from the masses with inducements such as job security, travel to exotic destinations, pensions, medical care, accommodation, and of course, subsidized alcohol, tobacco and synthetic pharmaceutical medicine. Besides this there is the powerful inducement that patriotism offers. They use imagery of how great life is in the armed forces to seduce youth into joining the armed forces. One of the key qualities that governments try and indoctrinate into the masses is patriotism. Patriotism for one's country is projected as the greatest of all virtues. The sense of duty that one feels for the protection and security of one's near and dear is extrapolated into the sense of duty that one must feel for one's nation. Leo Tolstoy writes, in The Kingdom of God and Peace Essays, 'People of the ruling classes say that with such complete conviction that patriotism is a lofty sentiment, that common folk who have not experienced it acknowledge themselves to blame for not feeling it, and try to persuade themselves that they do feel it, or at least pretend to do so.' He further writes 'Patriotism in its simplest, clearest, and most indubitable meaning is nothing but an instrument for the attainment of the government's ambitious and mercenary aims, and a renunciation of human dignity, common sense, and conscience by the governed, and a slavish submission to those who hold power. That is what is really preached wherever patriotism is championed. Patriotism is slavery.' Other nations are projected as evil threats to one's own values and security, as people who wish to kill and rape one's family and loot everything that one possesses. This developing of patriotism in one's own nation goes hand in hand with developing hatred for the other. Tolstoy writes 'And therefore the maintenance and defence of any nationality - Russian, German, French, or Anglo-Saxon, provoking the corresponding maintenance and defence not only of Hungarian, Polish, and Irish nationalities, but also of Basque, Provencal, Mordva, Tchouvash, and many other nationalities - serves not to harmonize and unite men but to estrange and divide them more and more from one another.' He further writes 'The ruling classes have in their hands the army, the schools, the churches, the press, and money. In the schools they kindle patriotism in the children by means of histories describing their own people as the best of all peoples and always on the right. Among adults they kindle it by spectacles, jubilees, monuments, and by a lying patriotic press. Above all they inflame patriotism by perpetrating every kind of injustice and harshness against other nations, provoking in them enmity towards their own people, and then in turn exploit that enmity to embitter their people against the foreigner.' He says 'All the people of the so-called Christian world have been reduced by patriotism to such a state of brutality that not only those who are obliged to kill or be killed desire slaughter and rejoice in murder, but all the people of Europe and America, living peaceably in their homes exposed to no danger, are at each war - thanks to easy means of communication and to the press - in the position of the spectators in a Roman circus, and like them delight in the slaughter, and raise the bloodthirsty cry, "Pollice verso."' When the elites face a threat within their own nation, they project these threats as anti-national elements working in conjunction with rival nations to try and destroy the fabric of existing society. In many societies where there is a risk that wisdom among the people will make them shun the armed forces - recognizing the armed forces as the tools of the elites, and killing another human as a crime - the elites create policies such as mandatory drafts into the armed forces of persons above the age of 18 or 21, as can be seen in the US, Russia and Israel. Many individuals, who cannot make an honest living in civil society, make a beeline for the armed forces as a means of securing their future and an easy way out of doing honest work to survive in this world. Herman Hesse writes in If the War Goes On 'What you call action is a running-away from pain, a not-wanting-to-be-born, a flight from suffering! You, or your fathers, called it 'action' when you bustled about night and day in shops and factories, when you heard many many hammers hammering, when you blew quantities of soot into the air. Don't misunderstand me, I have nothing against your hammers, your soot, or your fathers. But I cannot help smiling when you speak of your bustling as 'action'. It was not action, it was merely a flight from suffering. It was painful to be alone - and so men established societies. It was painful to hear all manner of voices within you, demanding that you live your own lives, seek your own destiny, die your own death - it was painful, and so you ran away, and made noise with hammers and machines, until the voices receded and fell silent. That is what your fathers did, that is what your teachers did, and that is what you yourselves did. Suffering was demanded of you - and you were indignant you didn't want to suffer, you wanted only to act! And what did you do? First, in your strange occupations you sacrificed to the god of deafening noise, you were so busy with your activity that you had no time to suffer, to hear, to breathe, to drink the milk of life and the light of heaven. No, you had to be active, perpetually active, perpetually doing. And when the fuss and bustle proved futile, when the destiny within you, instead of ripening into sweetness, decayed and turned into poison, you multiplied your activity, you created enemies for yourselves, first in your imagination, then in reality; you went to war, you became soldiers and heroes. You have made conquests, you have borne insane hardships and done gigantic deeds. And now? Are you content? Are your hearts happy and serene? Is destiny sweet to your taste? No, it is bitterer than ever, and that is why you are clamouring for more action, rushing into the streets, storming and shouting, electing councils, and loading your guns again. All because you are forever in flight from suffering! In flight from yourselves, from your souls!' Quite often, governments create situations of economic stress - where millions of youth do not have jobs - to induce them to join the armed forces and enslave themselves to the elites and their industries, an example of which can be seen in the Agniveer scheme launched by the Indian government to recruit young Indians on short service commissions for a few years, even as the government works with the elites to increase the wealth gap between the rich and the poor. A large percentage of the Indian youth have no jobs, and no serious steps have been taken by the Indian government to address this pressing issue. Cannabis legalization would generate millions of sustainable jobs in the Indian economy, but this would result in narrowing the inequality gap between the rich and poor, which goes against the goals of the elites. Herman Hesse writes in his book If the War Goes On, in the aftermath of World War II 'Nevertheless, I recall with a smile certain of his observations on the character of the Germans, and sometimes it seems to me that if Goethe were my contemporary he would more or less agree with my diagnosis of the two great ailments of our day. For in my opinion the present state of mankind springs from two mental disorders: the megalomania of technology and the megalomania of nationalism. It is they that give the present-day world its face and its image of itself. They have been responsible for two world wars and their consequences, and before their fury is spent they will have further similar consequences. Resistance to these two world ailments is today the most important task and justification of the human spirit. To this resistance I have devoted my life, a ripple in the stream.'
Once an individual has been seduced into joining the armed forces, one of the first steps is to remove all traces of individuality and free will, and to mould the individual into a machine that operates on the command of his or her masters without thinking or questioning. This is done systematically, breaking down the individual's resistance through time-tested methods, much like how a wild elephant is broken down through repeated thrashing to learn to fear and obey the command of the mahout. So it is very common for an individual who joins the armed forces, based on the antics of the Bollywood soldier hero, to find himself waking up to peeling potatoes and washing his officer's (and his wife's) undergarments. The war mongers - who use humans as their weapons to further their own interests, and protect their status as the elites and ruling classes in society - do not want their soldiers to think, and have a conscience. To achieve this, the soldier must be kept servile, drugged and addicted to the poisons that the elites serve them. Leo Tolstoy writes in the Kingdom of God and Peace Essays about a conversation he has with a young soldier who has been indoctrinated to serve his masters unquestioningly. He writes "And suppose your own father were a prisoner and he tried to run away?" I asked a young soldier. "I would stab him with my bayonet," he replied in a peculiar, unintelligent, soldierly voice. "And if he made off I should have to shoot him." he added, evidently proud of knowing what must be done if his father tried to escape. And when a kindly young man has been brought to this condition, lower than a brute, he is just what is needed by those who use him as an instrument of violence. He is then ready. The man has been destroyed, and a new instrument of violence has been produced. And all this is done each year, every autumn, everywhere all over Russia in broad daylight and in large towns where all may see it; and the deception is so artful, so cunning, that though everyone sees it and in the depth of his soul knows all its horror and all its terrible consequences, he cannot free himself from it.'
The elites - who use patriotism, fear, hatred and financial inducements to recruit the soldiers to protect their interests - never put themselves on the line when it comes to a situation of conflict. It is the masses of one nation who go for the throats of the masses of another nation, while the elites sit back with their caviar and wine, watching the mayhem and slaughter of the innocents and the money pouring into their own bank accounts as a result of this. The large majority of the people - who belong neither to the elites nor to the paid killers that form the armed forces - watch in dismay as their worlds are turned upside down, pushing huge numbers of people into poverty, starvation, injury and death. Leo Tolstoy writes in the Kingdom of God and Peace Essays, 'The bells will peal and long-haired men will dress themselves in gold-embroidered sacks and begin to pray on behalf of murder. The familiar, age-old, horrible businesses will recommence. The editors of newspapers will set to work to arouse hatred and murder under the guise of patriotism and will be delighted to double their sales. Manufacturers, merchants, and contractors of army-stores, will hurry about joyfully in expectation of doubled profits. Officials of all sorts will busy themselves in the hope of being able to steal more than usual. Army commanders will bustle here and there, drawing double pay and rations and hoping to receive various trinkets, ribbons, crosses, stripes, and stars, for murdering people. Idle ladies and gentlemen will fuss about, entering their names in advance for the Red Cross and getting ready to bandage those whom their husbands and brothers are setting out to kill - imagining that they will be doing a most Christian work thereby. And hundreds of thousands of simple kindly folk, torn from their wives, mothers, and children, and with murderous weapons in their hands, will trudge wherever they may be driven, stifling the despair in their souls by songs, debauchery, and vodka. They will march, freeze, suffer from hunger, and fall ill. Some will die of disease, and some will at last come to the place where men will kill them by the thousand. And they too, without themselves knowing why, will murder thousands of others whom they had never before seen, and who had neither done nor could do them any wrong.'' He further writes 'The victim is always and ever the deceived, foolish, working folk - those who with blistered hands have built all those ships, fortresses, arsenals, barracks, cannon, harbours, steamers, and moles, and all these palaces, halls, platforms, and triumphal arches; who have set up and printed all these newspapers and pamphlets, and have procured and brought all these pheasants and ortolans, oysters, and wines that are consumed by the men who are fed, brought up, and kept by them, and who are deceiving them and preparing the most fearful calamities for them. It is always the same kindly, foolish folk, who stand open-mouthed like children, showing their healthy white teeth, naively delighted by dressed-up admirals and presidents with flags waving above them, and by fireworks and bands of music; and for whom, before they have time to look around, there will be neither admirals nor presidents nor flags nor bands, but only a desolate battlefield, cold, hunger, and anguish - before them murderous enemies and behind them relentless officers preventing their escape - blood, wounds, suffering, putrefying corpses, and a senseless unnecessary death.' The elites try and gloss over their own crimes and selfish interests which led to the death of a soldier in the first place by pretending to glorify the dead soldier as a martyr and hero. Herman Hesse writes 'Just as reporters abuse the language when they term some senseless accident 'tragic' (which for those clowns is synonymous with 'deplorable') it is an abuse of language to say - as is now fashionable, especially among the stay-at-homes - that our poor soldiers , slaughtered at the front, died a 'heroic death'. That is sentimentality. Of course the soldiers who died in the war are worthy of our deepest sympathy. Many of them did great things and suffered greatly, and in the end paid with their lives. But that does not make them 'heroes'. The common soldier, at whom an officer bellows as he would at a dog, is not suddenly transformed into a hero by the bullet that kills him. To suppose that there can be millions of 'heroes' is in itself an absurdity. The obedient well-behaved citizen who does his duty is not a 'hero'. Only an individual who has fashioned his 'self-will', his noble, natural inner law, into his destiny can be a hero. 'Destiny and cast of mind are words for the same thing,' said Novalis, one of the profoundest and least-known German thinkers. But only a hero finds the courage to fulfil his destiny.' It is important for the elites to pay lip service to the dead soldier, in order to induce more gullible persons from the masses to step up and take the place of the fallen soldier. Otherwise, the masses would quickly see through the deception, and refuse to fight and kill each other for the sake of the elites.
The elites - who use patriotism, fear, hatred and financial inducements to recruit the soldiers to protect their interests - never put themselves on the line when it comes to a situation of conflict. It is the masses of one nation who go for the throats of the masses of another nation, while the elites sit back with their caviar and wine, watching the mayhem and slaughter of the innocents and the money pouring into their own bank accounts as a result of this. The large majority of the people - who belong neither to the elites nor to the paid killers that form the armed forces - watch in dismay as their worlds are turned upside down, pushing huge numbers of people into poverty, starvation, injury and death. Leo Tolstoy writes in the Kingdom of God and Peace Essays, 'The bells will peal and long-haired men will dress themselves in gold-embroidered sacks and begin to pray on behalf of murder. The familiar, age-old, horrible businesses will recommence. The editors of newspapers will set to work to arouse hatred and murder under the guise of patriotism and will be delighted to double their sales. Manufacturers, merchants, and contractors of army-stores, will hurry about joyfully in expectation of doubled profits. Officials of all sorts will busy themselves in the hope of being able to steal more than usual. Army commanders will bustle here and there, drawing double pay and rations and hoping to receive various trinkets, ribbons, crosses, stripes, and stars, for murdering people. Idle ladies and gentlemen will fuss about, entering their names in advance for the Red Cross and getting ready to bandage those whom their husbands and brothers are setting out to kill - imagining that they will be doing a most Christian work thereby. And hundreds of thousands of simple kindly folk, torn from their wives, mothers, and children, and with murderous weapons in their hands, will trudge wherever they may be driven, stifling the despair in their souls by songs, debauchery, and vodka. They will march, freeze, suffer from hunger, and fall ill. Some will die of disease, and some will at last come to the place where men will kill them by the thousand. And they too, without themselves knowing why, will murder thousands of others whom they had never before seen, and who had neither done nor could do them any wrong.'' He further writes 'The victim is always and ever the deceived, foolish, working folk - those who with blistered hands have built all those ships, fortresses, arsenals, barracks, cannon, harbours, steamers, and moles, and all these palaces, halls, platforms, and triumphal arches; who have set up and printed all these newspapers and pamphlets, and have procured and brought all these pheasants and ortolans, oysters, and wines that are consumed by the men who are fed, brought up, and kept by them, and who are deceiving them and preparing the most fearful calamities for them. It is always the same kindly, foolish folk, who stand open-mouthed like children, showing their healthy white teeth, naively delighted by dressed-up admirals and presidents with flags waving above them, and by fireworks and bands of music; and for whom, before they have time to look around, there will be neither admirals nor presidents nor flags nor bands, but only a desolate battlefield, cold, hunger, and anguish - before them murderous enemies and behind them relentless officers preventing their escape - blood, wounds, suffering, putrefying corpses, and a senseless unnecessary death.' The elites try and gloss over their own crimes and selfish interests which led to the death of a soldier in the first place by pretending to glorify the dead soldier as a martyr and hero. Herman Hesse writes 'Just as reporters abuse the language when they term some senseless accident 'tragic' (which for those clowns is synonymous with 'deplorable') it is an abuse of language to say - as is now fashionable, especially among the stay-at-homes - that our poor soldiers , slaughtered at the front, died a 'heroic death'. That is sentimentality. Of course the soldiers who died in the war are worthy of our deepest sympathy. Many of them did great things and suffered greatly, and in the end paid with their lives. But that does not make them 'heroes'. The common soldier, at whom an officer bellows as he would at a dog, is not suddenly transformed into a hero by the bullet that kills him. To suppose that there can be millions of 'heroes' is in itself an absurdity. The obedient well-behaved citizen who does his duty is not a 'hero'. Only an individual who has fashioned his 'self-will', his noble, natural inner law, into his destiny can be a hero. 'Destiny and cast of mind are words for the same thing,' said Novalis, one of the profoundest and least-known German thinkers. But only a hero finds the courage to fulfil his destiny.' It is important for the elites to pay lip service to the dead soldier, in order to induce more gullible persons from the masses to step up and take the place of the fallen soldier. Otherwise, the masses would quickly see through the deception, and refuse to fight and kill each other for the sake of the elites.
The armed forces, which, in my definition, includes army, navy, air
force, disaster management personnel, industrial security and other
security personnel of all kinds, have one thing in common. It is in
their line of work to be in dangerous and difficult, often life
threatening, situations. In the course of their work, many suffer from
serious injuries, loss of limbs and trauma. The armed forces require that an individual maintain a high level of physical and mental health, besides masculinity and discipline, supposedly aimed at keeping the individual combat ready. The reality is that the current system ends up often pushing the individual to alcohol and synthetic drugs forced upon them in the name of medical treatment - as in the case of medical prescription pharmaceutical drugs - or as perks of the job - as in the case of vast amounts of free or subsidized alcohol. Many become highly addicted to
these drugs that they use for pain management, stress and depression. There are
reports of rising suicide among active and retired armed forces
personnel. Also the association of armed forces individuals, active or
retired, in an increasing number of mass shootings on innocent people is
an indication of their poor states of mental health very often caused
by pain, depression, stress and lack of healthy medication and
recreational alternatives.This is not just the case with injured or
retired personnel, but with active personnel too.
Alcohol use is looked upon as a masculine trait in the armed forces and persons are encouraged to use alcohol to show that they are tough. Countless persons have fallen victim to alcohol through this carefully cultivated and propagated stereotype. Many armed forces personnel take to synthetic cannabinoids, heroin and other powerful opioids, methamphetamine, novel psychotropic substances, non-medical use of prescription drugs, etc, since it is easier to evade detection with these very dangerous synthetic drugs, as compared to legal alcohol and the much safer illegal cannabis. As an example, Cell reports that 'Often abused by adolescents and military personnel to elude detection in drug tests due to their lack of structural similarity to delta9-THC, SCBs [synthetic cannabinoids]are falsely marketed as safe marijuana substitutes. Instead, SCBs are a highly structural diverse group of compounds, easily synthesized, which produce very dangerous adverse effects occurring by, as of yet, unknown mechanisms. Therefore, available evidence indicates that K2/Spice products are clearly not safe marijuana alternatives.'
Armies forces worldwide ban the use of cannabis within their organizations. These organizations are themselves the law enforcers, ensuring that the unjust worldwide ban on cannabis stays in place to protect the elites and their interests. The establishment takes extra pains to ensure that cannabis usage does not infiltrate into the armed forces. For example, Marijuana Moment reports the steps taken by the US Navy to keep cannabis off limits by banning hemp based shampoos and lotions, 'The branch acknowledged that hemp and its derivatives, including CBD, were federally legalized under the 2018 Farm Bill. But it said that their policy stands regardless in an effort to “ensure there is no unknowing consumption of any THC amount.” “This really is about the health of the force and ensuring the Navy remains a drug-free workplace,” LA Parker, the head of Navy’s Drug Detection and Deterrence program, said in a press release. “We have to be fit to fight and can’t take a risk in allowing our Sailors to consume or use these types of products.”' On the same subject, Marijuana Moment reports in another article 'While hemp and its derivatives are federally legal—and a growing number of states have regulated marijuana markets—a Massachusetts base of the military branch emphasized that possessing or using cannabis products can result in disciplinary action. “Hemp, CBD and traces of THC can be found in a number of products like shampoos, lotions, and lip balms that you can buy in the open market, but you can’t bring them onto the installation,” Tech. Sgt. Kyle Majorana said. “Even if it’s for your pet, it’s still illegal.”' Army personnel are not even allowed to invest in cannabis businesses that are part of the new wave of sustainable economic growth in the US. Stripes reports that 'The uncertainty surrounding the issue has arisen from recent guidance circulated within the Defense Department and in conflicting news reports. While federal law and DOD policy remain opposed to possession, use, manufacture, sale or distribution of pot, rapid changes to the burgeoning quasi-legal weed industry have raised questions among those looking to invest early into the “Amazon of pot.” Adding to the confusion is the fact that some investors — including servicemembers participating in the Thrift Savings Plan — may hold shares of companies invested in pot-related businesses without knowing it. The federal government also may be indirectly invested in the industry through the company it hired to manage the TSP and retirement investment funds.' Task and Purpose reports that 'The existing policy is outlined in a November 2014 memo from then Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, which says that anyone who disregards federal law about "the use, sale, or manufacture of marijuana" could be denied a security clearance, but does not mention investing in companies that sell marijuana products legally. Put simply, there's nothing currently in writing that says troops and Defense Department civilians can't own stock in companies that legally sell marijuana products, but that doesn't necessarily mean that's a good idea. "The DoD CAF adheres to applicable policies when making adjudicative determinations," Harris said. "These determinations apply the 'whole person concept' and take into account all available information, favorable and unfavorable, to render an appropriate determination on a person's reliability and trustworthiness to hold a clearance."'
In Israel, where human rights atrocities are committed on a regular basis by the armed forces, it is most important that cannabis is kept out of the reach of the soldier, in order to ensure complete obedience to their masters. Jerusalem Post reports that 'A 2018 survey conducted by the Israel Anti-Drug Authority found that 54% of soldiers admitted to having smoked cannabis over the past year.' There is a constant crackdown on soldiers smoking cannabis. This is one of the reasons why most soldiers who complete their mandatory short service commission with the army in Israel make a beeline for places like Kodaikanal in India as soon as they escape the clutches of the army.
Despite absolutely no evidence that past cannabis usage impairs a soldier in performing his duties in any way, recruiters in most armies reject a candidate on the basis of past cannabis usage. Army Times reports that 'But if that would-be soldier is perhaps a little older, and has grown up in a state like Colorado, California or Massachusetts or another of eight states that have legalized cannabis for recreational use among adults it’s possible that he could have been legally smoking marijuana for several years before deciding to join the military. And if he decides to be truthful with his recruiter, his dreams could be dashed.' This is based on completely unscientific grounds. Marijuana Moment reports that 'Findings from a new government-funded analysis of U.S. Army recruits suggest that past cannabis use has relatively little impact on overall performance. Recruits with documented histories of marijuana use were just as likely as their peers to make sergeant, for example, and while they were more likely to leave the Army over drug use, they were less likely to separate as the result of health or performance concerns. Further, there’s no strong evidence that the continuing trend of legalization across the country has significantly affected recruit outcomes. “Contrary to expectations, waivered recruits and recruits with a documented history of marijuana or behavioral health conditions are not uniformly riskier across all dimensions,” says the analysis, from the RAND Corporation. “In some cases, they are historically more likely to perform better.”' It is the fear that a past user of cannabis is likely to be more independent, and less likely to obey irrational commands, that drives army recruiters to take this stance. On the other hand, the growing proliferation of legal cannabis usage makes it difficult for the army, just like other industries, to find an individual who has not used cannabis in the past. This results in relaxing recruitment rules, or usage while in service, so as to ensure that there is enough human fodder in the armed forces, as we are beginning to see in some places. For example, Leafly reports that 'Israel’s military will be relaxing its disciplinary actions against soldiers accused of consuming cannabis while they are on leave, a general in charge of the reform said Wednesday. Offending soldiers will no longer be systematically court-martialed nor receive prison sentences of up to two months, said reserve Maj. Gen. Danny Efroni, the Israeli Defense Force’s former chief military advocate general, according to Times of Israel.' Why, even the FBI is the US has now relaxed its recruitment policies to permit individuals with a record of past cannabis use into the organization, with an absurd caveat that this should not have been within the past 24 months, or something like that.
It is totally unfair on the soldier to prevent him or her from adopting safe medicine and intoxication. This seems completely illogical when one considers that a healthy and fit soldier is the best asset for a nation's armed forces. Washington Post reports that 'There is no reason why cannabis use, especially for veterans, should continue to be criminalized. Why should veterans be pumped full of opioids that often don’t work, when research indicates cannabis is a viable alternative treatment? Studies show that in states where cannabis is legal, opioid deaths were reduced by more than 20 percent. The majority of participants in one study even indicated they used cannabis as a substitute for other substances, such as alcohol, tobacco and prescription medication.' Maybe this has to do with the fact that the opioid, prescription medicine, alcohol and tobacco industries view the armed forces as one of their primary markets. Nobody questions the budgets - drawn from taxpayers money - allocated to the armed forces in the name of national security. A large part of this budget goes in reimbursing and subsidizing the costs of harmful intoxicants and medicine. It is a win-win situation for both governments and these industries opposed to cannabis. The public and the soldier have no choice but to play along, as these entities fatten themselves while harming the very people that they have appointed to protect the nation.
Cannabis, as one of the best universal medicines, has been used by humans recreationally and socially for hundreds of thousands of years.
Many units of armed forces in the past have used cannabis as their
preferred forms of intoxication. Remember, the word 'assassin' is taken from 'hashishin' who were
essentially an elite group of fighters who imbued vast amounts of hashish (cannabis resin) to become immune to pain, and to become fearsome,
fearless warriors. The Scythian women warriors of legend were known
cannabis users. Surveys of Indian armed units in the
19th century, as a part of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission study of 1894-95, revealed cannabis users spread across regiments all over
the country. Before cannabis was prohibited in 19th century India and Burma - where
prohibition began under the British colonists - it was used by some of
the most elite fighting units in the native Indian army. The Gorkha regiment was known for its use of ganja. The Sikh regiments were known for their use of bhang. The Madras regiments that were posted in Burma were known for their use of ganja. In fact, when cannabis was completely prohibited in Burma, it was the Madras regiments that most often brought ganja into Burma from their native places for their own personal use. I believe that the trigger for cannabis prohibition among the armed forces was the Sepoy Mutiny of 1857 in India. This, according to me, is the first instance of the armed forces anywhere in the world banning cannabis for its personnel. Of course, nowhere in the world was the use of cannabis as extensive as it was in India, and therefore correspondingly among the native Indian armed forces. The decision to ban cannabis among the Indian regiments was driven, according to me, by the use of cannabis by a number of the soldiers who were involved in the Sepoy Mutiny. This cemented the opinion of the army leaders that the use of cannabis made a soldier rebellious, independent and more difficult to control. This was an opinion already widespread among the Indian ruling classes, upper classes and upper castes who were well aware of the extensive usage of cannabis among the working classes, the indigenous communities, the religious mendicants and the poor in the country. One witness to the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission of 1895 specifically states that the lower classes sit around in the evenings at social gatherings, poking fun at the elites and fomenting rebellion against the ruling classes.
Some of the ways in which cannabis prohibition was enforced in the native Indian army were: dismissal of individuals found using cannabis; non-recruitment of individuals from communities with a history of cannabis usage; stopping or reducing pensions for army personnel found using cannabis; spreading the propaganda within the armed forces that a cannabis user was a criminal or a low-caste/low-class person; spreading the usual propaganda that cannabis usage was physically, mentally and morally harmful; encouraging the use of alcohol in place of cannabis; the gradual increase in the cost of cannabis as well as scarcity; spreading the propaganda that a soldier who consumed cannabis was less efficient than one who did not. Some of the the evidence from the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission Report of 1895 given by British commanding officers of Indian regiments, in response to question 25, reveal how ganja was stifled among the Indian native armies. Army witness No. 52 states that 'The use of ganja is daily decreasing. The Chettri caste of Gurkhas, who were the chief consumers, being no longer enlisted.' Army witness No. 101 states that 'In the regiment the use of these drugs is decreasing. Reasons—fear of punishment and loss of one-third of pension, if men have to leave the service on account of use of these drugs.' Army witness No. 115 states that 'There have not been many regular ganja or charas consumers for a long time in the regiment (exceptions see 46). Bhang was formerly taken by a certain number, say 150, in the regiment in the hot weather over ten years ago; but it is a standing order that no drugs are allowed in the lines and as known bhang or charas consumers have been passed over for promotions, there is very little of it now. Those figures refer chiefly to fighting men. It is not so easy to tell what followers do. This refers to all the questions.' Army witness No. 116 states that 'In the battery the use of all the drugs has decreased. The Purbias who chiefly used ganja and charas have diminished in numbers. The Brahmins who were habitual consumers of bhang have left the battery. These were the Havildar Major and some drivers who joined the Burma police. One Mussalman who used to smoke ganja and charas has left it off, because the Panjabi Mussalmans refused to eat with him till he did so.' Army witness No. 119 states that 'On the decrease in the military service; the chief reason being that men cannot keep up to the increased standard of efficiency required, if they indulge in drugs which they know themselves to affect the intellect.' Army witness No. 138 states that 'On the decrease. Due to education and a general moral improvement when subject to military discipline.'Army witness No. 140 states that 'The use of these drugs is on the decrease, because it is being realised that the use of them is inconsistent with the proper discharge of a soldier's duty. Those who are at all given to the habit are gradually leaving the regiment; the men as a body see that they are certain to get into trouble through the habit.' Army witness No. 156 states that 'I am informed that the use of these drugs is decreasing owing to the more ready sale of spirituous liquors now-a-days.' Army witness No. 162 states that 'The use of these drugs is on the decrease in the regiment, owing to the Purbia Rajputs, who are the largest consumers of it, being on the decrease.' Army witness No. 166 states that 'On the decrease. I do not enlist a man given to hemp drugs, and the men are warned that if ganja or bhang is found in their possession, specially when on duty, they would be punished. When I took command of this force, seventeen years ago, I have had to get rid of some men given to ganja and bhang, as they were idle and untidy. I think it is not very safe to entrust fire-arms to men addicted to these drugs, as they easily get excited.' Army witness No. 167 states that 'The use of one or any of these drugs is on the decrease. Any suspected of using these drugs are watched, and those given to them usually commit themselves in a way as to render them liable to severe punishments.' Army witness No. 174 states that 'On the decrease. Because the men given to drugs, viz., the Baluch, have many of them been discharged.' Army witness No. 177 states that 'The use is on the decrease, probably owing to scarcity of money and increased cost of living, also owing to the spread of education.' Army witness No. 179 states that 'The consumption of ganja is on the decrease. Bhang is not much consumed, and charas not at all. The decrease is mainly due to the increased consumption of alcohol.' Army witness No. 180 states that 'On the decrease in the battery, I hope, as if I know of any man who is affected by it or takes these drugs in any excess, I at once discharge him if a syce.' Army witness No. 181 states that 'As far as I can ascertain, it is on the decrease, especially among the higher classes.' Army witness No. 196 states that 'The use of these drugs is on the decrease. Men are better educated now than they were in former days.' Army witness No. 205 states that 'The general opinion of the native officers is that the use of these drugs is on the decrease, as liquor or spirits are now much more readily obtained than formerly.' Army witness No 207 states that 'Decreasing; I believe owing to introduction of cheap liquor from Europe.' Army witness No. 208 states that 'Decreasing. Because facilities for obtaining liquor are increasing, and the latter is preferred where a choice exists.' Army witness No. 212 states that 'On the decrease: most of those men who were in habit of using ganja have left the regiment.' Army witness No. 224 states that 'On the decrease. Neither charas nor bhang is used in the regiment. The use of ganja and allied drugs is prohibited, and any man found smoking such drugs or having them in his possession lays himself open to severe punishment.' Army witness No. 232 states that 'The use of these drugs is on the decrease in this infantry regiment in these days. The reason is that since it has been included in the Imperial Service army, parade duties have become heavier, and the men have generally given up the habit of bhang-drinking accordingly.' Army witness No. 250 states that 'The use of ganja (charas and bhang not being taken) may be said to be rather on decrease than increase. The number of Bhils and Naiks who smoke ganja is very few (22 only), and they are all old soldiers, who have smoked for some time. The enlistment of other classes and castes is now prohibited, and the few Pardesi ganja-smokers who remain (6) will ere long be retired on pension or gratuity (see answer to question No. 20).' Army witness No. 260 states that 'Ganja is not used by any one in this territory. The use of bhang is on the decrease, because the consumers now have recourse to alcoholic stimulants.' Most army witnesses to the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission were, of course, senior British officers in charge of Indian regiments with almost no knowledge of cannabis usage within the country.
Paradoxically, the very same army units that speak about how cannabis is an evil that must be eradicated from the army, also respond largely in favor of the fact that moderate use of cannabis is not just harmless, but also beneficial and medicinal. I believe the dichotomy in the responses - one stating that cannabis should be banned in the army, and the other stating that moderate use is not harmful - stems from the fact that these two responses come from two different sections of the army. The British commanding officers in the army, who answer the questions regarding cannabis policy and usage within the regiments, are very clear that its use must be eradicated, whereas the army medical officers, who answer the questions related to the medical aspects of cannabis, are very clear that moderate usage is not harmful. As examples of the answers given to the questions 41 and 42 asked by the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission to army witnesses - '41. May the moderate use of charas, ganja, or bhang be beneficial in its effects— (a) as a food accessory or digestive; (b) to give staying-power under severe exertion or exposure, or to alleviate fatigue; (c) as a febrifuge or preventive of disease in malarious and unhealthy tracts; (d) in any other way. What classes (if any) use the drug for any of the above purposes, and in what proportion of such classes? Is it the moderate habitual use or moderate occasional use of the drug which you refer to?'; 42. If not beneficial, do you consider the moderate use of any of these drugs to be harmless? Give reasons for your answer', we find that Army witness No. 1 says 'No; but for a person addicted to its use it is necessary that it should not be given up at once; as in that case it will produce uneasiness. Bhang in small quantity is beneficial if not taken habitually. 42. Habitual moderate use is harmless, but when cold is severe, or when one feels costive, charas will do no harm and may do good. It is the habitual excessive use which is to be condemned.' Army witness No. 6 says '41. The moderate smoking of charas, particularly in hill districts, is not injurious, as it cheers and invigorates the system. 42. In moderate use, the effects of indulgence in charas and bhang are at first harmless, and very evanescent, producing slight exhilaration of the spirits, and somewhat pleasing hallucinations; and the after-effects are less unpleasant than those of opium. Any further indulgence, however, would at once produce narcotism. N. B.—Bhang was used by hakims and baids in India for surgical operations before the introduction of chloroform.' Army witness No. 8 says '41. I am not aware of any beneficial results arising from even moderate use of ganja or charas. The moderate use of bhang may be useful as a stimulant in certain cases, just as alcohol is. The most that can be said for it is that used ordinarily in moderate doses it appears to be productive of no harm, and, unlike ganja and charas, does not tend to establish a habit or create a craving. 42. Moderate use of bhang innocuous. Moderate use of ganja and charas is almost impossible. The tendency is almost inevitably to excess, and excess spells ruin, physical, mental and moral.' Army witness No. 13 says '41. In moderation ganja and bhang are considered to be beneficial; the former is said to be particularly good in its effect in cases of rheumatism. 42. Said by the consumers to be perfectly harmless.' Army witness No. 17 says '41. The moderate use of ganja and charas is said to put warmth into the body for a short time, while the moderate use of bhang mixed with mint leaves or aniseed is generally considered beneficial in its effects, especially during the summer months. 42. They are considered beneficial for reasons stated in answer to question 41.' Army witness No. 19 says '41. It is beneficial apparently as a stimulant in cold climates, but I do not think it does any real good. It is not used in fevers, but will enable a man to bear up under excessive temporary fatigue, such as a forced march. 42. The general opinion is that an abstainer is better than a ganjeri. A healthy man should not require a sedative.' Army witness No. 27 says '41. Moderate use of bhang and ganja assists digestion, and the effects of bad water and air are not so felt, and it allures hunger for a time. Even the moderate use of charas is not beneficial. 42. Except bhang, the other forms of this drug are harmful.' Army witness No. 33 says '41. Bhang is most used in hot climates, charas and ganja in cold. Troops of this presidency use the latter in Afghanistan in the winter. Vide reply to 44. 42. Quite harmless when taken in moderation. They never lead to disturbances.' Army witness No 41 says '41. The moderate use of the charas ration once a day is held by the men to be an antifebrine. 42. If strictly in moderation, and in regard to the men who take it, I am inclined to believe the use of these drugs would not be attended with any harm.' Army witness No. 44 says '41. No, not as a rule, unless taken after violent exercise, a long or cold march, etc. 42. I think it would be better if they were not taken at all. If once taken to it becomes a regular habit, and would in the end probably act injuriously. Sikhs drink a little bhang after a long march, etc., and are benefited by it temporarily.' Army witness No. 47 says '41. As before stated, the use of ganja and charas are looked on as baneful, but bhang is regarded as beneficial in the hot weather, when it is principally used. 42. I am unable to say of my own knowledge. I have seen cases of sepoys invalided on account of excessive indulgence in drugs, but am unable to say whether the drugs were opium, charas, ganja or bhang. The Jats and Sikhs, who principally consume bhang, are as fine men as are to be found in the native army. It seems therefore reasonable to suppose that the moderate use of bhang at any rate is harmless.' Army witness No. 50 says '41. The men who take it state that they find it beneficial. 42. I should say it was harmless in moderation, as all these men carry out their duties in a satisfactory manner. The only combatant who smokes it is a Naik; he is superior in intelligence, etc., to the other combatants.' Army witness No. 53 says '41. I believe charas and ganja-smoking cannot be otherwise than injurious, even in moderation. The moderate use of bhang is quite harmless, and I believe acts as a stimulant to digestion. I once lived for six months with a Hindu gentleman, a Brahman. He and his friend and attendants used bhang moderately. He was a great shikari and a man of great activity and acute intellect. He told me he had taken bhang for several years and that it did no harm as whiskey did; that its use produced no illeffects on either him or his friends, and from personal observations I have arrived at the same conclusion. 42. Answered in reply to question 41.' Army witness No. 55 says '41. The moderate use of the drug is known to have a beneficial effect generally, having a quieting effect on the brain, increases the appetite, soothes pain, and causes sleep. 42. In moderate use, is considered not only harmless but beneficial. Moderate use is understood to render men less irritable, acts as a mental and physical stimulant and refreshes a tired man. Smoking ganja and afterwards drinking water is said to allay hunger.' Army witness No. 67 says '41. The moderate use of bhang is said to help digestion and promote appetite, and I can quite understand it having this good effect. Ganja-smokers also attribute the same good effects to their way of using the drug; but this is very doubtful, I should think. The use of these drugs is also said to destroy or lessen the injurious effects of drinking impure water. 42. The moderate use of bhang and ganja I consider to be quite harmless, and my reason for thinking so is that those who use them so are just as healthy as those who do not.' Army witness No. 68 says '41. Natives consider that smoking ganja is a preventive of disease caused through drinking bad water, though I cannot say if such is really the case. 42. The moderate use of smoking does not seem to affect the efficiency of the men, and if anything there is less sickness amongst consumers. If, however, the smoker cannot procure the drug for even one day he becomes absolutely incapable and does not seem to know what he is doing, nor is he capable of any work until he has obtained the drug again. The moderate use of bhang I believe to be quite harmless.' Army witness No. 80 says '41. The moderate use of bhang is said to render hard work easier, to aid digestion and increase appetite for food, especially for old men. There are numbers of men who state they have used it all their lives and have felt always better from it. Ganja is said, when smoked in moderation, to be beneficial in relieving cold and rheumatism. 42. The smoking of ganja and charas is said to cause irritation of the bronchial tubes and give aid to liability to bronchitis and coughs.' Army witness No. 81 says '41. Yes. (1) It improves the appetite. (2) Produces an agreeable exhilaration, with increased intellectual and motor activity. (3) Gives increased willingness for work. (4) Removes feeling of lassitude and fatigue and diminishes in this way risk of malarial infections. 42. See replies to query 41.' Army witness No. 83 says '41. The moderate use of these drugs is considered beneficial in the prevention of malaria and disease. It also acts as a stimulant in the absence of food. Smoking charas and ganja is also considered to render the body less liable to the influence of cold. 42. The moderate use of these drugs I consider to be harmless. It is thus used by about 20 per cent. of my regiment, and its use does not appear to militate against them in any way either physically or mentally.' Army witness No. 102 says '41. I think so. In hot weather',bhang-drinking is said to keep off thirst, and in the cold weather charas-smoking is said to keep out the cold.' Army witness No. 116 says '41. It is apparently considered that in cold weather the moderate use of ganja and bhang promotes the warmth of the body and creates an appetite. To the habitual consumer it is beneficial, as to be without it makes him uneasy, irritable, disinclined to work and wanting in appetite. The moderate use of bhang has a cooling effect in the hot weather; a regular consumer of bhang is said to be comparatively free from the diarrhœa and slight dysentery which non-consumers amongst natives are so liable to on the march or in a new station from drinking water with properties they are not accustomed to. 42. The moderate consumption of charas and ganja by discreet habitual consumers is considered harmless; it apparently has no harmful effect on their health or disposition. The use of bhang is not considered harmless; it is said to dull the intellect of habitual consumers; to non-habituès it causes intoxication and renders them unfit and disinclined for exertion. Habitual consumers are considered liable to vary the doses, and sometimes take it in excess; if deprived of it, their health suffers and they become unfit for exertion.' Army witness No. 137 says '41. The moderate use of bhang is said to increase appetite. No doubt these drugs have their medicinal and legitimate uses. Indian hemp is of great value in cases of obstinate malarial fever, though not usually prescribed by English physicians. As a form of indulgence, however, native opinion, so far as I know it, regards the use of these drugs as deleterious morally, and ultimately physically also. 42. Strictly moderate use may be harmless as regards constitutional effects. I have no instance of incapacity for service produced by moderate use.' Army witness No. 185 states that '41. I consider that the moderate use of either preparation may be beneficial in its effects, and undoubtedly is of great value to the indigent labourer, enabling him to perform more laborious duties than he could otherwise do on his scanty allowance of food, acting as it does as a nerve tonic and stimulant, enabling him to sustain fatigue till the end of the day, when he can obtain rest. That this actually is the case, I can assert from knowledge. 42. I have already stated that under the ordinary conditions of life of the poor cooly the moderate use is beneficial, for the reasons already stated.' Army witness No. 195 says '41. Yes. 42. Yes. Their physiological action being soporific, anodyne, antispasmodic, and nervine stimulant, they are useful for the relief of painful affections.' Army witness No. 203 states that '41. I believe it to be so, and that by their use men are enabled to withstand fatigue, hunger and exposure better than others not so fortified. 42. I have seen a great many habitual moderate consumers, they appeared well, and the Medical Officer reports that within his experience they nearly always had sound constitutions.' Army witness No. 219 says '41. A little ganja or bhang taken with bread is the same as vegetables with meat, and is therefore used by poorer classes to make inferior food more palatable, and taken in this way it is beneficial. Bhang and ganja are both beneficial when a man is tired. 42. Moderate use of ganja and bhang is both beneficial and harmless.' Army witness No. 241 says '41. During summer the moderate use of bhang containing milk, sugar, &c., has a cooling effect. It also sharpens the appetite of the consumer. The use of ganja in snowy countries protects the consumer from cold, otherwise its use is not beneficial. 42. The beneficial qualities of the drugs have been stated in the preceding answer. Regarding their bad results, I may say that the consumer of bhang can pull on without taking the drug if he is in poverty and has no money to purchase the bhang with, but the consumer of ganja feels serious privation if he cannot get the drug to satisfy his craving.' Army witness No. 260 says '41. The use of charas alleviates fatigue caused by hard work or journey. The moderate consumption of bhang creates appetite and exhilaration. Excessive use of both the drugs is harmful. 42. See the preceding answer.'
It is quite evident from the above answers from the Indian army to questions 41 and 42 posed by the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission that the army medical officers (almost all British) who provided the answers were themselves largely ignorant of the use of cannabis and its effects. They appear to have received their inputs from those with whom they associated - largely members of the Indian upper classes and upper castes. This is clearly evident from the lack of knowledge that bhang, ganja and charas are essentially the leaves, flowers and resin of the cannabis plant, and that all three contain the same phytocannabinoids. This was an ignorance quite widespread among India's ruling and upper classes, and upper castes as well. To say that bhang is largely beneficial, but ganja and charas is harmful appears to stem from the fact that bhang was drunk (mostly by the elites), while ganja and charas were smoked (mostly by the working classes and the poor). The fact that a bhang drinker consumed larger quantities of the plant in a beverage form, as compared to a ganja or charas smoker, thus ultimately ingesting the same amount of phytocannabinoids as the ganja or charas smoker, appears to have completely eluded the army medical officers, just like it eluded the Indian elites. Also the rationale that moderate use is harmless while excess use is harmful comes from the basic meaning implied by the words themselves - 'moderate' and 'excessive'. Many seem to consider the tendency to move from moderate to excessive use as the great harm associated with cannabis. As we saw in the amounts consumed across Indian society in the 19th century, both moderate and excessive use were relative terms, with different people considering different amounts of usage as moderate or excessive. It was widely acknowledged that the religious mendicants were excessive users, but they appeared to be in excellent physical and mental health despite the adverse conditions in which they lived. Of course, if you considered that usage of large quantities of cannabis would make a soldier give up his profession and become a religious mendicant, then this can definitely be termed 'harmful' in the context of the army, as the last thing that the elites wanted would be their soldiers abandoning their roles as killers and protectors of the elites, and pursuing spiritual paths of peace and renunciation. Speaking about the loss of desire to kill another man, and the desire to turn spiritual, Army witness No. 14 says '41. The men who consume the drug say that the moderate use of charas or bhang is beneficial, inasmuch as it increases the appetite and takes away the feeling of fatigue, and that bhang is also cooling and refreshing in the hot weather. Ganja does not appear to be consumed by any one in this regiment. 42. Moderate use is harmless, but there is danger of the amount of the drug consumed being gradually increased till the consumption is immoderate. Such immoderate consumers often become "fakirs."' Even the widespread assumption that moderate use eventually leads to excess was refuted by the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission's findings, when it stated that a large majority of cannabis users were moderate users, with only a small percentage being excessive users. These excessive users, according to the Commission, belonged either to the religious mendicants or the dissipated members of society who generally had the tendency to abuse anything, be it alcohol or cannabis. Even in this instance of dissipated excessive cannabis users, it should be noted that nobody died or were severely injured through excess cannabis use, unlike alcohol. The Hemp Commission summarizes moderate and excessive cannabis use, in its report, as follows - 'Moderation and excess. 480. It is a general belief that there is a tendency for the moderate habit to develop into the excessive. This belief is based on the general view that such a tendency must exist more or less in the case of all intoxicants, on the fact that as the system becomes accustomed to the use of a drug a larger dose appears to be required to produce the same effect, and on the undoubted fact that there are some excessive consumers who had begun and continued for some time the use of these drugs in moderation. It is, however, a matter of ordinary experience that in the case of a moderate consumer of alcohol, for example, who is in normal health, the effect which he wishes to produce by his moderate use is regularly produced by the same dose without any necessity for increasing it. And the fact that there is comparatively so little of excess in the use of hemp drugs, and that so many consumers, especially of bhang among the middle classes and of ganja among working people, retain their moderate habit and regularly have their accustomed dose twice or thrice a day, seems to show that this tendency is certainly not stronger in their case. While individual differences in strength of mind must always lead to difference in results, and hereditary mental instability is in certain cases a factor which must not be overlooked, the fact seems generally to be that excess is found (as in the case of alcohol) to be mainly confined to idle and dissipated persons, and to be often due to the force of example and foolish emulation in bad company. The man who takes these drugs regularly as a food accessory, or as a stimulant in hard work, does not seem to be prone to excess. Apparently also the tendency is much less towards that occasional excess which in the case of alcohol so frequently becomes habitual. The working man, for example, does not seem to have the same temptation to a debauch with ganja as with alcohol.' Also, many witnesses claim that cannabis deprivation causes great suffering to the regular user, which is also false, as the findings of the Hemp Commission state. The Commission states that a regular cannabis user feels uneasy for some time on being deprived of his drug, but this is in no way life threatening as is the case with alcohol and opium. The uneasiness felt by an user deprived of cannabis is, according to me, comparable to the uneasiness felt by a regular drinker of tea or coffee who finds his or her beverage unavailable. The eminent 19th century British physician William O'Shaugnessy states that "As to the evil sequelæ so unanimously dwelt on by all writers, these did not appear to us so numerous, so immediate, or so formidable as many which may be clearly traced to over-indulgence in other powerful stimulants or narcotics, viz., alcohol, opium, or tobacco." Surgeon-Lieutenant-Colonel Crombie, appearing before the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission states that "I believe that the habit of using ganja moderately is absolutely harmless; but I think even the moderate use of alcohol is liable to produce tissue changes in the long run. Further, I here refer entirely to the native community; and it is my observation that when a native takes to alcohol, it is extremely difficult for him to remain moderate; and in life assurance work, of which I have a good deal, I always advise an extra premium in the case of any native who indulges in alcohol even in the most moderate way, and utterly refuse to accept a native life if there is evidence of the consumption of alcohol to any considerable extent which would still be considered moderate in the case of Europeans. My experience leads me to hold the same views of the effects of alcohol on the lower classes. A native who takes to liquor is lost. As regards the excessive use, I would still place alcohol first. I regard it as most deleterious." In summarizing moderate and excessive usage, the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission states that 'And the fact that there is comparatively so little of excess in the use of hemp drugs, and that so many consumers, especially of bhang among the middle classes and of ganja among working people, retain their moderate habit and regularly have their accustomed dose twice or thrice a day, seems to show that this tendency is certainly not stronger in their case. While individual differences in strength of mind must always lead to difference in results, and hereditary mental instability is in certain cases a factor which must not be overlooked, the fact seems generally to be that excess is found (as in the case of alcohol) to be mainly confined to idle and dissipated persons, and to be often due to the force of example and foolish emulation in bad company. The man who takes these drugs regularly as a food accessory, or as a stimulant in hard work, does not seem to be prone to excess. Apparently also the tendency is much less towards that occasional excess which in the case of alcohol so frequently becomes habitual. The working man, for example, does not seem to have the same temptation to a debauch with ganja as with alcohol.'
In summarizing the usage of cannabis among the Indian armed forces, the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission of 1894-95 states that: 'Armed Forces. Real extent of the use of the hemp drugs not ascertained. 409. The inquiries made in the army have elicited replies from 274 Army regiments, batteries of artillery, and special corps in the service of the British Government and Natives States. If commanding officers had found it possible to take an accurate and complete census of the consumers of the hemp drugs among the sepoys and other natives attached to their corps, the result would have been of the greatest service in determining the extent to which the hemp drugs are used among the various races and castes and the population generally. But the cases are few in which the inquiry has elicited information on the point which has the appearance of being complete. It would therefore be misleading to compile and tabulate the results in statistical form. Several enquiring officers report that their men will not admit the use of the hemp drugs, though it is certain that they are taken to some extent. And in many cases there are special reasons for this reticence in addition to the disrepute attaching to the habit in native society generally. In some regiments the use of the drugs is directly prohibited, and in others the commanding officers, though they may not have gone this length, regard the consumers with distrust. It must be the case also that in some regiments the consumers are held in greater disrepute among their comrades than in others. In many it is apparent that the inquiry was distasteful to the men, and in some that the commanding officers were not very insistent in pressing it. Keeping in view these reasons for distrusting the figures, it will not be prudent to do more than indicate a few general features of the hemp drug habit as it prevails in the native armies; Armed Forces. Extent of use reported. 410. There are regiments in all three presidencies and in the Native States in which the hemp drugs in one form or other are shown to be used by 5 per cent. of the men and followers. Forty-nine out of the 274 corps come under this category, and the number evidently falls far short of the truth. In some corps the number of consumers is far higher than 5 per cent. In some corps the use, if the reports are to be taken literally, does not exist, or is quite infinitesimal, or is practically confined to the followers. The consumption in these corps is no doubt trifling in most cases, but it is difficult to accept it as fact as regards any regiment that the drugs are not used at all, especially in regiments of Sikhs, who are extremely partial to bhang; Armed Forces. Little evidence of excessive use. 411. As regards the character of the habit, the smokers are for the most part regular smokers, and the drinkers indulge occasionally, and principally in the hot weather. In these respects the habit resembles that of the civil population. It is natural that excess should be comparatively uncommon in bodies of men living under strict discipline. It has been found that even in the police, where the men have more personal liberty, the use of hemp rarely obtrudes itself; Armed Forces. Use of the different drugs. 412. The habit of drinking bhang is more prevalent in the corps serving in the north-western part of India, but it cannot be said that smoking is more common in one part than another. Charas is preferred in the comparatively small tract where it is cheap and easily procurable, and ganja is used elsewhere. Smoking is regarded as a protection against cold, and bhang drinking as a relief under the distress of very hot weather. The habit, therefore, varies according as regiments experience different conditions of climate, and it would seem that on service the number of smokers increases. The preparation of the drink, however, takes time, and requires certain ingredients which on service may not be obtainable. It is doubtful, therefore, if bhang drinking increases on service as smoking does, but the practice of chewing or eating the drug in a simpler form may very well take its place; Armed Forces. Use among principal castes of sepoys. 413. The Sikhs drink bhang and do not smoke; but it is reported of more than one Sikh regiment that the men do not use any of the drugs. In one regiment they have given up bhang for the good rum which the canteen supplies. The Gurkhas also prefer liquor, and rarely use the hemp drugs. The habit would seem to be more prevalent in the Gurkha regiments serving in Assam than elsewhere, but uncommon even there. The Rajputs and Purbhias seem to be more given to the drugs than other castes. There is some strictness among the Muhammadans in some of the regiments of the north of India in regard to both smoking and drinking of hemp; but in Madras they appear to have the full proportion of smokers among them; Armed Forces. Evidence indicates decrease of use in the army. 414. The very great majority of the replies state that the use of the drugs is decreasing, and among the 38 which take the opposite view, 13 do not refer to the troops, but to the civil population. Some replies also are not very definite. There are hardly more than 20 out of the 274 which can be said to be evidence on the side of increase. The actual facts on which increase is alleged are not often stated, but the commandant of a Bengal Cavalry regiment finds that 25 years ago not a man in the regiment used the drugs, while now some do, especially among the later enlisted men. The causes of increase, when they are stated, which is very rarely, are the cheapness of the drugs as compared with liquor, the speedy action and convenient form of charas, and the religious objection to the use of liquor. On the other hand, there is a strong body of evidence on the side of decrease. The cause which appears most prominently in the replies is the greater demand which service makes in these days on the time and intelligence of the sepoy. He cannot spare the time to indulge in the drugs, which involves the laborious preparation of bhang as drink, and the period of listlessness and incapacity which follows an ill-regulated dose either as drink or smoke. And he is said to be conscious that the habit renders a man less fit for the things he has to do and learn. In many regiments the prohibition is credited with having had a decided effect in reducing the practice. In some it is said that the older men, who have the habit, are retiring, and making room for young men, who, entering the more intellectual school of soldiering, do not readily acquire it. This is in direct contrast with the evidence from a Bengal Cavalry regiment quoted above, and it is for this reason the quotation was made. Both opinions are apparently based on observation, and that in favour of decrease has a great number of adherents, while the officer who holds the other stands almost alone. The point is of general interest as touching on the quality of the modern recruit apart from the hemp question. The rise in the price of drugs is alleged in some quarters as a cause of decrease, and in others the cheapness of liquor. It is probable that liquor is competing with drugs in the army as it is doing among the better classes of the civil population.'
It is quite evident from the above answers from the Indian army to questions 41 and 42 posed by the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission that the army medical officers (almost all British) who provided the answers were themselves largely ignorant of the use of cannabis and its effects. They appear to have received their inputs from those with whom they associated - largely members of the Indian upper classes and upper castes. This is clearly evident from the lack of knowledge that bhang, ganja and charas are essentially the leaves, flowers and resin of the cannabis plant, and that all three contain the same phytocannabinoids. This was an ignorance quite widespread among India's ruling and upper classes, and upper castes as well. To say that bhang is largely beneficial, but ganja and charas is harmful appears to stem from the fact that bhang was drunk (mostly by the elites), while ganja and charas were smoked (mostly by the working classes and the poor). The fact that a bhang drinker consumed larger quantities of the plant in a beverage form, as compared to a ganja or charas smoker, thus ultimately ingesting the same amount of phytocannabinoids as the ganja or charas smoker, appears to have completely eluded the army medical officers, just like it eluded the Indian elites. Also the rationale that moderate use is harmless while excess use is harmful comes from the basic meaning implied by the words themselves - 'moderate' and 'excessive'. Many seem to consider the tendency to move from moderate to excessive use as the great harm associated with cannabis. As we saw in the amounts consumed across Indian society in the 19th century, both moderate and excessive use were relative terms, with different people considering different amounts of usage as moderate or excessive. It was widely acknowledged that the religious mendicants were excessive users, but they appeared to be in excellent physical and mental health despite the adverse conditions in which they lived. Of course, if you considered that usage of large quantities of cannabis would make a soldier give up his profession and become a religious mendicant, then this can definitely be termed 'harmful' in the context of the army, as the last thing that the elites wanted would be their soldiers abandoning their roles as killers and protectors of the elites, and pursuing spiritual paths of peace and renunciation. Speaking about the loss of desire to kill another man, and the desire to turn spiritual, Army witness No. 14 says '41. The men who consume the drug say that the moderate use of charas or bhang is beneficial, inasmuch as it increases the appetite and takes away the feeling of fatigue, and that bhang is also cooling and refreshing in the hot weather. Ganja does not appear to be consumed by any one in this regiment. 42. Moderate use is harmless, but there is danger of the amount of the drug consumed being gradually increased till the consumption is immoderate. Such immoderate consumers often become "fakirs."' Even the widespread assumption that moderate use eventually leads to excess was refuted by the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission's findings, when it stated that a large majority of cannabis users were moderate users, with only a small percentage being excessive users. These excessive users, according to the Commission, belonged either to the religious mendicants or the dissipated members of society who generally had the tendency to abuse anything, be it alcohol or cannabis. Even in this instance of dissipated excessive cannabis users, it should be noted that nobody died or were severely injured through excess cannabis use, unlike alcohol. The Hemp Commission summarizes moderate and excessive cannabis use, in its report, as follows - 'Moderation and excess. 480. It is a general belief that there is a tendency for the moderate habit to develop into the excessive. This belief is based on the general view that such a tendency must exist more or less in the case of all intoxicants, on the fact that as the system becomes accustomed to the use of a drug a larger dose appears to be required to produce the same effect, and on the undoubted fact that there are some excessive consumers who had begun and continued for some time the use of these drugs in moderation. It is, however, a matter of ordinary experience that in the case of a moderate consumer of alcohol, for example, who is in normal health, the effect which he wishes to produce by his moderate use is regularly produced by the same dose without any necessity for increasing it. And the fact that there is comparatively so little of excess in the use of hemp drugs, and that so many consumers, especially of bhang among the middle classes and of ganja among working people, retain their moderate habit and regularly have their accustomed dose twice or thrice a day, seems to show that this tendency is certainly not stronger in their case. While individual differences in strength of mind must always lead to difference in results, and hereditary mental instability is in certain cases a factor which must not be overlooked, the fact seems generally to be that excess is found (as in the case of alcohol) to be mainly confined to idle and dissipated persons, and to be often due to the force of example and foolish emulation in bad company. The man who takes these drugs regularly as a food accessory, or as a stimulant in hard work, does not seem to be prone to excess. Apparently also the tendency is much less towards that occasional excess which in the case of alcohol so frequently becomes habitual. The working man, for example, does not seem to have the same temptation to a debauch with ganja as with alcohol.' Also, many witnesses claim that cannabis deprivation causes great suffering to the regular user, which is also false, as the findings of the Hemp Commission state. The Commission states that a regular cannabis user feels uneasy for some time on being deprived of his drug, but this is in no way life threatening as is the case with alcohol and opium. The uneasiness felt by an user deprived of cannabis is, according to me, comparable to the uneasiness felt by a regular drinker of tea or coffee who finds his or her beverage unavailable. The eminent 19th century British physician William O'Shaugnessy states that "As to the evil sequelæ so unanimously dwelt on by all writers, these did not appear to us so numerous, so immediate, or so formidable as many which may be clearly traced to over-indulgence in other powerful stimulants or narcotics, viz., alcohol, opium, or tobacco." Surgeon-Lieutenant-Colonel Crombie, appearing before the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission states that "I believe that the habit of using ganja moderately is absolutely harmless; but I think even the moderate use of alcohol is liable to produce tissue changes in the long run. Further, I here refer entirely to the native community; and it is my observation that when a native takes to alcohol, it is extremely difficult for him to remain moderate; and in life assurance work, of which I have a good deal, I always advise an extra premium in the case of any native who indulges in alcohol even in the most moderate way, and utterly refuse to accept a native life if there is evidence of the consumption of alcohol to any considerable extent which would still be considered moderate in the case of Europeans. My experience leads me to hold the same views of the effects of alcohol on the lower classes. A native who takes to liquor is lost. As regards the excessive use, I would still place alcohol first. I regard it as most deleterious." In summarizing moderate and excessive usage, the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission states that 'And the fact that there is comparatively so little of excess in the use of hemp drugs, and that so many consumers, especially of bhang among the middle classes and of ganja among working people, retain their moderate habit and regularly have their accustomed dose twice or thrice a day, seems to show that this tendency is certainly not stronger in their case. While individual differences in strength of mind must always lead to difference in results, and hereditary mental instability is in certain cases a factor which must not be overlooked, the fact seems generally to be that excess is found (as in the case of alcohol) to be mainly confined to idle and dissipated persons, and to be often due to the force of example and foolish emulation in bad company. The man who takes these drugs regularly as a food accessory, or as a stimulant in hard work, does not seem to be prone to excess. Apparently also the tendency is much less towards that occasional excess which in the case of alcohol so frequently becomes habitual. The working man, for example, does not seem to have the same temptation to a debauch with ganja as with alcohol.'
In summarizing the usage of cannabis among the Indian armed forces, the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission of 1894-95 states that: 'Armed Forces. Real extent of the use of the hemp drugs not ascertained. 409. The inquiries made in the army have elicited replies from 274 Army regiments, batteries of artillery, and special corps in the service of the British Government and Natives States. If commanding officers had found it possible to take an accurate and complete census of the consumers of the hemp drugs among the sepoys and other natives attached to their corps, the result would have been of the greatest service in determining the extent to which the hemp drugs are used among the various races and castes and the population generally. But the cases are few in which the inquiry has elicited information on the point which has the appearance of being complete. It would therefore be misleading to compile and tabulate the results in statistical form. Several enquiring officers report that their men will not admit the use of the hemp drugs, though it is certain that they are taken to some extent. And in many cases there are special reasons for this reticence in addition to the disrepute attaching to the habit in native society generally. In some regiments the use of the drugs is directly prohibited, and in others the commanding officers, though they may not have gone this length, regard the consumers with distrust. It must be the case also that in some regiments the consumers are held in greater disrepute among their comrades than in others. In many it is apparent that the inquiry was distasteful to the men, and in some that the commanding officers were not very insistent in pressing it. Keeping in view these reasons for distrusting the figures, it will not be prudent to do more than indicate a few general features of the hemp drug habit as it prevails in the native armies; Armed Forces. Extent of use reported. 410. There are regiments in all three presidencies and in the Native States in which the hemp drugs in one form or other are shown to be used by 5 per cent. of the men and followers. Forty-nine out of the 274 corps come under this category, and the number evidently falls far short of the truth. In some corps the number of consumers is far higher than 5 per cent. In some corps the use, if the reports are to be taken literally, does not exist, or is quite infinitesimal, or is practically confined to the followers. The consumption in these corps is no doubt trifling in most cases, but it is difficult to accept it as fact as regards any regiment that the drugs are not used at all, especially in regiments of Sikhs, who are extremely partial to bhang; Armed Forces. Little evidence of excessive use. 411. As regards the character of the habit, the smokers are for the most part regular smokers, and the drinkers indulge occasionally, and principally in the hot weather. In these respects the habit resembles that of the civil population. It is natural that excess should be comparatively uncommon in bodies of men living under strict discipline. It has been found that even in the police, where the men have more personal liberty, the use of hemp rarely obtrudes itself; Armed Forces. Use of the different drugs. 412. The habit of drinking bhang is more prevalent in the corps serving in the north-western part of India, but it cannot be said that smoking is more common in one part than another. Charas is preferred in the comparatively small tract where it is cheap and easily procurable, and ganja is used elsewhere. Smoking is regarded as a protection against cold, and bhang drinking as a relief under the distress of very hot weather. The habit, therefore, varies according as regiments experience different conditions of climate, and it would seem that on service the number of smokers increases. The preparation of the drink, however, takes time, and requires certain ingredients which on service may not be obtainable. It is doubtful, therefore, if bhang drinking increases on service as smoking does, but the practice of chewing or eating the drug in a simpler form may very well take its place; Armed Forces. Use among principal castes of sepoys. 413. The Sikhs drink bhang and do not smoke; but it is reported of more than one Sikh regiment that the men do not use any of the drugs. In one regiment they have given up bhang for the good rum which the canteen supplies. The Gurkhas also prefer liquor, and rarely use the hemp drugs. The habit would seem to be more prevalent in the Gurkha regiments serving in Assam than elsewhere, but uncommon even there. The Rajputs and Purbhias seem to be more given to the drugs than other castes. There is some strictness among the Muhammadans in some of the regiments of the north of India in regard to both smoking and drinking of hemp; but in Madras they appear to have the full proportion of smokers among them; Armed Forces. Evidence indicates decrease of use in the army. 414. The very great majority of the replies state that the use of the drugs is decreasing, and among the 38 which take the opposite view, 13 do not refer to the troops, but to the civil population. Some replies also are not very definite. There are hardly more than 20 out of the 274 which can be said to be evidence on the side of increase. The actual facts on which increase is alleged are not often stated, but the commandant of a Bengal Cavalry regiment finds that 25 years ago not a man in the regiment used the drugs, while now some do, especially among the later enlisted men. The causes of increase, when they are stated, which is very rarely, are the cheapness of the drugs as compared with liquor, the speedy action and convenient form of charas, and the religious objection to the use of liquor. On the other hand, there is a strong body of evidence on the side of decrease. The cause which appears most prominently in the replies is the greater demand which service makes in these days on the time and intelligence of the sepoy. He cannot spare the time to indulge in the drugs, which involves the laborious preparation of bhang as drink, and the period of listlessness and incapacity which follows an ill-regulated dose either as drink or smoke. And he is said to be conscious that the habit renders a man less fit for the things he has to do and learn. In many regiments the prohibition is credited with having had a decided effect in reducing the practice. In some it is said that the older men, who have the habit, are retiring, and making room for young men, who, entering the more intellectual school of soldiering, do not readily acquire it. This is in direct contrast with the evidence from a Bengal Cavalry regiment quoted above, and it is for this reason the quotation was made. Both opinions are apparently based on observation, and that in favour of decrease has a great number of adherents, while the officer who holds the other stands almost alone. The point is of general interest as touching on the quality of the modern recruit apart from the hemp question. The rise in the price of drugs is alleged in some quarters as a cause of decrease, and in others the cheapness of liquor. It is probable that liquor is competing with drugs in the army as it is doing among the better classes of the civil population.'
Today, the centuries-old anti-cannabis propaganda has however not stopped armed forces veterans from exercising their discretion to address their medical problems, especially in places that are relaxing cannabis related laws. NORML reports that 'A team of researchers affiliated with the University of California at San Diego reviewed marijuana use patterns among a nationally representative sample of over 4,000 US veterans. Of the sample, 12 percent acknowledged having consumed cannabis within the past six-months – up from nine percent in 2014 (the last time researchers surveyed the issue). Those with psychiatric conditions were most likely to report using cannabis – a finding that is consistent with other surveys of veterans.' In Canada, the legalization of adult recreational use of cannabis has vastly benefited army veterans, enabling them to manage their medical bills and get out of dependency to expensive, addictive, dangerous synthetic pharmaceuticals, opioids and alcohol. MJBizDaily reports that 'To put that into global perspective, Veterans Affairs Canada’s fiscal year spending on medical marijuana exceeded Australia’s medical marijuana market in 2020, which was estimated to be worth approximately CA$100 million. And the 14,463 kilograms (31,885 pounds) of cannabis reimbursed by Veterans Affairs Canada in 2020 was ahead of the European Union’s legal flower market that year, which dispensed approximately 10,000 kilograms. That points to how small some of the largest medical cannabis markets outside North America remain, and how much room there is for growth. Medical cannabis uptake by Canadian veterans comes as overall spending in Canada on the medicine has largely stagnated in recent years. Veterans account for about a quarter of Canada’s medical marijuana market by spending.' If cannabis is permitted within the armed forces, the industries opposed
to cannabis are likely to lose one of their biggest markets. This is
clearly evident in Canada where legalized cannabis for adult use is
available to army veterans as well since 2018. Saltwire reports that 'The
Department of Veterans Affairs [Canada] spent $77,794,212.57 last year
on marijuana. That is more than the department spent ($66.2 million) on
the 12,000 other drugs approved to be prescribed for veterans.' That
is 12,000 different synthetic pharmaceutical drugs which the veterans
would have been forced to consume if cannabis was not made available to
them. I am sure that the availability of cannabis would have made
similar dents to the alcohol, tobacco and illegal drug consumption by
these veterans who switched to the safe intoxicant and medicine. It is
no wonder then that the armed forces are among the strongest opponents
to cannabis legalization. In places where cannabis has been legalized
for medical or recreational use, the armed forces remain cannabis free
as great effort is taken to ensure that it remains so.
The making of cannabis available to armed forces personnel would provide them with a way to avoid the dangers of prescription drugs, harmful chemical drugs, heroin, methamphetamine and alcohol. It would also help them handle stress, anxiety, insomnia and chronic pain as well as diseases like cancer, diabetes, obesity, liver diseases and mental health issues besides keeping them alert, calm and healthy. Cannabis is gaining in popularity as skin medicine due to its ability to heal wounds and its anti-microbial properties. One of the prime medical conditions that cannabis is being used for in places where medical cannabis is legal is for the treatment of post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and the repression of fear and traumatic memories. Pain management is the leading condition that medical cannabis users use the plant for. There is more than ample evidence that cannabis helps armed forces veterans. NORML reports that 'Authors
concluded: “The present study contributes needed evidence about motives
for and health outcomes of cannabis use by older veterans which may
differ from younger veterans. … Veterans reported positive effects of
cannabis use for their pain, sleep quality, health conditions, and QOL
(quality of life). … Our results may help clinicians to consider [the]
motives behind cannabis use by veterans and engage more with veterans
about alternative ways to treat their conditions.”' This should be
quite obvious, since an armed forces personnel is a human being after
all, and anything that is beneficial to a civilian will be as beneficial
to an armed forces person. With 38 US states having legalized cannabis
for medical use, and many cities relaxing workplace policies that permit
cannabis use during non-work hours, the armed forces continues to exist
in a bubble of tight control and oppression.
Once the soldier has been used and finished serving the purpose, the
soldier is discarded - especially if the are maimed or disabled - as
they serve no further purpose for the state.Veterans - who are retired armed forces personnel or those discharged due
to injuries - face an increasing number of health conditions including arthritis, dementia, Parkinson's that they must suffer as they age. World wide, the elderly
are the fastest growing age group that is embracing cannabis for
medical and recreational purposes, having had enough of conventional
pharmaceutical medication and alcohol. Yet world wide, armed forces
veterans are not provided access to cannabis and are forced to rely on the black market in
places where it is available. Various veteran associations in the US
have been trying to make cannabis available for veterans for the
treatment of PTSD, anxiety, pain, depression and cancer but are still unsuccessful as the US federal government
remains opposed to cannabis legalization even as 47 odd US states have
legalized in some form or the other. The story is much worse world wide
where even civilian use of cannabis is prohibited, let alone for armed
forces personnel, active or retired.
Some of the largest veterans organizations in the US have been demanding access to cannabis for many years now, as a part of the medicines prescribed to them for which medical reimbursement is available. The Cannabist reports that 'The American Legion, the nation’s largest veterans organization, has been one of the loudest voices demanding increased research into the efficacy of medical marijuana.' Rx For Veterans reports that 'Last year, the American Legion, the oldest and largest veterans service organization in the U.S., could ignore the facts no longer. Since the expansion of its Veterans Crisis Line in 2007, the Department of Veterans Affairs has been logging 500,000 phone calls, e-chats and text messages annually, and its staff have sent emergency services to callers more than 66,000 times. And since early 2015, the Legion itself has been getting swamped by calls from traumatized Iraq/Afghanistan veterans for whom VA prescriptions weren’t working. They wanted legal access to marijuana.' Marijuana Moment reports that 'Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA), a group representing more than 400,000 veterans, released the survey on Wednesday. It showed that 83 percent support allowing legal access to medical marijuana, while 55 percent back recreational legalization. That’s a significant jump in support; the organization’s 2017 survey found that only 44 percent of veterans supported full legalization that year. There’s also significant interest among veterans in using cannabis or cannabinoid products as an alternative treatment option, with 89 percent indicating they’d pursue that option if it was available to them.'
NORML reports that 'Investigators reported that ten percent of those
sampled acknowledged past-year cannabis use. Consumers were most likely
to define their consumption as medical-only if they were age 65 or
older. Only a minority of the study’s respondents acknowledged having
received an authorization to use cannabis from a healthcare provider.
This is likely because federal law prohibits providers affiliated with
the Department of Veterans Affairs from issuing recommendations, even in
states where the medical use of cannabis is legal. The study’s authors
concluded: “Our findings, taken in context with current federal policy,
point toward a need for enhanced care coordination among veterans who
may benefit from marijuana, but are unable to access it through the VA. …
Additional research is needed to better understand veterans’ use of a
marijuana in the context of federal VA restrictions, including the
examination of how veterans obtain marijuana, what affect this has on
their care coordination and health outcomes, and whether or not
marijuana can play a role in reducing other drug use and drug-related
harms among veterans.” According to nationwide survey data compiled by
the group Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, 75 percent of
military veterans “would be interested in using cannabis or cannabinoid
products as a treatment option if it were available.”' Even army veterans who are prescribed medical cannabis are not spared by the establishment. Alabama News reports that 'Disabled Iraqi War veteran Sean Worsley, who was arrested while driving through in Pickens County in 2016 and charged with felony possession of medical marijuana legally prescribed in his home state of Arizona, was granted parole on Wednesday by the Alabama Board of Pardons and Parole after being incarcerated more than eight months. With marijuana illegal in Alabama, Worsley, a Purple Heart recipient, was sentenced to five years in prison. On September 23, he was transferred from the Pickens County Jail to the Draper Correctional Facility.'
The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) is itself one of the biggest hurdles to enabling cannabis access for army veterans, when its primary role is that of ensuring the well-being of the veteran. Numerous bills have been raised in the US government to enable access to army veterans (we are not even talking about soldiers on active duty here but those struggling to survive as a result of their giving the best years of their lives to serve the nation). Nearly every single bill has been shelved through opposition, not just from corrupt politicians who sent the people out to war in the first place, but by the VA itself. Often the flimsiest excuses are used to oppose access to cannabis for veterans. Marijuana Moment reports that 'The VA official argued that any clinical trials involving human subjects that carriers potential risks must use the “smallest number of participants needed to avoid unnecessarily putting subjects at risk.” And as far as marijuana is concerned, some effects “are not known, thus a circumscribed approach to determine dose, administration modality and best outcome measure must be shown in a proof-of-concept approach to ensure the validity of the research.” Additionally, Carroll said certain requirements stipulated in the bill such as studying seven different cannabis varieties is “not consistent with the current state of scientific evidence, which suggests that smaller, early phase, controlled clinical trials with a focused set of specific aims are optimal to determine proof of concept for using cannabis to treat specific conditions.” He argued that there would need to be a “specific rationale” for studying each variety, saying that “progress in cannabis research must start with a scientific query of what is already known for specific diagnostic categories of interest, then moving to next level clinical investigation.”' The number of bills and research studies that have been initiated to study the benefits of cannabis for veterans, especially in the US, are probably in the dozens. NORML reports that 'Members of the Senate’s Veterans’ Affairs Committee advanced legislation today directing the United States Department of Veterans Affairs to conduct research evaluating the safety and efficacy of cannabis products for veterans suffering from chronic pain and post-traumatic stress. The bipartisan legislation directs the VA’s office to conduct a large-scale observational trial assessing veterans’ use of cannabis and to report on its ability to mitigate pain, improve sleep, and influence subjects’ intake of prescription medicines or alcohol.' Quite often these studies are initiated by politicians to put on a veneer of concern for the welfare of soldiers and veterans, and to secure their support in the next elections, rather than with any serious intent to improve the situation of the veteran.
One of the most powerful arguments that was used to prohibit cannabis globally was the myth that cannabis caused insanity. Fake stories of persons going berserk after consuming cannabis were used to justify the prohibition of cannabis. Even though such myths have been disproved repeatedly, both in the past and today, this myth of cannabis induced insanity is one of the most powerful myths used by the armed forces to keep cannabis away from their personnel. Marijuana Moment reports that 'There is “no statistically significant increase” in psychosis-related diagnoses in states that have legalized marijuana compared to those that continue to criminalize cannabis, a new study published by the American Medical Association concluded. Researchers at Stanford University, the University of Pennsylvania and the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) carried out an analysis of more than 63 million health insurance beneficiaries from 2003-2017 to address the idea that cannabis reform could be linked to higher rates of psychosis, which certain prohibitionists have cited to argue against legalization. The study, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) Psychiatry, determined that, “compared with no legalization policy, states with legalization policies experienced no statistically significant increase in rates of psychosis-related diagnoses.”' This may not have been the result that the VA wished to see.
There has been ever increasing funding for studies that show the benefits of cannabis for war veterans. Marijuana Moment reports that 'The bulk of the money, nearly $13 million, will examine “the efficacy of marijuana in treating the medical conditions of United States armed service veterans and preventing veteran suicide,” according to recipients at the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS). The grant will fund the next step of a study researchers say is the first clinical trial of inhaled botanical marijuana for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and only the second to compare the safety and efficacy of cannabis against a placebo. Another $7 million in marijuana revenue-funded grant money was awarded to Wayne State University’s Bureau of Community Action and Economic Opportunity, which has partnered with researchers to study how cannabis might treat a variety of mental health disorders, including PTSD, anxiety, sleep disorders, depression and suicidality. Both new grants come from Michigan’s $20 million Veteran Marijuana Research Grant Program, which was established by the state’s legalization law approved by voters in 2018.'
The potential cost savings to armed forces, by replacing, or at least partially substituting, prescription drugs and alcohol with cannabis, and the savings on medical bills due to the subsequent good health, is something that leaders continue to remain oblivious of, or choose to deliberately ignore. Armed forces worldwide are essentially under the control of power hungry politicians and leaders who do not feel the need to protect them from the harms of prescription drugs, harmful illegal synthetic drugs and alcohol produced by big businesses that fund politicians. If recreational use of cannabis is legalized in the armed forces, personnel could grow their own cannabis making it freely available to them. The industrial applications of cannabis is another area that could revolutionize materials used by armed forces making them highly sustainable and cost effective. Countries like China, France, and increasingly the US, are shifting to cannabis to meet their needs for sustainable fabrics, as well as other light-weight, bio-degradable and durable materials.
In the US, in states where cannabis has been legalized for adult recreational use, some retailers are going to extra mile to enable veterans to access affordable cannabis. The cannabis online retailer, Eaze reports that 'Eaze, the on-demand cannabis marketplace, today announced the launch of a new program to expand access to cannabis for U.S. veterans. Beginning this Veterans Day (Sunday, November 11), veterans will receive a 25% discount on products purchased through Eaze. The discount reflects Eaze's commitment to helping veterans safely access sustainable, affordable relief from PTSD, physical disabilities, chronic pain, and other combat-related conditions.'
But cannabis for the armed forces means going against conventional arms, petrochemical, pharmaceutical, alcohol, medical, transportation and mining industries. Taxpayer's money that goes to the government, and from the government to the armed forces, finally ends up in the pockets of these unsustainable, non-renewable big businesses that continue to eat up the earth's resources and cause environmental damage to manufacture, process and dispose their products. If the armed forces became more efficient in its functioning and used cannabis for recreational, medical and industrial needs, it could reach significant levels of sustainability and efficiency. The costs saved could translate into allocation of government funds to other priority areas such as education, health and infrastructure.
But then, the armed forces are mainly used by governments to protect the
very same industries that we are talking about being replaced by
cannabis. The armed forces are mostly used to suppress the very people
who grow and consume cannabis - the working classes of society = whose
freedoms governments choose to restrict through armies. So a return to
cannabis by the armed forces would mean an essential transformation at
all levels, a major upheaval. Such an upheaval may go down right to the
core of the armed forces and bring to surface questions that all armed organizations ultimately
fear confronting,
which is of their necessity to society.
In the US, the Republicans exemplify the elites who used the armed forces to further their own interests. Not only have the Republicans been responsible for most wars that the US has been involved in - in the recent past - to protect and stimulate the petrochemical, arms and construction industries, they have been the biggest opponents of federal cannabis legalization and access to cannabis for veterans. For example, NORML reports 'Republicans blocked a procedural vote that would have advanced legislation, S. 326: the VA Medicinal Cannabis Research Act, to the floor of the United States Senate. All but eight GOP members voted against the bill’s advancement, assuring that it would not meet the 60 vote threshold necessary to move forward under Senate rules. The measure had previously passed unanimously out of the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee with bipartisan support. The legislation directs the Department of Veterans Affairs to conduct an 18-month observational study to assess the effects of cannabis in veterans suffering from chronic pain and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Observational trial data published in December reported that patients suffering from post-traumatic stress exhibit “statistically significant improvements” in a variety of domains – including sleep, anxiety, and stress – following their use of cannabis. By contrast, a 2021 clinical trial reported that the inhalation of marijuana flowers provided limited benefits compared to placebo in treating symptoms of PTSD. Data published earlier this year in the journal JAMA Network Open reported that nearly one in three pain patients residing in states where medical cannabis access is legal have consumed it for pain management. Pain patients who utilize cannabis frequently report decreasing or ceasing their use of opioids.' So, not only do the Republicans have no qualms about sending out millions to die to protect their own interests, they also do not even have that modicum of humanity to ease the suffering of those who have paid dearly to protect them. This, of course, is not just the story of US Republicans but also the US Democrats (to a lesser degree) and nearly all governments world wide. What these elites want is absolute obedience without asking questions, and they seek to ensure that within their own militia there is no question of cannabis arising. Only then can they ensure the subjugation of the larger majority of the world outside their elite order. The latest that I had heard on the subject was that the US House of Representatives had voted to do away with testing recruits of cannabis use as a criteria for selection, in keeping with the evolving rules in many sectors of employment. Marijuana Moment reported in July that 'The U.S. House of Representatives has approved a large-scale defense
bill that includes a section to prevent military branches from testing
recruits for marijuana as a condition of enlistment has been left
intact, despite opposition from the White House. While the House
Rules Committee on Tuesday blocked a number of pro- and anti-cannabis
amendments from floor consideration, the full chamber’s approval of the
underlying bill means the military marijuana screening section, as well
as psychedelics report language, is advancing. The House passed the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) in a 217-199 vote on Friday.' In a sepaate bill, Marijuana Moment reported that 'A key U.S. Senate committee has approved a spending bill with a new amendment allowing doctors at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) to discuss and recommend medical marijuana to patients living in legal states. The Senate Appropriations Committee passed the cannabis amendment from Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR) in a voice vote on Thursday, also advancing the overall legislation, which provides funding for Military Construction, Veterans Affairs, and Related Agencies (MilConVA) for the 2025 Fiscal Year. “The only healthcare system in America where a doctor cannot discuss medical marijuana with patients in states where it’s legal is the veterans system,” Merkley told the panel. “We’re discriminating against our veterans. This is really unacceptable.”' How many of these bills can overcome the Republican hurdle and see the light of day remains to be seen...
Irrespective of whether a government is right wing, left wing, conservative, autocratic, theocratic or democratic, every nation maintains a standing army of hundreds of thousands (and, quite often, millions) of soldiers. This is because every country aims to protect the interests of the king-priest-businessman triad, drawing on the masses to provide the very forces that are used to dominate and suppress the masses, ensuring the gap between the elites and the rest remains, and even widens. Leo Tolstoy writes in the Kingdom of God and Peace Essays 'The condition of Christian humanity, with its fortresses, cannon, dynamite, rifles, torpedoes, prisons, gallows, churches, factories, custom-house and palaces, is really terrible. But neither the fortresses nor the cannon nor the rifles will attack anyone of themselves, the prisons will not of themselves lock anyone up, the gallows will not of themselves hang anyone, nor will the churches delude anyone or the custom-houses hold anyone back, and the palaces and factories do not build themselves or maintain themselves. All this is done by people. And if they once understand that there is no necessity for all these things, these things will disappear.' He further writes 'If people tell you that all this is necessary for the maintenance of the existing order of life and that this social order, with its destitution, hunger, prisons, executions, armies and wars, is necessary for society, that still more miseries will ensue were that organization infringed; all that is said only by those who profit by such an organization. Those who suffer from it - and they are ten times as numerous - all think and say the contrary. And in the depth of your soul you yourself know it is untrue, you know that the existing organization of life has outlived its time and must inevitably be reconstructed on new principles, and that therefore there is no need to sacrifice all human feeling to maintain it.'
To me, an evolved society is one that has no need for an army, where individuals and groups work for the welfare of society through peaceful, sustainable means. Tolstoy and Gandhi had visions of societies without armies. They believed in the strengthening of society from the grass-roots where each individual used his or her own abilities in the best possible way to create peaceful sustainable societies living in the lap of nature. If we evolve sufficiently then there is no need to maintain an army. As Tolstoy writes in The Kingdom of God and Peace Essays 'And what do we want armies for with their general, and their bands, and cavalry, and drums? What are they wanted for when there is no war and no one wants to conquer anybody? And even if there were a war, other nations would not let us profit by it, and the army will not fire on its own people. And once they ask themselves these questions, men cannot fail to conclude that they ought not to support all these institutions which have become useless.' Using dialogue to iron out our differences, and using intelligence to counter the threats posed to the existence of society, rather than violence, is the ideal. Though the world offers lip service to this, it heads in the very opposite direction. As the elites consume the planet voraciously in their unquenchable thirst and greed for material wealth and power, they create more and more destructive weapons and huge armies. It is no bravery to sit a few thousand miles away and press a button that launches a missile to kill the working classes, the poor, elderly, women and children in some unknown land who did nothing to hurt you. Tolstoy writes in the Kingdom of God and Peace Essays 'It is often said that the invention of terrible instruments of destruction will put an end to war: war will destroy itself. That is not true. As it is possible to increase the means of slaughter, so it is also possible to increase the means of bringing men of the social life-conception to submission. Let them be slaughtered and torn to pieces by thousands and by millions, they will still go to the slaughter like senseless cattle because they are driven by the lash.' What he wrote in the 19th century has assumed even more ominous proportions in the world that we live in today. Tolstoy says 'What would be more insensate and painful than the position in which the European peoples now live, spending a great part of their wealth on preparations to annihilate their neighbours and from whom nothing divides them and with whom they live in close spiritual intercourse? What could be more terrible than that which always awaits European nations, when at any moment in an unlucky hour some madman calling himself a potentate may say something displeasing to another such madman? What could be more terrible than all these newly devised and still to be devised means of destruction: cannon, shells, bombs, rockets with smokeless powder, torpedoes and other instruments of death? Yet everybody acquiesces in this state of affairs. Tomorrow a war may begin, and men driven like cattle to the slaughter, will go where they are sent and perish unprotestingly, and destroy other men without even asking themselves why they do it. And not only will they feel no remorse about it, they will even swagger and be proud of the geegaws they are allowed to wear for their skill in killing people, and they will exalt those unhappy or wicked men who placed them in such a position, and erect monuments to them.'
For the wise man, the peasant, and the masses, the threat of invasion by a neighbouring army is not as frightening as it is for the elites who fear that they will lose their wealth and power. Herman Hesse writes in If the War Goes On 'Years ago a Chinese devotee of his country's old and venerable ideas spoke of these developments in terms that have no bearing on politics but are close to the spirit of the Tao Te Ching. He spoke roughly as follows: Let the Japanese or other nations conquer us, take possession of our country, and run our government. Let them! It will be seen that we are weaker, that we can be conquered and gobbled up. Let that happen, if that is China's destiny! But when the others have gobbled us up, it remains to be seen whether they will be able to digest us. It may well turn out that our government and army, administration and finances will be Japanese, American, and English but that the conquerors will be powerless to change China, that on the contrary they will be conquered and changed by the spirit of China. For China is weak in the art of war and in political organization but rich in life, rich in spirit, rich in ancient culture.' But anyone who speaks about the futility of war and armies is quickly branded an anti-national and an enemy of the state by the elites. As Herman Hesse writes, 'For many years I was able to let the world run its course and conversely. For me what was taken seriously in the world and featured in speeches and editorials was mere sound and fury - while to the world what I did, what I took seriously and held sacred, was play and fancy. And this might have gone on. But then suddenly history turned up again! Suddenly editorialists, university professors, and high-school teachers proclaimed that once again history had crowded out everyday life, that a 'great day' had dawned. We unwordlly souls, writers and others, who shrugged our shoulders at history, and we men of religious mind, who warned our fellow citizens of the insane arrogance and terrifying insouciance of our leaders, were no longer harmless poets, objects of ridicule - we had become anti-patriots, defeatists, and bellyachers, to cite only a few of the lovely new terms. We were denounced, we were blacklisted, we were deluged with venomous articles in the 'right-thinking' press. We fared no better in our private lives. When in the spring of 1915 I asked a German friend what would be so dreadful about returning Alsace to France under certain circumstances, he observed that he personally forgave me my foibles but that I had better not say such things to anyone else if I wanted to keep my skull intact.'
Creating jobs in the armed forces, while depriving the means for individuals to earn sustainable livelihoods through peaceful means connected with nature, is only hastening the death of the human race. While we aim for the ideal of a peaceful world without ideals, the intermediate steps involve making cannabis available to the armed forces to ease the pain and suffering that they endure as a price for enslaving themselves to the causes of the elite. Herman Hesse writes in If the War Goes On 'And we believers in the future will never cease to concern ourselves with the old commandment: 'Thou shalt not kill.' Even if some day all the legal codes in the world forbid killing (inclusive of killing in war and killing by executioners), that imperative will never lose its cogency. It is the foundation of all progress, all human development. We kill so much! Not only in our stupid battles, the stupid street fighting of our revolution, our stupid executions - no, we kill at every step. We kill when circumstances force us to drive gifted young people into occupations for which they are not suited. We kill when we close our eyes to poverty, affliction, or infamy. We kill when, because it is easier, we countenance or even pretend to approve of atrophied social, political, educational, and religious institutions, instead of resolutely combating them. Just as a consistent socialist looks on property as theft, so those who hold consistently to our kind of faith regard all contempt of human life, all cruelty and indifference, as tantamount to killing. And not only things present can be killed, but the things of the future as well. A great deal of future in a young man can be killed by a mordant sceptism. Everywhere life is waiting, everywhere the future holds promise, and we see so little, we trample so much. We kill at every step. In respect to mankind we all of us have but one task. To help mankind as a whole make some small advance, to better a particular institution, to do away with one particular mode of killing - all these are commendable, but they are not my task or yours. Our task as men is this: in our own unique personal lives, to take a short step on the road from animal to man.'
Legalizing cannabis globally will offer the youth of the world a means to improve their economic standing, and to use their energies to work in sustainable industries rather than those that the elites have created which threaten to destroy all life on this planet, including the armed forces. As Tolstoy writes 'But a time is approaching and draws near when it will become perfectly evident to everyone that these people are of no use at all but are merely a hindrance, and those whom they interfere with will say amiably and quietly, like the man in the peasant's coat: "Don't interfere with us, please!" And then all these emissaries, and those who send them, will have to follow the good advice, that is, cease to ride about with an arm akimbo hindering people, and get off their horses, doff their uniforms, listen to what is being said, and join with others in real human work.' To shun violence at international levels, one must learn to first shun violence in the mind of the individual. Cannabis offers a means to do that. When the individual embraces non-violence, he or she can impact the immediate surroundings of family and neighbours. Tolstoy writes 'In early Christian times a soldier, Theodore, told the authorities that being a Christian he could not bear arms, and when he was executed for this the responsible authorities quite sincerely regarded him as a madman and far from trying to conceal such an occurrence, exposed him and men like him to public scorn at their execution. But now, when in Austria, Prussia, Sweden, Switzerland, Russia, and everywhere in Europe, cases of refusals of military service occur more and more frequently, these cases can no longer be regarded by the authorities as madness, but as a very dangerous awakening from madness, and the governments far from holding such cases up to public scorn carefully conceal them, knowing that the salvation of men from humiliation, enslavement, and ignorance, will come about not by revolutions, trades-unions, peace-congresses, and books, but in the simplest way - by each man who is called upon to share in the infliction of violence on his fellow-men and on himself, asking in perplexity: "But why should I do this?"' When sufficient individuals reach this evolved state of being, society itself can reach it. It is as simple as embracing the herb and sitting down to see who one is, and what one's connection to the wider world is. Tolstoy writes 'Reflect, and you will understand that your foes are not the Boers, or the English, or the French, or the Germans, or the Finns, or the Russians, but that your foes - your only foes - are you yourselves, who by your patriotism maintain the governments that oppress you and make you unhappy. They have undertaken to protect you from danger and they have brought that pseudo-protection to such a point that you have all become soldiers - slaves - and are all ruined, or are being ruined more and more, and at any moment may and should expect that the tight-stretched cord will snap and a horrible slaughter of you and your children will commence. And however great that slaughter may be and however that conflict may end the same state of things will continue. In the same way and with yet greater intensity, the governments will arm, and ruin, and pervert you and your children, and no one will help you to stop it or prevent it if you do not help yourselves.' He writes 'But how will nations defend themselves against their enemies, how will they maintain internal order, and how can nations live without an army? What form the life of men will take if they repudiate murder, we do not and cannot know; but one thing is certain: that it is more natural for men to be guided by the reason and conscience with which they are endowed, than to submit slavishly to people who arrange wholesale murders; and that therefore the form of social order assumed in the lives of those who are guided in their actions not by violence based on threats of murder but by reason and conscience, will in any case be no worse than that under which they now live. That is all I want to say. I shall be very sorry if it offends or grieves anyone or evokes any ill feeling. But for me, a man eighty years old, expecting to die at any moment, it would be shameful and criminal not to speak out the whole truth as I understand it - the truth which, as I firmly believe, is alone capable of relieving mankind from the incalculable ills produced by war.' Herman Hesse writes 'If the majority of men possessed this courage and self-will, the earth would be a different place. No, say our paid teachers (the same who are so adept at praising the heroes and self-willed men of former times), everything would be topsy-turvy. But in reality life would be richer and better if each man independently followed his own law and will. In such a world, it is true, some of the insults and unreflecting blows that keep our venerable judges so busy today might go unpunished. Now and then a murderer might go free - but doesn't that happen now in spite of all our laws and punishments? On the other hand, many of the terrible, unspeakably sad, and insane things that we witness today in our so well-ordered world would be unknown and impossible. Such as wars between nations. Now I hear the authorities saying: 'You preach revolution.' Wrong again. Such a mistake is possible only among herd men. I preach self-will, not revolution. How could I want a revolution? Revolution is war; like all other war, it is a 'prolongation of politics by other means'. But a man who has once felt the courage to be himself, who has heard the voice of his own destiny, cares nothing for politics, whether it be monarchist or democratic, revolutionary or conservative! He is concerned with something else. His self-will, like the profound, magnificent God-given self-will that inhabits every blade of grass, has no other aim than his own growth. 'Egoism', if you will. But very different from the sordid egoism of those who lust for money and power!' Aldous Huxley writes in Heaven and Hell 'The contemplative whose perception has been cleansed does not have to stay in his room. He can go about his business, so completely satisfied to see and be a part of the divine Order of Things that he will never even be tempted to indulge in what Traherne called 'the dirty Devices of the world.' When we feel ourselves to be the sole heirs of the universe, when 'the sea flows in our veins...and the stars are our jewels,' when all things are perceived as infinite and holy, what motive can we have for covetousness or self-assertion, for the pursuit of power or the drearier forms of pleasure?' Once we have become meditative, which cannabis enables us to be, we can then clearly see the world for what it is. As Huxley writes in Heaven and Hell, 'A spray of blossoming plum, eighteen inches of bamboo stem with its leaves, tits or finches seen at hardly more than arm's length among the bushes, all kinds of flowers and foliage, of birds and fish and small mammals. Each small life is represented as the centre of its own universe, the purpose, in its own estimation, for which this world and all that is in it were created; each issues its own specific and individual declaration of independence from human imperialism; each, by ironic implication, derides our absurd pretensions to lay down merely human rules for the conduct of the cosmic game; each mutely repeats the divine tautology: I am that I am.'
The bright side is that there is growing awareness among lawmakers, and efforts are on to introduce legislation that will enable veterans to access cannabis for medical and recreational purposes in the US. In most places worldwide, however, they continue to suffer due to the illegal status of the herb, the negative information that has been created in the last century, the opposing forces to cannabis and the outdated policies surrounding the use of cannabis within the army and police forces.
The day will ultimately come when all recognize that we do not need
armies anymore. Till that zenith of human evolution is reached, we can
work towards bettering the life of a person in the armed forces by
legalizing cannabis for all purposes for the armed forces.
Related articles
The following list of articles taken from various media speak about the above subject. Words in italics are the thoughts of yours truly at the time of reading the article.A key U.S. Senate committee has approved a spending bill with a new amendment allowing doctors at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) to discuss and recommend medical marijuana to patients living in legal states.
The Senate Appropriations Committee passed the cannabis amendment from Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR) in a voice vote on Thursday, also advancing the overall legislation, which provides funding for Military Construction, Veterans Affairs, and Related Agencies (MilConVA) for the 2025 Fiscal Year.
“The only healthcare system in America where a doctor cannot discuss medical marijuana with patients in states where it’s legal is the veterans system,” Merkley told the panel. “We’re discriminating against our veterans. This is really unacceptable.”
https://www.marijuanamoment.net/senators-approve-bill-to-let-va-doctors-recommend-medical-marijuana-to-veterans-in-legal-states/
The U.S. House of Representatives has approved a large-scale defense bill that includes a section to prevent military branches from testing recruits for marijuana as a condition of enlistment has been left intact, despite opposition from the White House.
While the House Rules Committee on Tuesday blocked a number of pro- and anti-cannabis amendments from floor consideration, the full chamber’s approval of the underlying bill means the military marijuana screening section, as well as psychedelics report language, is advancing.
The House passed the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) in a 217-199 vote on Friday.
https://www.marijuanamoment.net/u-s-house-votes-to-ban-military-from-testing-recruits-for-marijuana-as-a-condition-of-enrollment/
The Senate Appropriations Committee passed the cannabis amendment from Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR) in a voice vote on Thursday, also advancing the overall legislation, which provides funding for Military Construction, Veterans Affairs, and Related Agencies (MilConVA) for the 2025 Fiscal Year.
“The only healthcare system in America where a doctor cannot discuss medical marijuana with patients in states where it’s legal is the veterans system,” Merkley told the panel. “We’re discriminating against our veterans. This is really unacceptable.”
https://www.marijuanamoment.net/senators-approve-bill-to-let-va-doctors-recommend-medical-marijuana-to-veterans-in-legal-states/
The U.S. House of Representatives has approved a large-scale defense bill that includes a section to prevent military branches from testing recruits for marijuana as a condition of enlistment has been left intact, despite opposition from the White House.
While the House Rules Committee on Tuesday blocked a number of pro- and anti-cannabis amendments from floor consideration, the full chamber’s approval of the underlying bill means the military marijuana screening section, as well as psychedelics report language, is advancing.
The House passed the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) in a 217-199 vote on Friday.
https://www.marijuanamoment.net/u-s-house-votes-to-ban-military-from-testing-recruits-for-marijuana-as-a-condition-of-enrollment/
'The branch acknowledged that hemp and its derivatives, including CBD, were federally legalized under the 2018 Farm Bill. But it said that their policy stands regardless in an effort to “ensure there is no unknowing consumption of any THC amount.”
“This really is about the health of the force and ensuring the Navy remains a drug-free workplace,” LA Parker, the head of Navy’s Drug Detection and Deterrence program, said in a press release. “We have to be fit to fight and can’t take a risk in allowing our Sailors to consume or use these types of products.”'
https://www.marijuanamoment.net/navy-explains-why-it-banned-hemp-shampoos-and-lotions-for-sailors/
'Disabled Iraqi War veteran Sean Worsley, who was arrested while driving through in Pickens County in 2016 and charged with felony possession of medical marijuana legally prescribed in his home state of Arizona, was granted parole on Wednesday by the Alabama Board of Pardons and Parole after being incarcerated more than eight months.
With marijuana illegal in Alabama, Worsley, a Purple Heart recipient, was sentenced to five years in prison. On September 23, he was transferred from the Pickens County Jail to the Draper Correctional Facility.'
https://www.al.com/news/2020/10/disabled-iraqi-war-vet-imprisoned-for-medical-marijauna-possession-granted-parole.html
Dear healthcare professional, soldier and policeman,
In gratitude for your support in helping the government use Covid to:
- suppress dissent everywhere
- pass all kinds of harmful laws as ordinances
- collect funds through dubious schemes, electoral bonds and Covid violation fines to fund its election campaigns
- crush the pillars of the economy - the migrant worker, farmer, labourer and small businessman
- target minorities
- destroy education and healthcare
- boost the western medical industry with its pharmaceuticals and medical equipment at the cost of all other medical systems
the Supreme Leader has decided that, as a special privilege, you will be the first to be administered undertested, underdeveloped and experimental Covid vaccines that the government has already ordered in bulk from several favored multinational pharma companies. I am sure you will be very glad to hear this and come out in large numbers to get yourselves stabbed as a part of your national duty. Now, now, why are you running away? We can organize flower showers using helicopters and Rafale jets at your funeral if you like..its free..the taxpayers will pay for all of the above...
Dec 06, 2020 9:22:33pm
'While hemp and its derivatives are federally legal—and a growing number of states have regulated marijuana markets—a Massachusetts base of the military branch emphasized that possessing or using cannabis products can result in disciplinary action.
“Hemp, CBD and traces of THC can be found in a number of products like shampoos, lotions, and lip balms that you can buy in the open market, but you can’t bring them onto the installation,” Tech.
Sgt. Kyle Majorana said. “Even if it’s for your pet, it’s still illegal.”'
https://www.marijuanamoment.net/dont-bring-cbd-pet-shampoo-onto-military-bases-u-s-air-force-warns/
'Authors concluded: “The present study contributes needed evidence about motives for and health outcomes of cannabis use by older veterans which may differ from younger veterans. … Veterans reported positive effects of cannabis use for their pain, sleep quality, health conditions, and QOL (quality of life). … Our results may help clinicians to consider [the] motives behind cannabis use by veterans and engage more with veterans about alternative ways to treat their conditions.”'
https://norml.org/news/2021/05/13/older-veterans-using-cannabis-for-mental-health-conditions
“This really is about the health of the force and ensuring the Navy remains a drug-free workplace,” LA Parker, the head of Navy’s Drug Detection and Deterrence program, said in a press release. “We have to be fit to fight and can’t take a risk in allowing our Sailors to consume or use these types of products.”'
https://www.marijuanamoment.net/navy-explains-why-it-banned-hemp-shampoos-and-lotions-for-sailors/
'Disabled Iraqi War veteran Sean Worsley, who was arrested while driving through in Pickens County in 2016 and charged with felony possession of medical marijuana legally prescribed in his home state of Arizona, was granted parole on Wednesday by the Alabama Board of Pardons and Parole after being incarcerated more than eight months.
With marijuana illegal in Alabama, Worsley, a Purple Heart recipient, was sentenced to five years in prison. On September 23, he was transferred from the Pickens County Jail to the Draper Correctional Facility.'
https://www.al.com/news/2020/10/disabled-iraqi-war-vet-imprisoned-for-medical-marijauna-possession-granted-parole.html
Dear healthcare professional, soldier and policeman,
In gratitude for your support in helping the government use Covid to:
- suppress dissent everywhere
- pass all kinds of harmful laws as ordinances
- collect funds through dubious schemes, electoral bonds and Covid violation fines to fund its election campaigns
- crush the pillars of the economy - the migrant worker, farmer, labourer and small businessman
- target minorities
- destroy education and healthcare
- boost the western medical industry with its pharmaceuticals and medical equipment at the cost of all other medical systems
the Supreme Leader has decided that, as a special privilege, you will be the first to be administered undertested, underdeveloped and experimental Covid vaccines that the government has already ordered in bulk from several favored multinational pharma companies. I am sure you will be very glad to hear this and come out in large numbers to get yourselves stabbed as a part of your national duty. Now, now, why are you running away? We can organize flower showers using helicopters and Rafale jets at your funeral if you like..its free..the taxpayers will pay for all of the above...
Dec 06, 2020 9:22:33pm
'While hemp and its derivatives are federally legal—and a growing number of states have regulated marijuana markets—a Massachusetts base of the military branch emphasized that possessing or using cannabis products can result in disciplinary action.
“Hemp, CBD and traces of THC can be found in a number of products like shampoos, lotions, and lip balms that you can buy in the open market, but you can’t bring them onto the installation,” Tech.
Sgt. Kyle Majorana said. “Even if it’s for your pet, it’s still illegal.”'
https://www.marijuanamoment.net/dont-bring-cbd-pet-shampoo-onto-military-bases-u-s-air-force-warns/
'Authors concluded: “The present study contributes needed evidence about motives for and health outcomes of cannabis use by older veterans which may differ from younger veterans. … Veterans reported positive effects of cannabis use for their pain, sleep quality, health conditions, and QOL (quality of life). … Our results may help clinicians to consider [the] motives behind cannabis use by veterans and engage more with veterans about alternative ways to treat their conditions.”'
https://norml.org/news/2021/05/13/older-veterans-using-cannabis-for-mental-health-conditions
'Nobody who was out there on the street with the demonstrators would be naive enough to compare them to "helpless Christians." With the lone exception of the Vietnam Veterans Against the War, the demonstrators in Miami were a useless mob of ignorant, chicken-shit ego junkies whose only accomplishment was to embarrass the whole tradition of public protest. They were hopelessly disorganized, they had no real purpose in being there, and about half of them were so wasted on grass, wine, and downers that they couldn't say for sure whether they were raising hell in Miami, or San Diego.
For weeks earlier, these same people had been sitting in the lobby of the Doral, calling George McGovern a "lying pig" and a "warmonger." Their target-hotel this time was the Fontainebleu, headquarters for the national press and many TV cameras. If the Rolling Stones came to Miami for a free concert, these assholes would build their own fence around the bandstand - just so they could have something to tear down and then "crash the gates."
During both conventions, Flamingo Park was known as "Quaalude Alley," in deference to the brand of downers favored by most demonstrators. Quaalude is a mild sleeping pill, but - when consumed in large quantities, along with wine, grass, and adrenaline - it produces the same kind of stupid, mean-drunk effect as Seconal ("Red"). The Quaalude effect was so obvious in Flamingo Park that the "Last Patrol" caravan of Vietnam Vets - who came here in motorcades from all parts of the country - refused to even set up camp with the other demonstrators. They had serious business in Miami, they explained, and the last thing they needed was a public alliance with a mob of stoned street crazies and screaming teenyboppers.'
- The Campaign Trail: More Fear and Loathing in Miami: Nixon Bites the Bomb, September 28, 1972, Fear and Loathing at the Rolling Stone, The Essential Writing of Hunter S. Thompson
'A team of researchers affiliated with the University of California at San Diego reviewed marijuana use patterns among a nationally representative sample of over 4,000 US veterans. Of the sample, 12 percent acknowledged having consumed cannabis within the past six-months – up from nine percent in 2014 (the last time researchers surveyed the issue). Those with psychiatric conditions were most likely to report using cannabis – a finding that is consistent with other surveys of veterans.'
https://norml.org/news/2021/05/20/cannabis-use-increasing-among-veterans
'To put that into global perspective, Veterans Affairs Canada’s fiscal year spending on medical marijuana exceeded Australia’s medical marijuana market in 2020, which was estimated to be worth approximately CA$100 million.
And the 14,463 kilograms (31,885 pounds) of cannabis reimbursed by Veterans Affairs Canada in 2020 was ahead of the European Union’s legal flower market that year, which dispensed approximately 10,000 kilograms.
That points to how small some of the largest medical cannabis markets outside North America remain, and how much room there is for growth.
Medical cannabis uptake by Canadian veterans comes as overall spending in Canada on the medicine has largely stagnated in recent years.
Veterans account for about a quarter of Canada’s medical marijuana market by spending'
https://mjbizdaily.com/medical-cannabis-reimbursements-for-canadian-veterans-soar-past-ca100-million/
'A 2018 survey conducted by the Israel Anti-Drug Authority found that 54% of soldiers admitted to having smoked cannabis over the past year.'
https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/idf-cracking-down-on-troops-who-smoke-marijuana-674916
'There is no reason why cannabis use, especially for veterans, should continue to be criminalized. Why should veterans be pumped full of opioids that often don’t work, when research indicates cannabis is a viable alternative treatment? Studies show that in states where cannabis is legal, opioid deaths were reduced by more than 20 percent. The majority of participants in one study even indicated they used cannabis as a substitute for other substances, such as alcohol, tobacco and prescription medication.'
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/07/27/medical-marijuana-veterans-military-punish-cannabis/
'The bulk of the money, nearly $13 million, will examine “the efficacy of marijuana in treating the medical conditions of United States armed service veterans and preventing veteran suicide,” according to recipients at the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS). The grant will fund the next step of a study researchers say is the first clinical trial of inhaled botanical marijuana for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and only the second to compare the safety and efficacy of cannabis against a placebo.
Another $7 million in marijuana revenue-funded grant money was awarded to Wayne State University’s Bureau of Community Action and Economic Opportunity, which has partnered with researchers to study how cannabis might treat a variety of mental health disorders, including PTSD, anxiety, sleep disorders, depression and suicidality. Both new grants come from Michigan’s $20 million Veteran Marijuana Research Grant Program, which was established by the state’s legalization law approved by voters in 2018.'
https://www.marijuanamoment.net/michigan-spends-20m-in-marijuana-revenue-to-study-medical-cannabis-for-veterans-with-ptsd/
'The VA official argued that any clinical trials involving human subjects that carriers potential risks must use the “smallest number of participants needed to avoid unnecessarily putting subjects at risk.” And as far as marijuana is concerned, some effects “are not known, thus a circumscribed approach to determine dose, administration modality and best outcome measure must be shown in a proof-of-concept approach to ensure the validity of the research.”
Additionally, Carroll said certain requirements stipulated in the bill such as studying seven different cannabis varieties is “not consistent with the current state of scientific evidence, which suggests that smaller, early phase, controlled clinical trials with a focused set of specific aims are optimal to determine proof of concept for using cannabis to treat specific conditions.”
He argued that there would need to be a “specific rationale” for studying each variety, saying that “progress in cannabis research must start with a scientific query of what is already known for specific diagnostic categories of interest, then moving to next level clinical investigation.”'
https://www.marijuanamoment.net/va-under-biden-remains-opposed-to-marijuana-research-bill-for-veterans-official-tells-house-committee/
'Given these two depressing options, I figured Tuesday was as good a day as any to get away from politics and act like a human being for a change - or better still, like an animal. Just get off by myself and drift naked in the sea for a few hours...
But as I drove toward Key Biscayne with the top down, squinting into the sun, I saw the vets...They were moving up Collins Avenue in dead silence; 1,200 of them dressed in battle fatigues, helmets, combat boots...a few carried full-size plastic M-16s, many peace symbols, girlfriends walking beside vets being pushed along the street in slow-moving wheelchairs, others walking jerkily on crutches...But nobody spoke; all the "stop, start"..."fast, slow"..."left, right" commands came from "platoon leaders" walking slightly off to the side of the main column and using hand signals.
One look at that eerie procession killed my plan to go swimming that afternoon. I left my car parked at a parking meter in front of the Cadillac Hotel and joined the march...No, "joined" is the wrong word; that was not the kind of procession that you just walked up and "joined." Not without paying some very heavy dues: an arm gone here, a leg there, paralysis, a face full of lumpy scar tissue...all staring straight ahead as the long silent column moved between rows of hotel porches full of tight-lipped Senior Citizens, through the heart of Miami Beach.
The silence of the march was contagious, almost threatening. There were hundreds of spectators, but nobody said a word. I walked beside the column for ten blocks, and the only sounds I remember hearing were the soft thump of boot leather on hot asphalt and the occasional rattling of an open canteen top.'
- The Campaign Trail: More Fear and Loathing in Miami: Nixon Bites the Bomb, September 28, 1972, Fear and Loathing at the Rolling Stone, The Essential Writing of Hunter S. Thompson
'Findings from a new government-funded analysis of U.S. Army recruits suggest that past cannabis use has relatively little impact on overall performance. Recruits with documented histories of marijuana use were just as likely as their peers to make sergeant, for example, and while they were more likely to leave the Army over drug use, they were less likely to separate as the result of health or performance concerns.
Further, there’s no strong evidence that the continuing trend of legalization across the country has significantly affected recruit outcomes.
“Contrary to expectations, waivered recruits and recruits with a documented history of marijuana or behavioral health conditions are not uniformly riskier across all dimensions,” says the analysis, from the RAND Corporation. “In some cases, they are historically more likely to perform better.”'
https://www.marijuanamoment.net/army-recruits-whove-used-marijuana-perform-no-worse-than-other-soldiers-military-funded-report-finds/
Members of the Senate’s Veterans’ Affairs Committee advanced legislation today directing the United States Department of Veterans Affairs to conduct research evaluating the safety and efficacy of cannabis products for veterans suffering from chronic pain and post-traumatic stress.
The bipartisan legislation directs the VA’s office to conduct a large-scale observational trial assessing veterans’ use of cannabis and to report on its ability to mitigate pain, improve sleep, and influence subjects’ intake of prescription medicines or alcohol.
https://norml.org/blog/2023/02/16/us-senate-committee-advances-bill-facilitating-cannabis-research-among-veterans/
There is “no statistically significant increase” in psychosis-related diagnoses in states that have legalized marijuana compared to those that continue to criminalize cannabis, a new study published by the American Medical Association concluded.
Researchers at Stanford University, the University of Pennsylvania and the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) carried out an analysis of more than 63 million health insurance beneficiaries from 2003-2017 to address the idea that cannabis reform could be linked to higher rates of psychosis, which certain prohibitionists have cited to argue against legalization.
The study, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) Psychiatry, determined that, “compared with no legalization policy, states with legalization policies experienced no statistically significant increase in rates of psychosis-related diagnoses.”
https://www.marijuanamoment.net/marijuana-legalization-not-associated-with-increased-rates-of-psychosis-american-medical-association-study-of-63-million-people-finds/
'The Vets made their camp in a far corner of the park, then sealed it off with a network of perimeter guards and checkpoints that it made it virtually impossible to even enter the area unless you knew somebody inside. There was an ominous sense of dignity about everything the VVAW did in Miami. They rarely even hinted at violence, but their very presense was menacing - on a level that the Yippies, Zippies and SDS street crazies never even approached, despite all their yelling and thrashing.
The most impressive single performance in Miami during the three days of the GOP Convention was the VVAW march on the Fontainebleu on Tuesday afternoon. Most of the press and TV people were either down at the convention hall, covering the "liberals vs. conservatives" floor-fight over rules for seating delegates in 1976 - or standing around in the boiling mid-afternoon sun at Miami International Airport, waiting for Nixon to come swooping out of the sky in Air Force One.
My own plan for that afternoon was to drive far out to the end of Key Biscayne and find an empty part of the beach where I could swim by myself in the ocean, and not have to talk to anybody for a while. I didn't give a fuck about watching the rules fight, a doomed charade that the Nixon brain trust had already settled in favor of the conservatives...and I saw no point in going to the airport to watch three thousand well-rehearsed "Nixon Youth" robots "welcome the president."'
- The Campaign Trail: More Fear and Loathing in Miami: Nixon Bites the Bomb, September 28, 1972, Fear and Loathing at the Rolling Stone, The Essential Writing of Hunter S. Thompson
'Investigators reported that ten percent of those sampled acknowledged past-year cannabis use. Consumers were most likely to define their consumption as medical-only if they were age 65 or older.
Only a minority of the study’s respondents acknowledged having received an authorization to use cannabis from a healthcare provider. This is likely because federal law prohibits providers affiliated with the Department of Veterans Affairs from issuing recommendations, even in states where the medical use of cannabis is legal.
The study’s authors concluded: “Our findings, taken in context with current federal policy, point toward a need for enhanced care coordination among veterans who may benefit from marijuana, but are unable to access it through the VA. … Additional research is needed to better understand veterans’ use of a marijuana in the context of federal VA restrictions, including the examination of how veterans obtain marijuana, what affect this has on their care coordination and health outcomes, and whether or not marijuana can play a role in reducing other drug use and drug-related harms among veterans.”
According to nationwide survey data compiled by the group Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, 75 percent of military veterans “would be interested in using cannabis or cannabinoid products as a treatment option if it were available.”'
https://norml.org/news/2023/03/30/survey-one-in-ten-veterans-acknowledges-using-cannabis/
'Republicans blocked a procedural vote that would have advanced legislation, S. 326: the VA Medicinal Cannabis Research Act, to the floor of the United States Senate.
All but eight GOP members voted against the bill’s advancement, assuring that it would not meet the 60 vote threshold necessary to move forward under Senate rules. The measure had previously passed unanimously out of the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee with bipartisan support.
The legislation directs the Department of Veterans Affairs to conduct an 18-month observational study to assess the effects of cannabis in veterans suffering from chronic pain and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
Observational trial data published in December reported that patients suffering from post-traumatic stress exhibit “statistically significant improvements” in a variety of domains – including sleep, anxiety, and stress – following their use of cannabis. By contrast, a 2021 clinical trial reported that the inhalation of marijuana flowers provided limited benefits compared to placebo in treating symptoms of PTSD.
Data published earlier this year in the journal JAMA Network Open reported that nearly one in three pain patients residing in states where medical cannabis access is legal have consumed it for pain management. Pain patients who utilize cannabis frequently report decreasing or ceasing their use of opioids. '
https://norml.org/news/2023/05/04/senate-republicans-block-effort-encouraging-the-veterans-administration-to-study-cannabis-as-a-treatment-option-for-post-traumatic-stress/
'More than half of the studies, however, have shown that cannabis and alcohol are substitutes, meaning that the increased use of one substance reduces the use of the other. Other researchers have also suggested that cannabis, especially cannabis for medical use, may serve as a substitute for alcohol, tobacco and other drugs, including prescription drugs.' - United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, World Drug Report 2020, https://wdr.unodc.org/wdr2020/field/WDR20_BOOKLET_4.pdf
You can down a few bottles of whiskey or pop a handful of opioids, sleeping pills and prescription drugs though, no problem...
'While the message was serious, the warning to military members at least ended on a lighter note, seeming to acknowledge the therapeutic use of cannabis edibles, something that federal law still doesn’t officially recognize: “Your friend’s grandma’s miracle sticky buns might look mighty tasty and get rave reviews at the big shindig, but if you’re in the military or work for the federal government you might want to think twice and make sure they weren’t made to treat her bad hip first before you jeopardize your career.”'
https://www.marijuanamoment.net/u-s-air-force-warns-about-grandmas-marijuana-infused-miracle-sticky-buns/
'While the message was serious, the warning to military members at least ended on a lighter note, seeming to acknowledge the therapeutic use of cannabis edibles, something that federal law still doesn’t officially recognize: “Your friend’s grandma’s miracle sticky buns might look mighty tasty and get rave reviews at the big shindig, but if you’re in the military or work for the federal government you might want to think twice and make sure they weren’t made to treat her bad hip first before you jeopardize your career.”'
https://www.marijuanamoment.net/u-s-air-force-warns-about-grandmas-marijuana-infused-miracle-sticky-buns/
'The Fontainebleu was already walled off from the street by five hundred heavily armed cops when the front ranks of the Last Patrol arrived, still marching in total silence. Several hours earlier, a noisy mob of Yippie/Zippie/SDS "non-delegates" had shown up in front of the Fontainebleu and been met with jeers and curses from the GOP delegates and other partisan spectators, massed behind the police lines...But now there was no jeering. Even the cops seemed deflated. They watched nervously from behind their face-shields as the VVAW platoon leaders, still using hand signals, funneled the column into a tight semicircle that blocked all three northbound lanes of Collins Avenue. During earlier demonstrations - at least six in the past three days - the police had poked people with riot sticks to make sure at least one lane of the street stayed open for local traffic, and on the one occasion when mere prodding didn't work, they had charged the demonstrators and cleared the street completely.
But not now. For the first and only time during the whole convention, the cops were clearly off balance. The vets could have closed all six lanes of Collins Avenue if they'd wanted to, and nobody would have argued. I have been covering anti-war demonstrations with depressing regularity since the winter of 1964, in cities all over the country, and I have never seen cops so intimidated by demonstrators as they were in front of the Fontainebleu Hotel on that hot Tuesday afternoon in Miami Beach.
There was an awful tension in that silence. Not even that pack of rich sybarites out there on the foredeck of the Wild Rose could stay in their seats for this show. They were standing up at the rail, looking worried, getting very bad vibrations from whatever was happening over there on the street. Was something wrong with their gladiators? Were they spooked? And why was there no noise?'
- The Campaign Trail: More Fear and Loathing in Miami: Nixon Bites the Bomb, September 28, 1972, Fear and Loathing at the Rolling Stone, The Essential Writing of Hunter S. Thompson
'“Despite the refusal of the [VA] and Arizona’s public universities and hospitals to assist with recruitment for the study, the trial is on track to finish on time,” read a news release from the nonprofit Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies, which is sponsoring the research.
To enroll, veterans had to be diagnosed with chronic PTSD brought on by military service. Researchers wanted a range of ages, as well as men and women. The study needed 76 veterans to be viable.'
https://www.stripes.com/news/us/marijuana-ptsd-study-reaches-target-enrollment-of-76-veterans-1.556639
'Asked whether medical marijuana was among the alternative therapies the VA would explore for patients, Wilkie said flatly that cannabis “is against federal law.”
“If that changed, would you be OK with it?” a moderator at a National Press Club forum asked.
“If the laws change and there’s medical evidence there, of course we look at that,” Wilkie said. “But the law is pretty clear at the federal level.”'
https://www.marijuanamoment.net/va-will-explore-medical-marijuana-but-only-if-federal-law-changes-secretary-says/
'Often abused by adolescents and military personnel to elude detection in drug tests due to their lack of structural similarity to delta9-THC, SCBs are falsely marketed as safe marijuana substitutes. Instead, SCBs are a highly structural diverse group of compounds, easily synthesized, which produce very dangerous adverse effects occurring by, as of yet, unknown mechanisms.
Therefore, available evidence indicates that K2/Spice products are clearly not safe marijuana alternatives.'
https://www.cell.com/trends/pharmacological-sciences/fulltext/S0165-6147(16)30185-7
Telling police officers that they cannot use cannabis off duty where recreational use is legal seems discriminatory and an infringement on their basic rights especially in a line of work where problems like PTSD, depression and anxiety have a higher chance of occurring. Cannabis usage policies while off duty should at a minimum be similar to that of alcohol.
'Tom Stamatakis, president of the Canadian Police Association, wonders why certain forces are treating cannabis differently than other legal products — such as alcohol and prescription drugs — that can cause impairment. “Effectively what they’re saying is, we don’t trust police officers to make the right decision when it comes to reporting for work fit for duty,” Stamatakis said in an interview. “And I just find that to be an offensive approach.”'
https://ottawacitizen.com/cannabis/police-officers-decry-offensive-restrictions-on-off-duty-cannabis-use/wcm/7b87aeca-f9a4-44ed-88bb-ab1338eb5e7e
'The existing policy is outlined in a November 2014 memo from then Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, which says that anyone who disregards federal law about "the use, sale, or manufacture of marijuana" could be denied a security clearance, but does not mention investing in companies that sell marijuana products legally.
Put simply, there's nothing currently in writing that says troops and Defense Department civilians can't own stock in companies that legally sell marijuana products, but that doesn't necessarily mean that's a good idea.
"The DoD CAF adheres to applicable policies when making adjudicative determinations," Harris said. "These determinations apply the 'whole person concept' and take into account all available information, favorable and unfavorable, to render an appropriate determination on a person's reliability and trustworthiness to hold a clearance."'
https://taskandpurpose.com/stocks-marijuana
'One of the platoon leaders smiled faintly and assured McCloskey that
they'd never had any intention of attacking the Fontainebleu. They
didn't even want to go in. The only reason they asked was to see if the
Republicans would turn them away in front of network TV cameras - which
they did, but very few cameras were on hand that afternoon to record it.
All the network floor crews were down at the convention hall, and the
ones who would have normally been on standby were out at the airport
filming Nixon's arrival.
No doubt there were backup crews around somewhere - but I expect they were up on the roof, using very long lenses, because in those first few moments when the vets began massing in front of the police line, there was no mistaking the potential for real violence...and it was easy enough to see, by scanning the faces behind those clear plastic face masks, that the cream of the Florida State Highway Patrol had no appetite at all for a public crunch with 1,200 angry Vietnam veterans.
Whatever the outcome, it was a guaranteed nightmare situation for the police. Defeat would be bad enough, but victory would be intolerable. Every TV screen in the nation would show a small army of heavily armed Florida cops clubbing unarmed veterans - some on crutches and others in wheelchairs - whose only crime was trying to enter Republican Convention headquarters in Miami Beach. How could Nixon explain a thing like that? Could he slither out from under it?
Never in hell, I thought - and all it would take to make a thing like that happen, right now, would be for one or two vets to lose control of themselves and try to crash through the police line; just enough violence to make one cop use his riot stick. The rest would take care of itself.
Ah, nightmares, nightmares...Not even Sammy Davis Jr. could stomach that kind of outrage. He would flee the Nixon compound within moments after the first news bulletin, rejecting his newfound soul brother like a suckfish cutting loose from a mortally wounded shark...and the next day's Washington Post would report that Sammy Davis Jr. had spent most of the previous night trying to ooze through the keyhole of George McGovern's front door in suburban Maryland.'
- The Campaign Trail: More Fear and Loathing in Miami: Nixon Bites the Bomb, September 28, 1972, Fear and Loathing at the Rolling Stone, The Essential Writing of Hunter S. Thompson
Legalize ganja in Punjab to neutralize smuggling into the state of opium and synthetic drugs and to protect the health of the Indian Army.
'He said it was a very critical issue, that had been going on for a long time in Punjab. The State had seen a shift from use of marijuana to synthetic stuff, which was posing a major threat.
The seizure of a consignment that had come from Mandavi in Gujarat into Punjab clearly suggested that the aim of the drug smugglers was to starve the Indian Army of precious manpower, Mr. Singh said.'
https://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-national/tp-otherstates/punjab-cm-calls-for-collective-efforts-to-fight-drug-menace/article25185952.ece
'The uncertainty surrounding the issue has arisen from recent guidance circulated within the Defense Department and in conflicting news reports.
While federal law and DOD policy remain opposed to possession, use, manufacture, sale or distribution of pot, rapid changes to the burgeoning quasi-legal weed industry have raised questions among those looking to invest early into the “Amazon of pot.”
Adding to the confusion is the fact that some investors — including servicemembers participating in the Thrift Savings Plan — may hold shares of companies invested in pot-related businesses without knowing it. The federal government also may be indirectly invested in the industry through the company it hired to manage the TSP and retirement investment funds.'
https://www.stripes.com/pentagon-hazy-on-legality-of-pot-company-investments-for-servicemembers-1.572332
'A Vietnam veteran and career educator at an elite military training school now finds himself resorting to a Reagan-era executive order in hopes of clearing his name. Henry Cobbs' crime? Vaping a non-psychoactive form of cannabis to treat his prostrate cancer.'
https://www.heraldtribune.com/news/20181001/military-school-dean-fired-after-using-cannabis-to-treat-cancer
'The VA Medicinal Cannabis Research Act would mandate research into the potential therapeutic use of cannabis for conditions that commonly afflict veterans such as chronic pain and post-traumatic stress disorder.
“With the opioid crisis raging across America, it is imperative to the health and safety of our veterans that we find alternative treatments for chronic pain and service-related injuries,” Correa said in a press release. “Numerous veterans attest to the treatment benefits of medical cannabis. It’s time the VA did a formal study.”'
https://www.marijuanamoment.net/new-congressional-bill-requires-va-to-study-medical-marijuana-for-veterans/
'Israel’s military will be relaxing its disciplinary actions against soldiers accused of consuming cannabis while they are on leave, a general in charge of the reform said Wednesday. Offending soldiers will no longer be systematically court-martialed nor receive prison sentences of up to two months, said reserve Maj. Gen. Danny Efroni, the Israeli Defense Force’s former chief military advocate general, according to Times of Israel.'
https://www.leafly.com/news/politics/israels-military-relax-stance-cannabis-soldiers
No doubt there were backup crews around somewhere - but I expect they were up on the roof, using very long lenses, because in those first few moments when the vets began massing in front of the police line, there was no mistaking the potential for real violence...and it was easy enough to see, by scanning the faces behind those clear plastic face masks, that the cream of the Florida State Highway Patrol had no appetite at all for a public crunch with 1,200 angry Vietnam veterans.
Whatever the outcome, it was a guaranteed nightmare situation for the police. Defeat would be bad enough, but victory would be intolerable. Every TV screen in the nation would show a small army of heavily armed Florida cops clubbing unarmed veterans - some on crutches and others in wheelchairs - whose only crime was trying to enter Republican Convention headquarters in Miami Beach. How could Nixon explain a thing like that? Could he slither out from under it?
Never in hell, I thought - and all it would take to make a thing like that happen, right now, would be for one or two vets to lose control of themselves and try to crash through the police line; just enough violence to make one cop use his riot stick. The rest would take care of itself.
Ah, nightmares, nightmares...Not even Sammy Davis Jr. could stomach that kind of outrage. He would flee the Nixon compound within moments after the first news bulletin, rejecting his newfound soul brother like a suckfish cutting loose from a mortally wounded shark...and the next day's Washington Post would report that Sammy Davis Jr. had spent most of the previous night trying to ooze through the keyhole of George McGovern's front door in suburban Maryland.'
- The Campaign Trail: More Fear and Loathing in Miami: Nixon Bites the Bomb, September 28, 1972, Fear and Loathing at the Rolling Stone, The Essential Writing of Hunter S. Thompson
Legalize ganja in Punjab to neutralize smuggling into the state of opium and synthetic drugs and to protect the health of the Indian Army.
'He said it was a very critical issue, that had been going on for a long time in Punjab. The State had seen a shift from use of marijuana to synthetic stuff, which was posing a major threat.
The seizure of a consignment that had come from Mandavi in Gujarat into Punjab clearly suggested that the aim of the drug smugglers was to starve the Indian Army of precious manpower, Mr. Singh said.'
https://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-national/tp-otherstates/punjab-cm-calls-for-collective-efforts-to-fight-drug-menace/article25185952.ece
'The uncertainty surrounding the issue has arisen from recent guidance circulated within the Defense Department and in conflicting news reports.
While federal law and DOD policy remain opposed to possession, use, manufacture, sale or distribution of pot, rapid changes to the burgeoning quasi-legal weed industry have raised questions among those looking to invest early into the “Amazon of pot.”
Adding to the confusion is the fact that some investors — including servicemembers participating in the Thrift Savings Plan — may hold shares of companies invested in pot-related businesses without knowing it. The federal government also may be indirectly invested in the industry through the company it hired to manage the TSP and retirement investment funds.'
https://www.stripes.com/pentagon-hazy-on-legality-of-pot-company-investments-for-servicemembers-1.572332
'A Vietnam veteran and career educator at an elite military training school now finds himself resorting to a Reagan-era executive order in hopes of clearing his name. Henry Cobbs' crime? Vaping a non-psychoactive form of cannabis to treat his prostrate cancer.'
https://www.heraldtribune.com/news/20181001/military-school-dean-fired-after-using-cannabis-to-treat-cancer
'The VA Medicinal Cannabis Research Act would mandate research into the potential therapeutic use of cannabis for conditions that commonly afflict veterans such as chronic pain and post-traumatic stress disorder.
“With the opioid crisis raging across America, it is imperative to the health and safety of our veterans that we find alternative treatments for chronic pain and service-related injuries,” Correa said in a press release. “Numerous veterans attest to the treatment benefits of medical cannabis. It’s time the VA did a formal study.”'
https://www.marijuanamoment.net/new-congressional-bill-requires-va-to-study-medical-marijuana-for-veterans/
'Israel’s military will be relaxing its disciplinary actions against soldiers accused of consuming cannabis while they are on leave, a general in charge of the reform said Wednesday. Offending soldiers will no longer be systematically court-martialed nor receive prison sentences of up to two months, said reserve Maj. Gen. Danny Efroni, the Israeli Defense Force’s former chief military advocate general, according to Times of Israel.'
https://www.leafly.com/news/politics/israels-military-relax-stance-cannabis-soldiers
'Vietnam veterans like Ron Kovic are not welcome in Nixon's White House.
They tried to get in last year, but they could only get close enough to
throw their war medals over the fence. That was perhaps the most
eloquent anti-war statement ever made in this country, and that Silent
March on the Fontainebleu on August 22 had the same ugly sting to it.
There is no anti-war or even anti-establishment group in America today with the psychic leverage of the VVAW. Not even those decadent swine on the deck of the Wild Rose can ignore Ron Kovic and his buddies have paid. They are golems, come back to haunt us all - even Richard Nixon, who campaigned for the presidency in 1968 with a promise that he had "a secret plan" to end the war in Vietnam.
Which is true, as it turns out. The plan was to end the war just in time to get himself reelected in 1972.
Four more years.'
- The Campaign Trail: More Fear and Loathing in Miami: Nixon Bites the Bomb, September 28, 1972, Fear and Loathing at the Rolling Stone, The Essential Writing of Hunter S. Thompson
There is no anti-war or even anti-establishment group in America today with the psychic leverage of the VVAW. Not even those decadent swine on the deck of the Wild Rose can ignore Ron Kovic and his buddies have paid. They are golems, come back to haunt us all - even Richard Nixon, who campaigned for the presidency in 1968 with a promise that he had "a secret plan" to end the war in Vietnam.
Which is true, as it turns out. The plan was to end the war just in time to get himself reelected in 1972.
Four more years.'
- The Campaign Trail: More Fear and Loathing in Miami: Nixon Bites the Bomb, September 28, 1972, Fear and Loathing at the Rolling Stone, The Essential Writing of Hunter S. Thompson
Marijuana is much better than war...
'But if that would-be soldier is perhaps a little older, and has grown up in a state like Colorado, California or Massachusetts or another of eight states that have legalized cannabis for recreational use among adults it’s possible that he could have been legally smoking marijuana for several years before deciding to join the military. And if he decides to be truthful with his recruiter, his dreams could be dashed.'
https://www.armytimes.com/news/your-army/2018/08/29/as-the-army-modernizes-its-standards-to-join-legal-marijuana-use-is-still-an-open-question/
'Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA), a group representing more than 400,000 veterans, released the survey on Wednesday. It showed that 83 percent support allowing legal access to medical marijuana, while 55 percent back recreational legalization. That’s a significant jump in support; the organization’s 2017 survey found that only 44 percent of veterans supported full legalization that year.
There’s also significant interest among veterans in using cannabis or cannabinoid products as an alternative treatment option, with 89 percent indicating they’d pursue that option if it was available to them.'
https://www.marijuanamoment.net/survey-veterans-support-marijuana-legalization-and-increasing-medical-cannabis-research/
Often, the people who express great respect and admiration for the soldier are the ones who are unfit, unable or unwilling to become one themselves. However, they will bully a person in the name of patriotism if he or she does not stand up for the national anthem in the movie theatre. They will extol the virtues of being a soldier and convince their sons and daughters to become soldiers. They will reap the benefits of association with the soldier through discounted army materials and kickbacks in various forms. They will create situations of conflict wherever possible and then without batting an eyelid send the soldiers in the millions to their death. They will construct memorials in the name of the dead and pose for pictures in front of the graves. They will make movies about the courage and valor of the soldier. They will once again express their profound respect and admiration for the soldier. They will then start looking for the next chance to use the soldier. To them the soldier is just a pawn in their game...https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZIKrGg15eds
It will be infinitely better if politicians, generals and soldiers smoke pot and keep the peace instead of having to see the day when soldiers on performance enhancing drugs run amok. War is not a game, death means the end of your life no matter what psychedelic state of mind you are in. Worse still war means the death of vast numbers of men, women and children who want no part in the foolish adventures that combatants and politicians are apparently itching to be a part of.
'“Combat does not reward fair play, and World Anti-Doping Agency doping control officers are not taking samples after missions to ban Marines from ‘competition.’ Our enemies are already seeking an edge over us through [performance enhancing drugs] and nootropics,” Albayrak argues in his proposal. “War is not a game, and meeting your enemy on equal footing is a fool’s errand.”'
https://www.thedailybeast.com/can-american-troops-win-wars-by-dropping-acid
'“There is currently substantial evidence from a comprehensive study by the National Academy of Sciences and the National Academic Press that concludes cannabinoids are effective for treating chronic pain, chemotherapy-induced nausea and vomiting, sleep disturbances related to obstructive sleep apnea, multiple sclerosis spasticity symptoms, and fibromyalgia –– all of which are prevalent in the veteran population,” he wrote.
Lawrence encouraged Congress to pass legislation that would “require VA to conduct a federally funded study with veteran participants for medical cannabis,” including veterans with PTSD, chronic pain and cancer.'
https://www.marijuanamoment.net/military-veterans-organizations-press-congress-on-medical-marijuana-research/
https://norml.org/marijuana/fact-sheets/item/veterans-and-cannabis
Thousands of military veterans have echoed Alonzo’s claim for years. They have pressured federal and state legislators to legalize medicinal cannabis and ease rules on research into the plant’s apparent therapeutic properties, arguing that it could help reduce suicide rates among former soldiers.
'Today the Patton family stands with all Americans in proudly supporting U.S. military veterans. In adding medical cannabis to their farm’s continuing cultivation of traditional crops, they promote veteran and diversity employment and continued scientific study of the potential benefits of cannabis in treating PTSD and other ailments.'
https://newfrontierdata.com/marijuana-insights/patton-family-green-meadows-farm-commitment-giving-back/
'Not much of what was said could be heard more than fifteen feet from
the bullhorn, however, because of two army helicopters that suddenly
appeared overhead and filled the whole street with their noise. The only
vet speaker who managed to make himself clearly understood above the
chopper noise was an ex-marine sergeant from Massapequa named Ron Kovic,
who spoke from a wheelchair because his legs are permanently paralyzed.
I would like to have a transcript or at least a tape of what Kovic said that day, because his words lashed the crowd like a wire whip. If Kovic had been allowed to speak from the convention hall podium, in front of network TV cameras, Nixon wouldn't have had the balls to show up and accept the nomination.
No...I suspect that's wishful thinking. Nothing in the realm of human possibility could have prevented Richard Nixon from accepting that nomination. If God himself had showed up in Miami and denounced Nixon from the podium, hired gunsels from the Committee for the Re-Election of the President would have quickly had him arrested for disturbing the peace.'
- The Campaign Trail: More Fear and Loathing in Miami: Nixon Bites the Bomb, September 28, 1972, Fear and Loathing at the Rolling Stone, The Essential Writing of Hunter S. Thompson
I would like to have a transcript or at least a tape of what Kovic said that day, because his words lashed the crowd like a wire whip. If Kovic had been allowed to speak from the convention hall podium, in front of network TV cameras, Nixon wouldn't have had the balls to show up and accept the nomination.
No...I suspect that's wishful thinking. Nothing in the realm of human possibility could have prevented Richard Nixon from accepting that nomination. If God himself had showed up in Miami and denounced Nixon from the podium, hired gunsels from the Committee for the Re-Election of the President would have quickly had him arrested for disturbing the peace.'
- The Campaign Trail: More Fear and Loathing in Miami: Nixon Bites the Bomb, September 28, 1972, Fear and Loathing at the Rolling Stone, The Essential Writing of Hunter S. Thompson
'"Marijuana and its compounds show promise for treating a wide-range of diseases and disorders, including pain management," the legislation's findings section reads. "Medical marijuana in States where it is legal may serve as a less harmful alternative to opioids in treating veterans."'
https://www.forbes.com/sites/tomangell/2018/09/05/senate-bill-legalizes-medical-marijuana-for-military-veterans/#7ad9074072a5
The agency should study medical marijuana use to treat post-traumatic stress disorder and chronic pain. Passage of Walz’s VA Medicinal Cannabis Research Act would kick-start that work.'
http://www.startribune.com/hearing-on-veterans-suicide-was-too-important-to-be-overlooked/495098781/
'Last year, the American Legion, the oldest and largest veterans service organization in the U.S., could ignore the facts no longer. Since the expansion of its Veterans Crisis Line in 2007, the Department of Veterans Affairs has been logging 500,000 phone calls, e-chats and text messages annually, and its staff have sent emergency services to callers more than 66,000 times. And since early 2015, the Legion itself has been getting swamped by calls from traumatized Iraq/Afghanistan veterans for whom VA prescriptions weren’t working. They wanted legal access to marijuana.'
https://www.rxforveterans.com/
'The American Legion, the nation’s largest veterans organization, has been one of the loudest voices demanding increased research into the efficacy of medical marijuana.'
https://www.thecannabist.co/2018/03/29/medical-marijuana-veterans-shulkin-ronny-jackson/102650/
'DAV calls for more research into medical cannabis as an alternative pain relief option for veterans with chronic pain, PTSD and TBIs'
https://www.dav.org/learn-more/news/2018/the-cannabis-cure/
'Eaze, the on-demand cannabis marketplace, today announced the launch of a new program to expand access to cannabis for U.S. veterans. Beginning this Veterans Day (Sunday, November 11), veterans will receive a 25% discount on products purchased through Eaze. The discount reflects Eaze's commitment to helping veterans safely access sustainable, affordable relief from PTSD, physical disabilities, chronic pain, and other combat-related conditions.
https://www.eaze.com/blog/posts/eaze-announces-new-program-provide-u-s-veterans-25-discount
Until the day we can abolish war and crime in society, one of the easiest and most compassionate things we can do is provide access to cannabis to treat PTSD in military and police veterans and persons in service. We offer so much lip service to their sacrifices for the nation but continue to use them as ammunition for the politician's increasing selfish battles. What are we really doing to make things better for them? Worldwide the rates of suicide are high among army and police veterans. Quite often the cause for suicide is despair due to the inability of the social system in place to provide the necessary means to treat the veteran's pain, stress, depression and need for recreation. The costs associated with medical treatment and the usage of dangerous and ineffective pharmaceutical drugs only compound the veteran's situation. Often alcohol and other high potency drugs like heroin are straws that the veteran tries to clutch but which only serve to drag him further into despair.
To me this shift to marijuana over all other pharmaceutical drugs
looks great but the report doesn't seem to agree. Some parts of this
report seems to hint that one veteran killed his family and committed
suicide because he was prescribed 10 grams of marijuana per day. It
seems to create this picture even though it states that the person
suffered from PTSD after serving in Afghanistan, had major depressive
disorder, financial and marital difficulties, a childhood of verbal and
physical abuse and was most likely on benzodiazepines, a known class of
drugs with high suicide rates. In India, before prohibition, 200 grams a
day was the common legal amount that could be sold to an individual at a
retail outlet and 20-40 grams a day was considered moderate intake.
'The Department of Veterans Affairs spent $77,794,212.57 last year on marijuana.That is more than the department spent ($66.2 million) on the 12,000 other drugs approved to be prescribed for veterans.'
https://www.saltwire.com/news/provincial/special-report-profitable-trauma-medical-marijuana-and-canadas-veterans-451441/
'But how will nations defend themselves against their enemies, how will they maintain internal order, and how can nations live without an army?
What form the life of men will take if they repudiate murder, we do not and cannot know; but one thing is certain: that it is more natural for men to be guided by the reason and conscience with which they are endowed, than to submit slavishly to people who arrange wholesale murders; and that therefore the form of social order assumed in the lives of those who are guided in their actions not by violence based on threats of murder but by reason and conscience, will in any case be no worse than that under which they now live.
That is all I want to say. I shall be very sorry if it offends or grieves anyone or evokes any ill feeling. But for me, a man eighty years old, expecting to die at any moment, it would be shameful and criminal not to speak out the whole truth as I understand it - the truth which, as I firmly believe, is alone capable of relieving mankind from the incalculable ills produced by war.'
- Leo Tolstoy - The Kingdom of God and Peace Essays
'The Department of Veterans Affairs spent $77,794,212.57 last year on marijuana.That is more than the department spent ($66.2 million) on the 12,000 other drugs approved to be prescribed for veterans.'
https://www.saltwire.com/news/provincial/special-report-profitable-trauma-medical-marijuana-and-canadas-veterans-451441/
'But how will nations defend themselves against their enemies, how will they maintain internal order, and how can nations live without an army?
What form the life of men will take if they repudiate murder, we do not and cannot know; but one thing is certain: that it is more natural for men to be guided by the reason and conscience with which they are endowed, than to submit slavishly to people who arrange wholesale murders; and that therefore the form of social order assumed in the lives of those who are guided in their actions not by violence based on threats of murder but by reason and conscience, will in any case be no worse than that under which they now live.
That is all I want to say. I shall be very sorry if it offends or grieves anyone or evokes any ill feeling. But for me, a man eighty years old, expecting to die at any moment, it would be shameful and criminal not to speak out the whole truth as I understand it - the truth which, as I firmly believe, is alone capable of relieving mankind from the incalculable ills produced by war.'
- Leo Tolstoy - The Kingdom of God and Peace Essays
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