Dexy’s midnight soldiers

As if the Brits couldn’t already be accused of prattling on incessantly, now Britain’s Ministry of Defence has admitted they’ve been giving their enlisted lads prescriptions for uppers to help keep them alert for days in war zones. This would only be half-troubling, the notion of chatty, cheap-accented, spitting Limeys notwithstanding, if the pills didn’t happen to be the very same ones blamed for a number of friendly fire deaths at the hands of U.S. military personnel over the past few years.

Though Britain has long denied serving up Dexedrine, documents obtained through the U.K.’s Freedom of Information Act show otherwise. While the amount spent on the tabs is only one per cent of that spent on sleep aids, analysts estimate the MoD is still scoring hundreds of five-milligram doses. The MoD won’t say what use the pills are actually put to, but few can see any other than to keep soldiers awake for long periods of time.

“There are not many uses for these drugs in the military,” said one unnamed department source. “If you need them for narcolepsy, then there’s not much point in you being in the army.”

by Scott Saxon