Defense Tech’s David Hambling writes that BZ is perhaps being used by Iraqi insurgents … against themselves. What is BZ?
BZ or “Agent Buzz” is the military name for 3-quinuclidinyl benzillate, an extremely powerful hallucinogen. After experimenting with a whole stash of mind-altering substances including cocaine, heroin and LSD, the Pentagon selected BZ for weaponizing. Its major advantages are that it can easily delivered in an aerosol cloud, and it is very safe. With many substances, the effective dose can be dangerously close to the amount needed to kill – ask any anesthetist. With BZ, the tiny effective dose (maybe two milligrams) is around one-thousandth the lethal dose. It is also odorless and invisible, and there is currently no means of detecting it.
Agent Buzz was tested between 1959 to 1975 on some twenty-eight hundred US soldiers at several locations. It proved extremely effective as an incapacitant. The physical effects are increased heart rates, pupil dilation, blurred vision, dry skin and mouth, increased temperature, and flushing of skin as a med school mnemonic has it blind as a bat, dry as a bone, hot as Hades, red as a beet.
But the psychological effects are more important than the physical ones, as the subject is also rendered mad as a hatter. … It also produces uncontrollable aggression, Wouter Basson, the man behind South Africas chemical and biological warfare program, notes … The Serb army manual on their BZ munitions implies a violent reaction: it can be expected that such individuals or groups will subsequently, under the effects of [this chemical agent], inflict great damage and losses on their own forces.
Hambling writes:
… its quite possible than coalition troops are facing a number of aggressive, paranoid insurgents, unable to tell friend from foe and unable to realize that there was anything wrong with them, beyond control and hallucinating their worst fears.
Could the guerillas be taking BZ — sometimes called the ultimate bad trip willingly? … In Iraq, cynical leaders might dole out BZ to unwitting cannon-fodder. A homicidally aggressive fighter, even an impaired one, is more useful than one who wont fight against insane odds.
Hambling concludes: “if anyone offers you any performance-enhancing substances with the words ‘Dude, this is weapons grade’ just say no.”