Forgotten Weapons: Japan’s Weaponized Opium Cigarettes

Once we consider weapons of battle, most of us consider tanks and fighter jets and artillery. For individuals who skilled battle within the Center East over the previous couple of many years, improvised explosive units (IEDs) and chemical weapons can also come to thoughts. However weapons do not need to be units that may trigger speedy loss of life and destruction. Some weapons are way more insidious. The newest video from Forgotten Weapons reveals an instance of a extremely efficient secret weapon created by imperial Japan throughout WWII to subvert and demoralize their enemies: opium cigarettes. These weaponized cigarettes had been secretly laced with opium and distributed all through China in an effort to trigger widespread dependancy, resulting in a gradual supply of revenue for Japan and likewise lowering Chinese language resistance to Japan’s invasion.

Opium Cigarettes: Utilizing Habit as a Weapon

Ian McCollum of Forgotten Weapons mentioned the historical past of those opium cigarettes with Patrick Phillips, the writer of Tobacco of the Emperor. Phillips explains that the pinnacle of Japanese intelligence in Manchuria, Basic Kenji Doihara, spearheaded the opium-laced cigarette program by distributing them to warlords all through China. These warlords would then place the cigarettes in bars, brothels, and playing homes, the place unsuspecting Chinese language residents would buy and smoke them.

Since Golden Bat was already an affordable and well-known model of cigarettes in China earlier than this program, and there was no seen indication of the addition of hint quantities of opium, people who smoke wouldn’t suspect a factor. The narcotic created a pleasing stress-free impact that saved the people who smoke coming again for extra, and shortly they had been addicted. It is very possible that this idea was impressed by the British involvement in opium smuggling into China within the 1700s and 1800s.

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We assumed this could be a largely unsuccessful experiment, very similar to Japan’s use of high-altitude incendiary balloons towards the continental United States. Nonetheless, Phillips says that wasn’t the case for the opium cigarettes. “It was wide-scale, and it labored. It labored very well for the Japanese, really.” Authorities later testified that this system generated as a lot as $300 million per 12 months for the Japanese authorities.

The chief of the weaponized cigarette program, Basic Doihara, was convicted of quite a few battle crimes and hanged after WWII. In accordance with former SOE operative Ronald Sydney Seth, “[Doihara’s] exercise performed a key function in shattering China’s means to confront Japan’s growth by producing chaotic circumstances, which prevented any mass response within the invaded nation.”

Take a look at the total video from Forgotten Weapons beneath for extra particulars, or choose up a duplicate of Patrick Phillips’ e-book right here.

Fashionable-Day Implications

Above: A desk stuffed with fentanyl and different medicine seized by Border Patrol. (U.S. Customs and Border Safety photograph by Kris Grogan)

Historical past repeats itself, so we will not assist however marvel in regards to the existence of recent applications impressed by the success of this opium cigarette program, very similar to imperial Japan was impressed by 18th century British opium distribution.

Contemplate the truth that China is the first exporter of fentanyl, an opioid drug which generates record-breaking overdose and dependancy charges 12 months after 12 months in america. China has additionally expressed a robust curiosity in the usage of unconventional and “Unrestricted Warfare” applications resembling financial warfare, political warfare, and cultural subversion towards technologically superior opponents (specifically america). CCP army officers said that these applications can “have the identical and even better damaging power than army warfare.” Whereas it is definitely doable (even possible) that China’s fentanyl exports are getting used deliberately to demoralize and destabilize the CCP’s enemies, there isn’t any technique to conclusively show it.

For an additional instance of narcotics exports getting used as a supply of army funding, we advocate studying about opium manufacturing in Afghanistan and its hyperlinks to the Taliban.

Written by Patrick McCarthy