4 - The Black Vault

THE BDM CORPORATION
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indicated earlier, some
noted in 1965.
low-frequency drug usage by American troops was
Beginning in 1957 questionnaires submitted to "outprocessing"
enlisted personnel at the 22d and 90th Replacement Battalions at Cam
Rahn Bay provided more reliable data on drug usage.
Available statistics indicate that the frequent use of marijuana
increased, peaking in 1970 when almost 60% of the servicemen outprocessing
acknowledged the use of marijuana. 18/
In a statement before the Senate
Subcommittee on Juvenile Delinquency (Octouer 1970), J. Steinberg reported
that' up to 70% of patients who were referred to psychiatric evaluation in
Vietnam reported their use of illicit drugs. 19/
Another study states that duriiig the summer of 1970 the pattern
of illicit drug use changed perceptibly towards the more frequent use of
"harder" drugs, especially heroin. This was reflected in the increased
number of heroin deaths due to overdose reported in theater hospitals and
the frequent use reported by 15% of the enlisted personnel by the fall of
1970. 20/
ae In his non-technical but highly descriptive account qf the
appearance of illicit drugs in Vietnam, Boyle states that binoctal was the
precursor to heroin which "had not yet appeared in South Vietnam in
1969." 21/ He further goes on to state that "grass," i.e., marijuana, was
*already in wide use by the late 50s and that the Army,
realizing the exivtef,(:e
of a drug problem, already had established a drug treatment program
at the 98th The Medical operation Detachment, of a heroin located smuggling in Nha Trang. ring as early as 1965 and
subsequent reports to the Pentagon in 1967 of the complicity and direct
involvement by high officials of the South Vietnamese government is described
by CI'itchfield's decidedly ariti-Ky regime narrative. 22/
Critchfield's
account is useful, however,
the drug problem
American troops.
in that it ties together the origin of
in Vietneuv with the arrival of substantial numbers 'f
By January 1968 marijuana use was an established paYt of the
Vietnamese combat environment. In recognition of the problem, special
marijuana and narcotics investigation teams were put in operation. 23/ On
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