Blitzed by Norman Ohler

6 out of 10

European powers used their colonial territories to supply coffee, tea, poppies, tobacco, and other natural narcotics.  Germany (especially after the Treaty of Versailles) focused more on synthetic stimulants.  Stone-cold-sober Nazis espoused loony rhetoric and delusions of global domination, so the inclusion of drugs is not vital to explain the madness.  The regime was obsessed with purity while also trying to build super-soldiers.  The pharmaceutical industry was intertwined with the war machine.  Even as the Allies continued to have major victories on the battlefields, Hitler maintained his megalomania--in part due to eukodal and other medicated cocktails administered by his personal doctor.  The paranoid psychotic man decayed in his bunker until his cyanide and bullet finished the job.