US military to deploy MDMA therapy for PTSD amid systemic failures in trauma care and war profiteering
Original framing: “Active-duty US soldiers to receive MDMA therapy for PTSD next year” — The Guardian - World
The military's interest in psychedelics dates to Cold War-era programs like MK-Ultra, where LSD was weaponized for interrogation and mind control. PTSD was only formally recognized in 1980 after Vietnam veterans' activism, yet the DoD has consistently deprioritized mental health funding. The current MDMA trials echo earlier failed attempts to 'optimize' soldiers (e.g., amphetamines in WWII), revealing a pattern of pharmacological quick-fixes over structural reform.
The US military's embrace of MDMA therapy for PTSD is a symptom of a deeper systemic failure: a war economy that profits from perpetual conflict while offloading its human costs onto soldiers.
This narrative obscures the Pentagon's role in creating trauma through endless wars, the racial and gendered disparities in who bears that trauma, and the colonial erasure of Indigenous healing traditions. The DoD's 'innovation' in psychedelic therapy mirrors historical patterns of pharmacological quick-fixes, from amphetamines in WWII to today's MDMA trials—each time deflecting from the need for structural change. True healing requires demilitarizing trauma care, centering marginalized voices, and dismantling the war economy that perpetuates it. The trickster's lesson is clear: the absurdity of dosing soldiers to return to combat reveals the folly of a system that treats human suffering as a solvable chemical imbalance rather than a political failure.