Performance enhancers and war go hand in hand

Story by Stephen J. Thorne

The use of performance-enhancing drugs has a long history in war, both as a product of state-sanctioned programs and illicit use by participants. Stimulants such as cocaine and amphetamines have been used to create better soldiers by improving stamina, overcoming sleeplessness, eliminating fatigue and boosting fighting spirit. Downers such as alcohol, opiates, morphine, heroin, marijuana and barbiturates have addressed with varying success the soldier’s greatest enemy—shattered nerves.

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Medical aid in the deep freeze

Story by Sharon Adams

Climate change has increased interest—and traffic—in the Arctic. This raises new threats to national security and sovereignty and increases chances of environmental disasters, shipwrecks and plane crashes, any of which may call for the scrambling of the Canadian Armed Forces, at any time of the year.

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June 19, 1917

King George V (right), seen here with his cousin Tsar Nicholas II of Russia, orders the royal surname changed from the Germanic Saxe-Coburg-Gotha to Windsor.

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