Fourteen US Air Force guards have been linked to yet another drug ring at F.E. Warren Air Force Base in Wyoming, a base that controls land-based Minuteman III missiles. They have faced disciplinary actions including courts martial, according to the Associated Press. Military investigators cracked the ring in 2016, after one of the service members made the mistake of posting drug-related material to social media. Six of the airmen were convicted of using or distributing LSD—which the Pentagon has stopped screening for in drug tests, the AP reported. The news service found that the drug ring operated outside the Cheyenne, Wyo. base and that the airmen took an array of drugs including ecstasy, cocaine and marijuana during their off-duty time. At least one airman acknowledged that while under the influence of LSD, he wouldn’t have been able to respond properly if he had been suddenly called to duty. The investigation came on the heels of other scandals involving the Minuteman missile corps including widespread cheating on missile launch proficiency exams. The Air Force faced a related scandal in 2002 when two fighter pilots were court-martialed after a bombing they did in Iraq killed four and injured eight Canadians. In court it was disclosed that the pilots were given amphetamines to stave off fatigue on long bombing runs—a failed policy that was temporarily halted after the 1991 Persian Gulf War. Maj. Glenn MacDonald (USAF Ret.) editor of MilitaryCorruption.com, said about the 2002 courts martial, “The USAF was coercing its pilots to possibly become drug addicts and endangering their health.”
—Associated Press, CBS News, Los Angeles Times, & National Public Radio, May 24, 2018; Wired, Feb. 10, 2003; & ABC News, Dec. 20, 2002
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