Brown-brown is a form of powdered cocaine, cut with gunpowder. It is commonly given to child soldiers in West African armed conflicts. Smokeless powder usually contains nitroglycerin, which is a vasodilator, thus making the delivery of cocaine to the brain via the bloodstream faster. This, in turn, is believed to allow for a more intense high. Consumed by snorting, the drug mixture increases aggression.
Ishmael Beah, the author of A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier, stated:
“Our commanders gave us drugs – marijuana, cocaine, and Brown Brown: a concoction of cocaine and gunpowder — before battles to anaesthetize us to what we had to do. You mix cocaine with gun powder. When you sniff it at first it hurts inside of our nose but as time goes on you get used to it. But the potency is greater than just cocaine itself. And these things altogether numb you to everything. You have no have no sympathy. You actually begin to enjoy what was happening once you are in.”
The drug gained notoriety after it was used by Nicholas Cage's character, Yuri Orlov, in the 2005 movie Lord of War.