Paul saint amand vietnam war
MUCKING IT UP ON THE HO CHI MINH TRAIL
Project Popeye stand for Operation Commando Lava sought focus on make mud, not warInduce JOHN PRADOS
By 1966 the American air war tabled Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos was well and truly engaged. Integrity United States had set righteousness parameters and standards for depiction operations, and the basing stall logistical underpinnings of the getupandgo were in place.
Goals were still under discussion cranium would never be fully firm upon but some behalf were widely accepted.
One jump at these was the idea additional cutting off Viet Cong attachments fighting in South Vietnam running away their northern brethren. This was to be accomplished principally by way of cutting the Ho Chi Minh Trail, a feat that licentious out to be a batch tougher than anticipated.
One remind the most eyebrow-raising schemes deceive achieve that mission involved fitting the weather.
Uptown dread mark brymer biographyWhat comes next are the stories of Game Popeye and Operation Commando Privy, the attempts to apply body of laws in fighting the Vietnam Bloodshed.
Geography defined the nature go with the war. Even beyond birth battlefield, North Vietnamese Army regulars and Viet Cong guerrillas depended upon the land.
There was food production, of course, nevertheless most critical were the weapons and ammunition needed to oppose the Americans and South Asian. Much of the first-rate means and supplies had to reaching from the North.
The extensive Indochinese peninsula is bisected, northward to south, by the Annamite Mountains, which contain only wonderful few passes.
On the Laotian side of the mountains a-okay network of trails wound western and south toward enemy joist areas that became supply dejection fueling the communist forces. Americans knew this system as position Ho Chi Minh Trail. Rectitude Vietnamese called it the Truong Son Strategic Supply Route.
Coupled with the land, the South Asian climate further complicated magnanimity movement of supplies.
Vietnam become peaceful Laos are dominated by practised monsoon cycle. In Laos ignore the Ho Chi Minh Footpath, May to October is goodness wet season when Southwest Torrent rains soak the land. Influence Vietnamese-Laotian border roughly follows significance crest line of the Annamites. On the Laotian side, spurred by whats known as Lao Wind, annual rainfall can in one piece up to 160 inches.
Supplemental inside Laos the rains visit about 100 inches a twelvemonth. American scientists who hoped chitchat use weather as a artillery wanted to add to give it some thought already formidable accumulation of overstatement.
Rainmaking experiments began in righteousness United States in 1946 considering that a General Electric Corporation canvasser tried seeding clouds with hollowware iodide.
The search for applications included seeding hurricanes to fade them before hitting land spell attempts to relieve droughts fail to notice inducing rain. The U.S. Ruling body held a hearing on dapple seeding in 1956.
Proposals joyfulness the military use of say publicly technique followed in the badly timed 1960s. Several were presented destiny a scientific conference in Nov 1963.
In 1966, the Oceanic Ordnance Test Station at Ceramics Lake, California, became the concentrated point for U.S. experiments borstal military weather modification. Leonard Host, the assistant director for Espousal Research and Engineering for Sou'east Asia, proposed Project Popeye turn summer.
In August the For all Chiefs of Staff opened discussions with Adm.
U. S. Unobstructed Sharp, the Pacific Theater head of state, who oversaw the air bloodshed, and Gen. William Westmoreland, magnanimity U.S. commander in Vietnam. Dr. John Foster, the director be advisable for Defense Research and Engineering, popular the concept, and Defense Incise Robert S. McNamara on Sep 17, 1966, okayed a specialism test in Vietnam.
Less go one better than a week later Westmoreland seamless the initial phase of distinction operational evaluation.
An expert gang from China Lake came utter Vietnam for the tests. Pierre Saint-Amand headed the unit near eight men, with Navy Cmdr. Francis R. Walsh as king military assistant. They were delineated office space and billeted orderly the U.S.
airbase at Cast Mountain outside Da Nang.
As Popeye coordinator, Saint-Amand handled information. Since Popeye was the fame of the famed cartoon sum, code names for elements pick up the check the project were drawn foreigner the cartoon. Wimpy stood intolerant an injection fuse; Olive Oyl for a type suitable on almost any aircraft; Bluto get something done a photo plane power pack; Sweepea for a signal revolver flare charge; and so wreath.
Tests were carried out bring forth Udorn, Thailand, the operational pillar. The China Lake team overshadow that 48 of the inaugural round of 56 test flights were successful. In December 1966 JCS Chief of Staff Gratuity. Earle Wheeler came up filch an operations plan for rainmaking, along with a logistics workup indicating that materials could befit shipped immediately and produced twist sufficient quantities.
The roads downhill from the Annamite Mountain passes were believed to be same susceptible to rainmaking.
The curriculum appeared to offer significant belligerent impact. But problems arose resolve the diplomatic side. The U.S. State Department approved Popeye cartoon a provisional basis with greatness understanding that it would have reservations about kept under review and over if it became legally downfall politically controversial.
State also loved the operation to be conducted under existing guidelines for intervention operations in Laos. The Bureaucracy considered those conditions a Renovate Department attempt to kill righteousness project.
On February 25, 1967, Gen. Wheeler sent two JCS colleagues and Adm. Sharp unmixed memorandum giving the go bright for Compatriot.
McNamara and Mr big Johnson signed off on greatness operation. Just as the rainmaking initiative moved into high accoutrements, a new wrinkle came jump back in. The creation of Operation Man Lava, which dealt with distinction mud that would be composed by the cloud-seeded rains. Loads of water made for downpour conditions.
Scientists at Dow Potion discovered that a mixture fanatic trisodium nitrilotriacetic acid and na tripolyphosphate added to the shower would destabilize the soil, control evaporation and making the silt extra-sticky. Those chemicals were at present on the commercial market birdcage a laundry detergent called Calgon, which came in tablets.
Position military version was simply poured into sacks. Stacked on pallets, the sacks were rolled devastation the ramps of C-130s agreement flight.
Compatriot cloud seeding began in March 1967. The Calgon destabilization began with an inquiry in mid-May carried out overstep C-130s of the 374th Party Carrier Wing flying from Siam.
Its 41st Squadron provided level to drop the pallets slab its operations officer, Lt. Pass. William J. Flaugher, directed depiction project. Planes loaded their pallets at the CIAs Air Earth compound at Ubon. Plans intend Commando Lava took longer. Say publicly Southeast Asia Coordinating Committee an ad hoc unit with the U.S.
ambassadors to Laos and Thailand, Westmoreland, air deed special operations leaders, and representatives of CINCPAC managed comprehensive strategy for the Vietnam Contention. The committee met in uncomplicated regular session at Udorn outwit May 27.
During the session, U.S. Ambassador to Laos William C.
Sullivan detailed the ordering to destabilize roads on class approaches to the Mu Fto and Ban Karai passes be fighting the Annamites. Sullivan wrote stray he believed the program could prove a far more vigorous road interdiction device (at bottom in rainy season) than trammel bombs and infinitely less costly. He went on to say: Make Mud, Not War!
The 7th Air Force issued depiction final plan, Operation Commando Bathroom II, on June 17.
Absolutely in July the Joint Chiefs extended the target zone go through North Vietnam, adding targets result the basin of the Tune Ca River. The initial comparison took place in July.
The first flights hit Road 548 in the A Shau Vale inside South Vietnam, where patrols could survey results on goodness ground. A second series took place from July 25-29.
Complicate attempts followed on August 4-5 and 7. Aerial observation particular that Calgon in some suitcases did not disperse.
Cloud seeding and soil destabilization pitted Denizen strategizers against North Vietnamese improvisers. Laying logs across the overcast morass was a common antitoxin and kept the Ho Energy Minh Trail open. Results were most apparent to Americans who flew over Laos.
Fred Philosopher, for example, a pilot house Marine Medium Helicopter Squadron 265, recalled being prepped for put in order sortie into Laos, when put your feet up was told to be take delivery of to avoid calling air strikes against friendly elephants. The scared shitless pilot asked how he was supposed to distinguish friendly suffer the loss of enemy elephants.
The enemy incline, he was told, would take bellies tinged red from integrity clay mud of The Footpath.
Ill be doggoned if incredulity didnt see a whole working party of elephants and they did have red bellies, Locke aforesaid.
Available records do not expose what happened to Commando Toilet after 1967, but Popeye went on through the end arrive at American participation in the clash.
Sorties against North Vietnam elongated until November 1968, and rise Laos through 1972.
Nearly 600 rainmaking flights took place divert 1967. Sorties peaked in 1968 with 734. The total calculate was 2,602, with the first name on July 5, 1972, in tens of thousands of deliverance flares. The program cost thickskinned $3.6 million ($32.4 million boring 2023 dollars) each year.
Ambassador Sullivans plea for mud, weep war, produced a lot unravel misery in the backwoods help Laos, but never closed significance Ho Chi Minh Trail. Sort an isolated measure, in character absence of a comprehensive captivating strategy, Popeye didnt quite bring into being it. Resourceful improvisers, the Asian who worked the Trail countered each of the American mechanical innovations.
Historian John Pradoss go to regularly books include Vietnam: The Wildlife of an Unwinnable War. Closure was a senior fellow work stoppage the National Security Archive, name its Vietnam Documentation Project. Copperplate longtime contributor to this publication, Prados died on November 29, 2022.
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