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As the Vietnam War reached a crossroads, the US Army had important decisions to make if they

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wanted to tip the scale back to their side. All options were on the table, both conventional and

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unconventional. And among the most unusual plots was Operation Popeye, launched in an attempt to

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weaken the Ho Chi Minh Trail, the Viet Cong's most vital mechanism and supply flow tool.

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To accomplish this, the US would turn the weather into a weapon of war.

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Operation Popeye utilized cloud-seating technology,

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a type of weather modification that artificially creates rain or snow.

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With it, the US military extended at least five monsoon seasons,

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causing detrimental effects to the unknowing Vietnamese citizens and soldiers.

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The mission spanned five years and cost taxpayers over $15 million.

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Despite multiple hearings in Congress, military officers and even President Nixon himself

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denied it existing at all.

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The Vietnam War was, for many reasons, unlike any other war American soldiers had ever seen.

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Instead of a standard campaign frontline, where the American army had more than enough experience,

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the Vietnam War's battles were fought in the dense South Vietnam jungle.

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This was an isolated region filled with mountains, animals, and endless greenery.

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The Viet Cong's most significant advantage over the US in this region was the Ho Chi Minh Trail,

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a logistics network made up of dirt pads and hand-dug tunnels. It had secret bunkers, barracks,

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and even a few hospitals. All were cleverly hidden from American aircraft looking for them in reconnaissance

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missions. With its extensive web of roads and handmade pads, the trail helped the Viet Cong carry

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massive amounts of manpower, weapons, food, and other war material from one side of the country to the

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other. At over a thousand miles in length, the trail ran from north to south Vietnam and extended

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through the kingdoms of Laos and Cambodia. The US military attempted to destroy the trail

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with never-ending bombing campaigns. More bombs were dropped on Laos than in Germany and Japan combined

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in World War II. But none of the tactics were entirely effective. Even Agent Orens wasn't up for the task.

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The trail network was so vast and complex that if one of the paths were closed, all Viet Cong soldiers

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had to do was find a secondary way back to their base. But there was one thing that significantly

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slowed the supply flow on the Ho Chi Minh Trail. Rain turned the trails into muddy messes, rendering them

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too difficult to supply vehicles to maneuver. Vietnam is known for having one of the world's longest

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monsoon seasons, usually running from April to October. June, July, and August are the months

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with the heaviest rain. And so the Department of Defense decided to attempt to recreate this process.

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Their goal was to try to control the weather and extend the monsoon season for as long as they could.

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To achieve this, they resorted to cloud seeding.

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This process is thought to have originated in 1946 by Vincent Schaffer, a chemist employed by General

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Electric. Cloud seeding is a method for artificially producing rain or snow.

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It requires modifying a cloud's chemical structure to boost the chances of precipitation

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with the added substance of silver iodide, which works as a condensation agent.

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There are two ways to disperse cloud seeding agents, either using large cannons to shoot

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the particles into the sky or using airplanes to drop the particles from above.

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Throughout the planning period, the program went by several names to maintain its secrecy.

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Operation Popeye ended up being its official name.

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In a memorandum sent in January 1967, from Deputy Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs

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Foy D. Kohler to then-Secretary of State Dean Rusk, Kohler described Project Popeye's goals, stating,

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The objective is to inhibit overland vehicular movement and to reinforce the bottlenecks already

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created at stream crossings by the bombing of bridges and ferry installations.

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With respect to Laos, the objective is to extend rainfall through the dry season.

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Keeping the ground as near the saturation point as possible,

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and obstructing traffic that normally fords streams during the low water period.

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By generating rain, the American army would slow the Viet Cong's truck traffic,

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impairing the supply flow throughout the trail, and leading them more susceptible to other attacks.

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Kohler also believed that cloud seeding was relatively more ethical than common warfare,

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stating,

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With respect to North Vietnam, we believe that as an interdiction measure,

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Popeye operations would be less harmful to the population and the area affected than bombing.

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For Operation Popeye to be successful, it had to be carried out with the utmost secrecy.

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If information about America playing God and controlling the weather came out,

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there might be speculation about man-made alterations in other climatic anomalies they had no connection with.

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However, American planners were also convinced

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that their intervention on the weather would inevitably be discovered.

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According to Deputy Under Secretary Kohler's memo,

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In the first place, the altered weather will be observable,

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in contrast to the experimental phase conducted during normally rainy periods.

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Disclosure of planned weather experiments in India would make it likely that the connection would

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become apparent.

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Secondly, the possibility of a US seeding aircraft being downed cannot be discounted.

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Thirdly, there is virtually no aspect of military operations in Southeast Asia which has not over time

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become the subject of leaks, or at least of speculation in the press.

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Operation Popeye is thought to be the first known successful application of weather control technology

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in warfare. The first flight of the operation took off on March 20, 1967.

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A total of 2,602 flights were made in five monsoon seasons, from March to November.

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The 54th Weather Reconnaissance Squadron executed the cloud seeding procedure using the slogan

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Make Mud, Not War. Within their squadron, the operation was codenamed Motor Pool.

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Three Lockheed C-130 Hercules aircraft and two McDonnell Douglas F-4 Phantom aircraft,

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based at Udantani Royal Thai Air Force Base, were altered and fitted with silver iodide ejectors.

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The five cloud seeding jets had the standard Southeast Asia camouflage colors and markings,

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but no unit identifiers, likely because the operation was top secret.

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The squadron flew two rainmaking operations per day, while also generating report data

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which they presented to their superiors.

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The flights were officially logged in as standard weather reconnaissance flights.

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The Viet Cong would not know where the rain was coming from.

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The initial range of operations for Popeye was the eastern half of the Laotian panhandle.

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Four months after the first official flight, the area of intervention was increased towards North

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Vietnam.

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In September 1967, the Oshua Valley in South Vietnam was also added to the mix.

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As bomb operations over North Vietnam expanded, that area was eliminated from the list on April 1, 1968.

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Likewise, the southern region of North Vietnam became part of the operational site

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for only a couple of months.

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In 1972, Northeastern Cambodia was added to the operational zone.

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A total of 47,409 units of cloud seed cartridges were expended.

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The operation's details were so secret that the soldiers who got selected to participate

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were usually kept in the dark until the last minute.

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Everyone had their own theory about what Operation Popeye was really about.

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Soldier Howard Kibble said,

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I had fleeting thoughts of flying over China, working for the CIA, you name it.

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But I signed a statement and found out that I was going to make rain.

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Geez, I thought they were kidding.

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ETHICAL AND ENVIRONMENTAL CONCERNS FOR OPERATION POPEYE'S DOWNFALL

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An article in the Washington Post in 1971 by reporter Jack Anderson revealed that the U.S.

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was engaged in clandestine weather weaponization in Vietnam.

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The information was corroborated by the Pentagon Papers leak released by Daniel Ellsberg.

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The following year, in July of 1972, journalist Seymour Hersh reported in the New York Times

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about Operation Popeye using the headline,

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Rainmaking is Used as a Weapon by the U.S.

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The article describes how some officials opposed the radical idea,

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and even doubted its effectiveness due to the unknown long-term consequences, stating,

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Despite years of experiments with rainmaking in the U.S. and elsewhere,

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scientists are not sure they understand its long-term effect on the ecology of a region.

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A few days after the story's publication, the entire program was officially ended,

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and all cloud-seeding missions stopped.

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Silver iodide, a material used in cloud-seeding condensation, is known to be toxic to aquatic life.

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So when used in the long term, precipitation from seeded clouds could harm the environment.

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The news caught the eye of Democratic Senator Claiborne Pell,

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who demanded to have the specifications of Operation Popeye officially declassified

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and released to the public.

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As one of the leaders of the operation, Lieutenant Harry Edward Soyster

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was asked to testify in front of the Committee on Foreign Relations.

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He told them everything he knew.

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The cost of Operation Popeye was about $3.6 million per year, which included the operation

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and maintenance of the modified jets, purchase of seeding materials, and pay for the people involved

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in the project.

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The timing of all these public announcements did not work out well for the Department of Defense.

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In 1972, the environmental boom in America was burgeoning.

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In addition, the Nixon administration was already struggling

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with the beginning stages of the infamous Watergate scandal.

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When the public, especially environmental activists, found out that America had secretly

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been playing God and altering the weather in Vietnam, they were outraged.

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The operations were dubbed the Watergate of Weather Warfare.

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Operation Popeye was officially terminated on July 5, 1972.

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In 1977, the US joined the Environmental Modification Convention Treaty, or NMOD,

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an international treaty which formally banned weather modification for malicious purposes.

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The agreement banned causing earthquakes and tsunamis, steering hurricanes,

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or tampering with the ionosphere.

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It also prohibited any kind of severe damage to the environment.

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Since cloud seeding has never been used in warfare again, the results cannot be measured or compared.

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Author James Roger Fleming agreed, stating,

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Although some claim that Operation Popeye induced from 1 to 7 inches of additional rainfall annually

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along the Ho Chi Minh Trail, no scientific data were collected to verify the claim.

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Even if Operation Popeye did help a few US victories in Vietnam, a fact that is impossible

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to determine, its extreme secrecy and denials by the military and the government resulted in

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a significant strategic defeat for climatic modification with military purposes.

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ponieważ

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those were not only true in the areas they want,

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You