Ep 208: The Vietnam Toilet bomb

This year marks the 250th anniversary of our country. It’s a long time, but it is also a reminder that in the grand scheme of things, we are young as a country and there is much we can and should still accomplish.

Here on Privy, one of the things we try not to take for granted is the freedoms we enjoy in this country and the safety we have in relation to what can be accomplished due to those freedoms. We recognize that freedom isn’t free, which we tell you every time we say goodbye. Out of thankfulness, which is much of what the underpinning of the show is, we take a look at a browner, less beautiful part of our nation’s history in July to celebrate the moments of bathroom history that help make our country great.

We’ve covered a lot, privy pits with artifacts of American history in them, Ben Franklin’s questionable “showering” habits, the brown sidewalk at Disney that is reminiscent of the days when there was no plumbing and we just dumped our poop out the window and rinsed it down the street. Again, it was a different time.

The Vietnam War

The Vietnam War officially lasted almost 20 years, from 1955-1975. During WWII, there were movements of decolonizing throughout the world. One such instance was the formerly French colonized Vietnam. As they decolonized, Japanese forces invaded. Caught in the middle was the Viet Minh led by Ho Chi Minh who sought for an “Independent Vietnam”. When the Japanese pulled out of Vietnam, but left Emperor Bao Dai in control. Ho Chi Minh’s forces rose up and took over the Northern city of Hanoi declaring a “Democratic Republic of Vietnam”.

Trying to take back control, the state of Vietnam was established with Emperor Bao as its leader, with the capital being in Saigon in 1949. Both sides wanted the same thing, a unified Vietnam. It was WHAT they would unify around that took the cake. Minh wanted it modeled after communist nations like China and Russia. Bao after the economic and cultural ties to the west, we see the French influence still bleeding through.

From here, conflict continued between communist Vietnamese forces in the north and the French influence, western leaning forces in the south.The tide turned in 1954 at the Battle of Dien Bien Phu, when Ho Chi Minh beat the French. The country was split along the 17th parallel with Minh controlling the North and Bao in the South.

Meanwhile, cold war tensions made America highly suspicious of any communist leanings throughout the world. And with a newly communist friendly power moving in Vietnam, it got America’s attention. While we were not actively involved at the outset, concerns related to the dominy theory were building.

The domino theory is the idea that if one thing falls the rest will go with it. In the case of Vietnam, it was the idea that if there was any Southeast Asian country that fell to communism, they would all follow. President Kennedy as such increased aid, but military intervention waited.

When Lyndon B Johnson took over, they ramped up involvement in the area. In 1964, Vietnamese Torpedo boats attacked US Vessels in the Gulf of Tonkin, leading to US military retaliation. The Gulf of Tonkin Resolution was passed and it gave permission for regular US bombing raids in Vietnam in what was called Operation Rolling Thunder. Operation Rolling Thunder, again see the distress I feel when bathrooming post Panda Express. Military troops were then further called into the region to help support South Vietnamese efforts to stop the spread of communism.

While there are ongoing tensions related to the end of the Vietnam war. While there was distrust related to the government’s purposes of the war, troop morale was at an all time low. Propaganda, televising the horrors of war to the US people, and reports about what is being said about beach homes not lining up with the soldier’s perspective on the ground, led to an ugly end of war resolution.

That , and when America finally pulled out, it didn’t take long for what they had tried to stop to happen anyway. The Vietnam war went in as a loss,  and what is most unfortunate is the mistreatment of American service members for their involvement. It’s a great reminder you can not support what conflicts we are in and still support the people who defend the freedoms we enjoy.

Supply Chain Problems

Supply chain problems are, well, a problem. Mostly, the longer the chain the more difficult or more likely you are going to experience a supply chain problem along the way. This is part of what happened in Vietnam. Turns out, when you are trying to stop communism and you have to ship your support over 7000 miles across the Pacific Ocean and the communists already have support there or it is there in a fraction of the time due to communist aid by much nearer countries, you have a supply line issue. 

Sometimes the aid you needed when the aid left port in the US has changed by the time the aid arrived in Vietnam. In many ways they had to make due with what they were sent or given.There were also drastic shortages. That coupled with the fact that it was very costly to send these supplies that far, meant it would often advantage the military financially to send aid after they could totally fill the boat or aircraft, even when that would mean a delay in the aid getting to where it was needed.

Turns out, war is a big financial game. As such pilots and ship captains hated to leave to make their deliveries when they were not fully loaded. This occurred so often that they had to make a policy during the Vietnam war.  From the carriers bomber pilots would often leave the strip without a fully loaded engine, not full ammo, and if we’re telling the truth, low on morale. They would have to leave if they had a half load of ordinance, meaning even if they weren’t full, if they were half full, they would be sent.

This policy further damaged morale, with many pilots objecting to the decision as it increased loss rates, at the worst they lost one pilot every day (they ran out of fuel, went down and at times were never seen again). It was not a great thing. Often, Vietnam soldiers reported feeling helpless both in the wartime efforts, but also in their position as US military servicemen. 

Navy Strike Fighter Squadron 25, of VFA-25’s Naval Air Station is a US airline carrier that operated in WW2, Korean and Vietnam Wars. During Vietnam, the Naval air station held and launched the giant piston powered A-1 Skyraider close air support aircraft. Known as a Douglas A-1 Skyraider, is an American single seat attack plane. It was a propeller base craft and one of the last used before they switched to jet  propelled aircraft. They are responsible for some of the earliest strikes against N vietnam.

While its primary firepower were two built in 20 mm M3 cannons on each wing, each carrying 200 rounds of ammo. However they could also carry 15 different pieces of ordinance or up to 8000 pounds. These could be anything from torpedoes, mines, rockets, or gun pods.

Most common were a GE, yes the people who make washing machines. They made a GAU-2 6 barrel machine gun that came with a 1500 round magazine and could fire 4000 rounds per minute. To be dropped was a 100 lb white phosphorus bomb or a Wiley Pete as it became called, this was usually used for signaling purposes. The 500lb low drag general purpose bomb or a mark-82 was a mechanical impact bomb, it hits the nose and sets the bomb off. A submunition dispenser which could dispense a variety of things as you flew over, including smoke bombs, pineapple bombs,jungle bombs, gravel mines, etc.

And what would happen is, when the plane’s ordinance was half full, they would send them, but sometimes it would only be half full with the things you didn’t want in that situation. And so, there was a feeling from pilots at the time that they were risking or putting their lives on the line with no real gain from it.

They dropped a lot of bombs. In fact, it is estimated over the course of the war, as a part of operation rolling thunder, the US dropped nearly 15 million tons of ordinance over Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia. That’s a lot of ordinance. And while I’m not making light of war time, I think the term “dropping an ordinance” is such a great replacement for… well you know. And for the most part, all of this ordinance was in those main types we just discussed. That is except for one special ordinance dropped in the Fall of 1965.

A Unique Type of Ordinance

What we have is a report of Retired Navy Captain Clint Johnson of the USNR. He stated: 

“I was a pilot in VA-25 on the 1965 Vietnam cruise.

572 was flown by CDR C. W. “Bill” Stoddard. His wingman in 577 (which was my assigned airplane) was LCDR Robin Bacon, who had a wing station mounted movie camera (the only one remaining in the fleet from WWII.)

The flight was a Dixie Station strike (South Vietnam) going to the Delta. When they arrived in the target area and CDR Stoddard was reading the ordnance list to the FAC [Forward Air Controller], he ended with “and one code name Sani-Flush.” The FAC couldn’t believe it and joined up to see it. It was dropped in a dive with LCDR Bacon flying in a tight wing position to film the drop. When it came off, it turned hole to the wind and almost struck his airplane. It made a great ready room movie.

The FAC said that it whistled all the way down.

The toilet was a damaged toilet, which was going to be thrown overboard. One of our plane captains rescued it and the ordnance crew made a rack, tailfins and nose fuse for it. Our checkers maintained a position to block the view of the air boss and the Captain while the aircraft was taxiing forward. Just as it was being shot off we got a 1MC message from the bridge, “What the hell was on 572’s right wing?”

There were a lot of jokes with air intelligence about germ warfare. I wish that we had saved the movie film. CDR Stoddard was later killed while flying 572 in Oct. 1966. He was hit by three SAMs over Vinh.”

If you didn’t catch that based on Johnson’s account, Clarence Stoddard took off in a plane called the Paper tiger ii. Strapped to his airplane in one of the ordinance spots was a makeshift bomb.  It was a toilet that had busted on board the carrier. Originally they were going to throw the toilet overboard, but they got ahold of it, rilled it full of explosives, and rigged it to detonate on impact. A one of a kind bomb, for a flight to commemorate the 6 millionth pound of ordinance to be dropped. It solved some problems, got rid of their waste, get it, because it is a toilet. AND allowed their flight to be one where they took off a little more fully loaded. Photos can be seen of the plane with the toilet strapped where the bomb normally would be.

They spray painted an E on the side of the toilet which denotes that it has been granted Battle Effective. They dropped a toilet bomb over Vietnam, a one of a kind projectile and maybe one of the most unique uses of toilet seen to date.

All that said, it is a reminder this independence day that America has been celebrating things by blowing other stuff up for a pretty long time. In this case we celebrated by dropping an explosive toilet onto Vietnam. It gives a whole new meaning to blowing up the toilet. When he released it, he released it mid dive as was custom for dropping a bomb on some commies. The problem is, if you’ve ever seen anyone drop a toilet off the top of a tall structure, the term aerodynamic is not exactly what you would apply to what is happening there.

It flips and tumbles. Turns out toilets, like turds, flip when falling. That would be fine, however, when the toilet begins to do that after just being released from the underside of your aircraft, it will cause a lot of troubles as that thing potentially causes your aircraft to crash. Thankfully the pilot did not and the toilet full of explosives spun all the way down.

And it goes down in history as that time that America dropped an explosive toilet on Vietnam.