Operation Popeye (No, not named after someone’s favorite restaurant.). Weather Machine. Lately we’re hearing crazy stuff about a weather machine used against Red states. Crazy right?
But after WWII the US was doing research on it. During the Vietnam war the US was attempting to manipulate the weather.
The United States used weather warfare in the Vietnam War. Operation Popeye saw the use of cloud seeding over the Ho Chi Minh trail. It was hoped that the increased rainfall would reduce the rate of infiltration down the trail.
The operation included creating clouds over South East Asia using silver iodide. American jets made about 2000 sorties to create the clouds. The cloud making units were attached to the side of WC-130A Hercules aircraft.
General Electric and the US military had already previously worked together to attempt to control weather systems, after World War Two.
Whether the program was successful or not remains debated. Some agree that the manmade clouds created between one and seven inches of rainfall every year of the operation.