See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.

net/publication/336313077

Radiophonics of the Vietnam War: A Collection

Article · August 2016

CITATION READS
1 1,714

1 author:

Jan Philip Müller

50 PUBLICATIONS 7 CITATIONS

SEE PROFILE

All content following this page was uploaded by Jan Philip Müller on 07 October 2019.

The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file.

Issue 5.3 / 2016: 0 TABLE OF CONTENTS

Wilderness Radio
Radiophonics of the Vietnam War: Becoming
Environmental
Good Morning Vietnam
Hanoi Hannah
The Bullshit Band
Dave Rabbit
Ghost Tape #10
Acoubouy
Maps and Territories
Frogs
Statistics
The Ears of the Jungle

*****

Radiophonics of the
Wilderness Radio

Vietnam War: A In a text titled “Radical Radio” Murray R. Schaeffer

writes:

Collection “A few years ago Bruce Davis and I had an idea for
what we called Wilderness Radio. The plan was to
put microphones in remote locations uninhabited
Jan Philip Müller
by humans and to broadcast whatever might be
happening out there: The sounds of wind and rain,
the cries of birds and animals – the uneventful
events of the natural soundscape transmitted
without editing into the hearts of cities. It seemed
to us that since man has been pumping his affairs
out into the natural soundscape, a little natural
wisdom might be a useful antidote.”[1]

continentcontinent.cc / ISSN: 21599920| This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.
Issue 5.3 / 2016: 1 Jan Philip Müller

‘lo-fi’ soundscapes on the other side. Schafer’s

work has been the subject of critique, often along
similar lines as roughly outlined here.[2]

But Wilderness Radio is one of the many moments

in Schafer’s texts in which things become more
complicated, rhetorical, polemical: when the
‘natural’ sounds are broadcast through the
technology of radio, they are split from their
‘original’ and ‘natural’ context and become
“schizophonic”[3], imperialistic sounds invading the
sonic space of the city, potentially drowning out
other communications and thus threatening to
actually intensify the cacophonic quarrels. Such
sounds are not simply good and natural anymore,
but can become a poison that – as Schafer
suggests – can, in turn, act as an antidote. It is
maybe these kinds of oscillations and iridescences –
between nature and technology; between non-
determinate processes of political disagreement
and a technocratic logic of feasibility by
(Album cover of “The Vancouver Soundscape”. engineering environments as cybernetic systems;
1973.) between signal and noise; between sounds
‘themselves’, and their media and milieux; and
between their meaning and their sonic or auditive
properties – that are the most interesting and
productive moments in Schafer’s writings.[4]

"01 Sound Wsp - OnAcousticDesign Excerpt Frogsncar 80av" by

continent on Soundcloud
Radiophonics of the Vietnam War: Becoming
Environmental

(Excerpt from “The Vancouver Soundscape” (1973), The following collection of stories and materials
Track 10: On Acoustic Design. See (and relating to radiophonic situations of the Vietnam
order): www.sfu.ca/~truax/vanscape.html & War is drawn together by an interest in similar
www.sfu.ca/~truax/vanpromo.html) ambiguities of sonic spatialities. The Vietnam War is
happening around the same time that Schafer
starts to elaborate the concept of the soundscape,
and its history seems – as (not only) “Apocalypse
Schafer writes this in 1982, but he had started Now” suggests – to offer itself to be told in hi-fi-
developing his concepts of acoustic design, and surround-sound.[5]
acoustic ecology and the soundscape in the late
1960s and the 1970s. In this conceptual work there
seems to be a tendency to reify certain
dichotomies that stick together and form
hierarchies of values. To put it very simply, there is
an order implied between the good communicative
sounds, in the dynamic harmony, ecological
balance and unity of the natural quiet ‘hi-fi’
soundscape on one side; and the bad, aggressive,
technologically transmitted and amplified noises,
competing in the cacophony of fragmented urban

continentcontinent.cc/index.php/continent/article/view/257
Issue 5.3 / 2016: 2 Jan Philip Müller

technologies and how this in turn, (re-)introduces

certain complications in these spaces, destabilizes
relations that had allowed to knit and map these
spatialities onto each other, and intensifies their
ambiguities or oscillations.

Good Morning Vietnam

In the Vietnam War, radio in its classical structure of

Link to Video: Apocalypse Now Opening Sequence
broadcast entertainment is a sonic playing field in
which the cultural, social and political spatialities of
American soldiers abroad are at stake. Two voices
can be taken as exemplary for the opposing
(Opening Sequence of “Apocalypse Now”. 1979,
polarities in this contested spectrum of the GI’s
Director: Francis Ford Coppola, Sound Design:
“hearts and minds”.[10]
Walter Murch.)

What historically connects these stories to

Wilderness Radio and the discourse of acoustic
ecology could then maybe called a ‘becoming-
environmental’ of sound.[6] The scope of this –
associative, coarse and preliminary – sketch of a
shift in sonic relations would be a kind of topology
of sounds “that explores the possibilities and
properties of different forms of continuous
transformation – and the different spaces which
express or allow these”[7]: a Euclidean space, a
geographical or territorial space, an acoustic space
of physical parameters, a Hertzian space of
electromagnetic waves[8], a space of
communication common to a group of individuals,
Link to video
a network space of socio-technical infrastructures, a
political space of disagreement and of making
oneself heard[9], and so on.
(Cramer Haas: Good Morning Vietnam)
This sonic topology could then account for how
these different ‘spaces’ are differentiating from one
(“Dawnbuster” with John Allgood (1972), 42
another by thinking about sounds as simultaneously
min. http://www.afvn.tv/audio/dawnbuster.mp3)
appearing in different spaces and thus mediating
between these spaces; or – turning the perspective
around – one could ask how these spaces are
actually performed, actualized by sounds, and how
these sounds – by being describable in terms of
different parameters and qualities in each of these
spaces – connect and set them apart at the same
time. This historical shift in sonic relations could
then take place as a reconfiguration of how
different spaces or spatialities are connected and
split apart by sonic practices, techniques and

continentcontinent.cc/index.php/continent/article/view/257
Issue 5.3 / 2016: 3 Jan Philip Müller

music that was played, with more and more music

coming from a ‘counterculture’ at ‘home’ that was
very much against the war[13]. While some insist that
songs like “We gotta get out of this place” by The
Animals were not allowed to be played, others say
that these decisions were mainly left to the disc
jockeys[14]. Michael J. Kramer instead has argued
that the military tolerated these kinds of music and
even used it for their purposes insofar as it helped
the soldiers make it through the war:

“Never banned or forbidden, rock was encouraged

as a leisure activity. Tolerance, even support, for it
by the Armed Forces revealed how the managers
of the US military transferred the latest consumer
strategies from domestic culture to military life. […]
(Adrian J. Cronauer SSgt, USAF DJ, Saigon The Armed Forces also actively imported the latest
1965-66) "acid rock," so-called for its associations with the
hallucinogenic drug LSD, into Vietnam in hopes of
keeping GIs who liked the music engaged in the
war effort. […] If antiwar protesters in the Bay Area
On one side there would be John Allgood and and elsewhere sought to ‘bring the war home,’ as a
Adrian Cronauer at the Armed Forces Vietnam popular antiwar slogan of the time went, then the
Network (AFVN) with their notorious commanders and managers of the United States
“Gooooooood Morning Vietnam” to start the day. Armed Forces sought to ‘bring home to the war’ as
What AFVN aimed to create was not just Vietnam never before.”[15]
or ‘in’ Vietnam, but also something like ‘home’:
This disagreement about the role of music then
“We gave the guys as much stateside sound as in seems to be not so much about its importance on a
WABC – which was then the god of all AM radio level of ‘vibes’, the question is rather how they
stations in the United States – right in the middle of translate in the situation of the military in Vietnam:
Vietnam. Not talking about the war… talking about do they articulate subversion and connect people
other things, so the guys can turn it on and against the military organization or do they rather
constantly have that sound from home.”[11] produce private spaces and times of leisure that
actually support the military efforts? One, however,
But what was ‘home’? Was it an imaginary America could call that ‘schizophonic’:
in which everything was alright, an America of small
towns with state fairs and Thanksgiving turkeys? “You get this ‘good morning Vietnam! It’s a
So, AFVN would work as an “antidote to […] beautiful day out there’, and I go: what in the hell is
homesickness”[12]. Or was it the America of he broadcasting from? You know, we had just been
intensifying struggles about – among other things – mortared and rocketed… They always tried to keep
the Vietnam War and Civil Rights? Was it more everything upbeat. They were trying to project that
important to make a program that would back the you were at some surf party in Santa Monica or
troop’s morale, but mask out the problems of the something and when I was over there in ‘66 and
war and back home in the country, whose ‘67, I can remember we listened to a very sexy
principles the soldiers were supposed to fight for? sultry good looking girl […]: after you’ve been
Or would these stations have the duty to give their mortared and your buddy is lying next to you dead
listeners all the information they would have a right or is screaming for a Corpsman, somehow it just
to have as American citizens? Of course, during the doesn’t fit.”[16]
war the news were censored. But in hindsight there
is a disagreement about the extent of censorship in
the military radio broadcasting in regard to the

continentcontinent.cc/index.php/continent/article/view/257
Issue 5.3 / 2016: 4 Jan Philip Müller

Hanoi Hannah 1967.)

On the other side of the spectrum there would be

the voice of Radio Hanoi, run by the North
Vietnamese Army, that called itself Thu Hương
(‘fragrance of autumn’) and that the Americans
"RadioHanoiToNewTroops.mp3" by continent on Soundcloud
called Hanoi Hannah[17]. Maybe all the female
voices from Radio Hanoi were called Hanoi Hannah,
but one in particular would later identify as her: a
woman by the name Trịnh Thị Ngọ, who had (Nguyen Van Tun, Radio Hanoi, 30 June 1965: “It is
learned English in the time under the French rule of a flat, scary jungle…”.)
Vietnam because she wanted to understand
American movies.[18]

Hanoi Hannah reads the news that are not heard on

AFVN and she talks to the doubts of the normal
recruits about their presence in Vietnam:

“How are you, GI Joe? It seems to me that most of

you are poorly informed about the going of the
war, to say nothing about a correct explanation of
your presence over here. Nothing is more confused
than to be ordered into a war to die or to be
maimed for life without the faintest idea of what's
going on.”[19]

In (re-) transferring the inner socio-economic and

racial fragmentations and polarizations of the
American society on the military in Vietnam, she is
“asking black and Latino soldiers, ‘what are you
doing here, soul brother?’ – and telling them to
desert and return to the United States to fight for
their own civil rights.”[20]

“Mike Roberts, 41, Detroit, Michigan remembers

Hanoi Hannah. Mike was a Marine, in a Hawk
Missile Battalion just outside Da Nang through
1967 and 1968. He summed up the black veteran's
attitude to Hannah's broadcasts: ‘I remember June
1967, I was sitting in a tent with about thirteen
guys from Charlie Company. We were all on mess
(Trịnh Thị Ngọ a.k.a. Hanoi Hannah) duty and we were gambling, drinking and having a
good time shootin' craps, talking about the world,
man, listening to music and you know one guy kept
saying, “Sshh, sshh, be quiet,” and everybody says
what, what, and he says “There's a riot in Detroit!” I
"Hanoi Hannah: How Are you G.I. Joe? 16 June 1967" by guess the governor called in the troops... there was
continent on Soundcloud some loss of life. There was no feeling of, you
know, what were they rioting for? What possibly
could they want? We all knew what they wanted,
you know what I'm saying. So of course we would
(Hanoi Hannah: How Are you G.I. Joe? 16 June feel some sort of empathy for the folks back

continentcontinent.cc/index.php/continent/article/view/257
Issue 5.3 / 2016: 5 Jan Philip Müller

home... the guys in the street who were struggling Autumn indicate, this layer itself is not fixed in
or rioting.”[21] regard to who is talking from where. This
entangled situation could not be restricted to more-
or-less central or official voices, but also GIs, like
the one calling himself Dave Rabbit, would
interfere in it.

The Bullshit Band

The Vietnam War is accompanied by the building

of a globally linked communication infrastructure
by radio relay stations of the American military, but
it also expands deeply into very small military
units[24]:

“The number of radio sets rose from one set for

every 38.6 men in 1943 to one set for 4.5 men in
1971, an 857 percent increase that far exceeded
(National Guard and police, Detroit Riots July 1967, the figure for any other kind of equipment. The
Image: Howard Bingham/The LIFE Picture increase made it possible to multiply the number of
Collection/Getty, online: Cris Wild: Remembering communication channels to each divisional
the Detroit Riots of 1967 (2014/11/26) http://masha headquarters fourfold, from eight in Korea to thirty-
ble.com/2014/11/26/detroit-riots-1967) two in Vietnam.”[25]

This was meant to increase the flow of information

And Hanoi Hannah also addresses the split upwards, and of commands downwards in the
between higher ranks and enlisted men that military hierarchy and thus reduce uncertainties.
escalated between 1969 and 1972 in a rising But it also increased the risk of what Martin van
number of incidents of “fragging” – the killing of Creveld has called “information pathologies” that
superiors often attempted with a fragmentation complicated, overflowed and slowed down these
grenade which could be covered up as accident:[22] chains of communication and control[26]:

“Don: What were your main aims? “Confronted with a military information network
that was impossibly complex and in the end often
Hannah: We mentioned that GIs should go AWOL unable to cope, decisionmakers not unnaturally
and suggested some frigging, or that is fragging. responded by attempting to cut through by any
We advised them to do what they think proper and every means that presented themselves.
against the war.”[23] Commanding officers in Vietnam relied on the
helicopter; officials in Washington depended on
In respect to the asymmetries and politics of the media to supplement the frequently highly
information at play here, one could think of what is abstract, imprecise, and slow-to-arrive information
going on in terms of measures to inform – to bring percolating through normal military and defense
into form – the individuals and groups inside the establishment channels; and the troops chatted
military: a radiophonic layer over an uncertain over their radio sets.”[27]
topology of soldiers far from home that aims to
articulate its identity or identities. Or maybe a
better term would be to modulate these identities,
if one thinks about the musical sounds and ‘vibes’
which seem to play a very important role in this. As
the ‘radio-names’ Hanoi Hannah and Fragrance of

continentcontinent.cc/index.php/continent/article/view/257
Issue 5.3 / 2016: 6 Jan Philip Müller

accompanying it throughout its history[28]:

“Regularly when you were out in the field, you

would use that band to sort of, you would bullshit,
and that’s why we called it the bullshit band. And
you’d be sitting around at night and get on and
say: Hey, Hi, I’m from… you know, Perkasie,
Pennsylvania – or wherever – anybody out there
from Pennsylvania? And people would talk back
and forth on this thing. Well, about the fourth or
fifth night that we were up at Con Thien, a couple
guys from the bunker next to ours came running in,
all excited, and told: wow, there are radiomen, you
had to turn on the radio, that there were tunes,
people were playing music on this thing. They got
him to turn this thing on. Well you couldn’t get
anything, we’re inside this bunker, so they tell him
to put on the whip, it’s a big long ten foot thing,
that he screws it in and sticks it out the door and
sure enough we hear rock’n’roll music. And it was
certainly by no means sanctioned radio
transmissions. You were forbidden to use that open
channel for anything except emergencies.”[29]

Dave Rabbit

But it goes further than this. For example, when

United States Air Force Sergeant Clyde David
DeLay broadcasts his own program – Radio First
Termer – for 21 days in January 1971 under the
name Dave Rabbit, as a full-blown parasite of the
military communication logistics; because he
himself works in the military supply, he has no
problem with funneling high quality audio and
(Radio Operator in Vietnam, source: http://olive- radio equipment through the “Midnight
drab.com/od_electronics_anprc25.php) Supply”[30] for his own radio studio[31]:

And the possibility that this chatter could make

itself independent was in a way permanently
installed in the troops that were equipped with
thousands of portable transistor radio sets. At any
moment, a soldier with a radio could become his
own little radio station. Thus, operating somewhere
in between subverting the discipline that would
make the radio a kind of telephone system
controlling who speaks to whom, and dissolving the
radio as the one-to-many structure of classical
broadcast, the so-called “bullshit band”
reintroduced an ambiguity of radio, that had been

continentcontinent.cc/index.php/continent/article/view/257
Issue 5.3 / 2016: 7 Jan Philip Müller

analogue of Smith in surnames, chosen “to have a

tie in with Vietnam and […] to sound exotic and
sexy”[33] – but who actually is an American working
in the AFVN offices[34] – would introduce the
broadcast:

“The following program is in living color, and has

been rated X by the Vietnam Academy of maggots.
This is Radio First Termer. The purpose of this
program is to bring vital news, information, and
hard acid rock music to the first termers and non-re-
enlistees in the Republic of Vietnam. Radio First
Termer operates under no Air Force regulations or
(Dave Rabbit in Vietnam, see: manuals. In the event of a vice squad raid, this
www.ibiblio.org/jwsnyder/rft/rftphotos-5.html) program will automatically self-destruct. Your host
tonight is Dave Rabbit.”[35]

At the same time, David Rabbit provides another

kind of connection back to the ‘ground’ of a
counter- or subculture that was developing in
"Radio First Termer - Pt. 1 (2009)" by continent on Soundcloud
Saigon:

“… blowing little grass now, going back into music

by Steppenwolf called The Pusher – speaking of a
(http://radiofirsttermerrestoration.com/?page_id=7
pusher, brothers and sisters: if you happen to be
)
down by the Magic Finger Lounge anytime night,
keep away from the Korean at the front door, he’s
pushing some bad H, I repeat, he’s pushing some
bad H.”[36]
“We were broadcasting from a Saigon
whorehouse, that we set up as a studio because we
Dave Rabbit, voiced by Clyde David DeLay, an
couldn‘t broadcast obviously from the air force
American soldier inside/outside the American
base that would be a little bit obvious. […] [T]he
communications network in Vietnam, played the
guys that I had met when we were at Phan Rang,
soundtrack for first-termers in Saigon, giving them
they really were the geniuses to this whole
coordinates for their navigations through an
operation and basically, of course, I’m not a
underground culture.
technical person by nature, just kind of a voice if
you will. We found our location in the whorehouse
of Saigon, we set our room up, the guys from Phan
Rang contacted the guys in the Saigon relay area
Ghost Tape #10
and they came and they wired us, they went to the
rooftop of the whorehouse that we were at and
Meanwhile, the American units for Psychological
they did up a dish or whatever to boost the signal
Operations (PSYOP) were blasting electronically
to where it went to the local Saigon relay station,
amplified sounds into the acoustic spaces of the
and then from there it just piggie-backed and went
war. Besides things like mobile propaganda teams
throughout Southeast-Asia on to the other relay
visiting the villages and the distribution of billions
stations.”[32]
of leaflets, like dropping them from airplanes, the
mobile loudspeaker played a central role in
Radio First Termer is broadcasting from
“winning the hearts and minds”[37] in Vietnam.
somewhere between inside and outside of the
Soldiers would carry them into the field and trucks,
military radio communication system and using a
planes, boats and helicopters were equipped with
pseudonym too. Rabbit’s partner, calling herself
loudspeakers to communicate with the country’s
Nguyen – which is a kind of the Vietnamese
population but also to reach the ‘invisible’ enemy.

continentcontinent.cc/index.php/continent/article/view/257
Issue 5.3 / 2016: 8 Jan Philip Müller

One of the most notorious stories in this regard is

the one of “Ghost Tape #10” or “Operation
Wandering Soul”[38].

(2nd Platoon "Chopper" UH-1B with special

PsyWar l loudspeaker system on right side of the
aircraft.(64) (Photo courtesy of Harold "Chip"
Austin.[40])

(http://www.psywarrior.com/WanderingTape1.jpg)

This tape was supposed to play on the beliefs of

the Vietnamese people that a soul whose body has
not been properly buried by its family is damned to
keep wandering in the afterworld. It starts with a
recording of traditional funeral music, followed by
electronic sound effects like those from “a scary
radio show or movie.”[39] Then a voice of a girl
starts crying: “Daddy, daddy, come home with me,
come home. Daddy! Daddy!” Which is answered by
a heavily reverberating male voice telling that his (Backpack loudspeaker.
body is dead and he is calling from hell; then Source:
addressing his fellow countrymen out there, telling http://www.pcf45.com/sealords/cuadai/VNBackpac
them to avoid this senseless death somewhere in kLS.jpg.)
the battlefield and go back home to their families
while they are still alive.

The effectiveness of Operation Wandering Soul is

controversial, or rather, the question is what kind of
effect it would induce. Some reports tell how it
actually lead to the intended effect of the defection
by Việt Cộng combatants, and it even was advised
to not play the tape in the proximity of allied South
Vietnamese soldiers as it would work with them as
well. The famous scene of the helicopters playing
Richard Wagner’s Ride of the Valkyries at high
volume in “Apocalypse Now”, however, points to a

continentcontinent.cc/index.php/continent/article/view/257
Issue 5.3 / 2016: 9 Jan Philip Müller

more intricate economy of affects, taking into voices do not appeal to people simply as soldiers,
account the people emitting these sounds to but as private persons – as fathers, mothers, sisters,
sonically invade and claim the territory flown over. and brothers. At the same time, the loudspeakers
This would not so much depend on a transmitted make themselves localizable through their sound,
meaning but on a kind of aggressive intensity of and can provoke a reaction that makes the enemy
the sound. This quality borders on the domain of localizable.
frequencies and sound pressure levels aiming at
physical bodily effects that Gregory Whitehead has
imagined as ‘Project Jericho’, that Steve Goodman
described in his book on sonic warfare, and that Acoubuoy
has been recently discussed on the occasion of the
Long Range Acoustic Device (LRAD) or ‘Sound In 1966 it became increasingly clear to the US-
Cannon’ used to disperse political demonstrations American administration that the strategy of
and to drive away pirates[41]. A main thread in the bombing central and critical military and
accounts of “Ghost Tape #10” suggests that, first infrastructural targets of North Vietnam, and of the
of all, this kind of public address would mark the communist South Vietnamese National Liberation
loudspeaker’s location and draw fire. And this Front – also known as Việt Cộng – proved to be
effect was then, in turn, used in another strategy, hardly effective. One problem was that for many
devised in an Operation called “Quick Speak”[42]. people living mostly from subsistence agriculture,
As these transmissions provoked the firing of shots there didn’t seem to exist very much ‘hardware
at the loudspeaker, this again was used to spot the infrastructure’ that could be targeted and bombed.
hidden enemy and shoot back[43]. As Herbert It was even noticed that these bombings might
Friedman remarks: instead unite the scattered local population, and
promote sympathy and support for the Việt
“We have seen no data to verify the success of the Cộng[46]. And there wasn’t one main route for
Wandering Soul operation. I suspect it did not do supply and troops from the Communist North into
well. The one continuing factor I find is that in most South Vietnam that simply could be destroyed by
cases the Việt Cộng took fire when they reacted to air or interrupted once and for all: The so called Hồ
the tape. This does not seem to be a successful Chí Minh Trail just didn’t exist as one. Instead, the
way to motivate defections.”[44] territory of South Vietnam, which the USA tried to
control and stabilize, was being infiltrated by a
In the end, what may be said about Operation rhizomatic net of roads and paths that was finding
Wandering Soul is of the different translations, its way through the opaque and confusing jungle of
transmissions and transferences at play. Of note in Vietnam, and especially through the neighbouring
this context is that the assumptions of the tape’s Laos, whose territory was not supposed to be
producers – on how their knowledge of Vietnamese involved in the war[47].
culture could be translated into a psychologically
functioning sonic application – can be read in a line
with the stereotypical figure of the superstitious
primitive reacting to recorded voices, which has
been recurring in the negotiation of acousmatic
media and would thus tell something about the
lineage of these concepts[45].

By asking where the voices and sounds of

Operation Wandering Soul are coming from,
different spaces can be drawn out that are put into
relation: American military PSYOP operatives speak
through Vietnamese voices, which are electronically
altered to appear to come from another space
altogether – the afterworld – are emitted from the
loudspeakers of helicopters hovering over the
jungle, addressing the invisible enemy. These

continentcontinent.cc/index.php/continent/article/view/257
Issue 5.3 / 2016: 10 Jan Philip Müller

engineering of AT&T[49]. Now, instead of dropping

them into the ocean, the Acoubuoys were dropped
into the jungle, where suspended on their
parachutes, they would hang in the trees listening
to the forest.

(Correll, John T.: Igloo White, in: Air Force

Magazine, Vol. 87, No. 11, November 2004, p.
57-61.

www.airforcemag.com/MagazineArchive/Pages/20
04/November%202004/1104igloo.aspx

www.airforcemag.com/MagazineArchive/Documen
ts/2004/November%202004/1104igloo.pdf)

The strategy devised to stop this influx was to draw

a line through the landscape without it being
necessary to see through it or for a person to have
to be there; without having to build something
concrete and permanent in the landscape; and, in
the best case, without even touching the ground —
an „Electronic Wall“. In this operation that was,
among other names, also called Operation Igloo
White[48], the American Armed Forces started to
install, or rather, intersperse an electronic
sensorium which consisted of a variety of detectors:
seismic, magnetic, even chemical detectors that
sniffed for urine and motor exhaust gases, and last,
but definitely not least, acoustical ones. Among
these sensors was a device called the Acoubouy,
short for acoustic buoy. The technology of the
Acoubuoy was a transfer from naval warfare, where
a similar problem exists of seeing, identifying and
locating enemy submarines. In the Cold War, the
Navy had developed a system of hydrophones with
the help of technologies for ‘visible speech’ and
spectral analysis coming from the research into
speech quality in the telephone business and

continentcontinent.cc/index.php/continent/article/view/257
Issue 5.3 / 2016: 11 Jan Philip Müller

could be calculated, and an airstrike on them could

be ordered. So in this system, objects are identified
by their movement through the grid of sensors,
showing up as white “worms” on the displays in the
center of calculation, superimposed on the “boxes”
The Acoubuoys were painted in camouflage of a map grid[52]. But in order to correlate this grid
patterns in order to hide in the background of the with the geographical map of the territory on the
forest. Other sensors had antennas that were made ground, it was of course necessary to know where
to look like some kind of grass or the form of the Acoubuoys had actually landed. Due to
animal droppings[50]. The Acoubuoy was activated peculiarities of the terrain, the jungle and the
by sonic events with certain pre-programmed mountains impeding clear lines of sight[53], and the
characteristics, and would send a radio signal with uncontrollability of the spaces in between, these
its identification code and also start to transmit the radio networks were devised for non-continuous
sound for a determined period of time, like ten territories that were not held together by fixed
seconds. These signals could then be relayed by installations on the ground.
planes circling over the territory to a computerized
data centre, the Infiltration Surveillance Center
(ISC) – “the largest building in Southeast Asia”[51] –
located in Nakhon Phanom in Thailand (see map
above), where they were collected, listened to and
processed with the computer system.

(Bugging the Battlefield, 1969, Department of

Defense, MF 11 5514, https://archive.org/details/g
ov.archives.arc.4524913)

(Source:
http://web.archive.org/web/20100112201840/http:
//home.att.net/~c.jeppeson/igloo_white.html)

Maps and Territories

(Inside the ISC)
When a group of trucks was moving along a series
of these sensors, the number and type of vehicles
could be estimated, their location and velocity

continentcontinent.cc/index.php/continent/article/view/257
Issue 5.3 / 2016: 12 Jan Philip Müller

This advance of radio technology now revealed

itself as the reason for “the most pressing single
problem facing the entire […] operation”[54]: the
sensor itself just couldn’t tell where it was, it would
only transmit its identification number. That is why,
while dropping the sensors, photos of the ground
were taken from the plane, which could be
compared and thus linked to the maps. After an
attack, it had to be checked again if the targets had
actually been hit and destroyed. To once again find
the hit targets on their locations trucks, for instance
— wasn’t as easy as it sounds: had things been
destroyed at all, or had the Việt Cộng hidden them
in the jungle after the attack? Problems like this (The Sound of Igloo White. I haven’t been able to
drove the circulating joke about the “Great Laotian get hold of Igloo White recordings. Paul Dickson
Truck Eater”, an undiscovered exotic animal describes one of these tapes in his book.)
roaming the jungle at night[55].

The huge amount of activations in turn caused the

personnel to lower their sensitivity and they would
Frogs often not trust their data to order a counter-
operation[57]. In order to be able to distinguish the
This strategy of detection proved to be more environmental background noises’ of the jungle
sonically difficult than it had been previously from sounds of humans and motors, personnel had
imagined. Nature in the Vietnamese jungle seems to be trained in listening. The newly formed
to be rather a grandiose hubbub than a quiet ‘hi-fi Acoustical Working Group (AWG), with Navy
soundscape’, making the distinction between signal specialists, and civilians from American universities
and noise complicated: and CBS Laboratories, undertook extensive
research into the spectral and temporal signatures
“Among the shortcomings of the anti-vehicular of trucks, frogs, thunderstorms and planes flying
systems was the excessive sensitivity of the sensors, by, to further the techniques of electronic sound
as demonstrated by the 491,814 [acoustic-seismic] analysis[58].
sensor activations and the 125,649 acoustic
acoubuoy activations. It was obvious that not
enemy trucks but ambient factors such as animals
(especially frogs), thunder, and other sounds were
triggering most of the activations.”[56]

continentcontinent.cc/index.php/continent/article/view/257
Issue 5.3 / 2016: 13 Jan Philip Müller

Still, how could one distinguish friend from enemy,

from the uninvolved? Signal analysis would give no
definite answer to that, somebody would have to
decide. And this could mean the need to switch
from ‘signal intelligence’ — which would analyze
the signal by physical parameters — to
‘communication intelligence’, looking for a
meaning that is transmitted over the carrier signal.
In the 1970 hearing on the Electronic Battlefield
Program, this link between switching to another
level, and the responsibilities for the lives of the
people on the ground becomes quite clear:

“Mr. Gilleas: There is a lot of interest in the ability

of sensors to discriminate between enemy forces
and friendly civilians who are out in remote areas.
[…] The question is, how do we prevent sensors
from killing innocent people versus enemy troops?

General Deane: You say the sensors won't tell you.

And the sensors might give you an indication if
over an acoustic sensor you heard voices and
determined, from the conversation that they were
enemy — that is the only way I would know you
would be able to tell. Now, when you get into that
kind of a problem, you have to bring to bear your
knowledge of where your friendly forces are, where
it is likely friendly people are civilians, and use your
best judgment.”[59]

Statistics

In the end the effectiveness of Operation Igloo

White stayed unclear. For example, one report that
explored these questions remarks:

“The reported figures for the number of North

Vietnamese and Pathet Lao trucks damaged or
(Acoustical Working Group: Acquisition, Reduction destroyed on the Trail are growing at a geometric
and Analysis of Acoustical Data. An Unclassified rate… These figures are not taken seriously by
Summary of Acoustical Working Group Studies. most US officials, even Air Force officers, who
NADC Report No. AWG-SU (Defense Technical generally apply something on the order of a 30%
Information Center, DTIC ADA025219), discount factor. One reason why there is some
Department of the Navy, Naval Air Development skepticism about the track kills claimed by the Air
Center, Warminster, PA, (printed for the NADC by Force is the total figure for the last year greatly
CBS Laboratories, Stamford, Connecticut), 1974, exceeds the number of trucks believed by the
online: http://handle.dtic.mil/100.2/ADA025219 , Embassy to be in all of North Vietnam.”[60]
https://archive.org/details/DTIC_ADA025219.)
Martin van Creveld and Paul Edwards have

continentcontinent.cc/index.php/continent/article/view/257
Issue 5.3 / 2016: 14 Jan Philip Müller

remarked on the strong influence of computerized believed to be of special importance in view of the
numerical and statistical modelling on how the burgeoning interest in the practice of noise control
Vietnam War was led[61]. In Operation Igloo White, and environmental acoustics, which is so heavily
this trait becomes entangled with the radiophonic dependent on accurate measurements and
infrastructure. The question of localization and meaningful data reduction.”[64]
identification of a potential target is informed by
the fact that sensors are sending their signals by Bernhard Siegert has noted that the history of radio
radio waves, and by the techniques of automated is marked by an ‘electronic’ split between the
spectral analysis that are making it a kind of game audible low frequencies of the transmitted sound
of battleship; structures of uncertainties and that is interpreted on the side of ‘communication
probabilities configured by the specific radiophonic intelligence’ and the high frequencies of the
infrastructure – the connections and disconnections electromagnetic carrier that is analyzed on the side
between different sonic spatialities – installed. of signal intelligence[65]. Taking up on this history of
radiophonics, a ‘becoming-environmental’ of sound
Operation Igloo White can be thought of as a kind can be thought of as a certain way of re-
of weird double of Schafer’s “Wilderness Radio”: a introducing this split into the acoustic and auditive
certain reversal of the classical structure of domain, when in the acoubuoy sound is analyzed
radiophonic entertainment, in which one center electronically and automatically in a logic of signal
would broadcast out into the world, causing an intelligence and the kind of ambiguities this logic
uncertainty about the listeners, that becomes a brings with it.
scattered ‘mass’ on one end of the channel and an
acousmatic or schizophonic separation of the Even taking into account the logic of finite
sound from its source or context on the other resources and time to obtain information that
end[62]. While Schafer’s design seems to start out might be available in principle, which all kinds of
from the assumption that the difference between decision-making may have to deal with – but
nature and technology is set, and then becomes maybe military command in particular – one crucial
muddled in a logic of the antidote – although still problem remains. If it has to be decided whether
thought in terms of a centrally controlled the objects or persons detected are the enemy and
intervention – Operation Igloo White encounters not civilians or allies, at least in principle, this
the problems of distinguishing one thing from radiophonic technology of surveillance and
another in the heart of its set up and the thousands intelligence cannot settle these things once and for
of ‘radio-stations’ reaching a ‘centre of calculation’ all, because it can potentially trigger an ever-
are threatening to overwhelm it in a cacophony of increasing spiral of counterintelligence and
sonic data. And these two strange doubles can be deception, and counter-counterintelligence and so
related to each other through the problematics of on, that calculates with the other’s reactions on
acoustic environments. In a 1974 publication of the sounds[66]. An ambiguity of sounds of a second
Acoustical Working Group, the authors explained order.
their motives in the leading abstract:

“With the ending of American military involvement

in the Indochina conflict it became appropriate to The Ears of the Jungle
summarize the unclassified aspects of those
investigations which might have a reference value It remains unclear to what extent such a logic
to future scientific workers both in the civilian and actually unfolded around the acoubuoy[67]. Pierre
military endeavors. […] They embrace, in general, Boulle - the author of The Bridge of the River
the study of sound propagation, a subject Kwai and Planet of the Apes - however, has taken
important to noise abatement, hearing protection, up the possible escalation of sonic
and other ecological and environmental counterintelligence and countermeasures in his
concerns.”[63] novel “Ears of the Jungle”[68]. Boulle had been a
French engineer working in different parts of
And a bit later they expand: colonial Southeast Asia, who then enlisted as a
secret agent before he came back to France and
“The publication of this volume at this time is wrote his novels. His being a representative of the

continentcontinent.cc/index.php/continent/article/view/257
Issue 5.3 / 2016: 15 Jan Philip Müller

former colonial power in Vietnam might be a clue the forest for a foundation of a “Hồ Chí Minh
to how he understands the Vietnam War. However, Road” that would lay the foundation for traffic and
although this story is explicitly fictional, the book thus for the unification between North and South
conveys a sense of a strange kind of sonic – or Vietnam.
better: radiophonic – ecology and its poetics; the
strange splits and paradoxes between nature and The stories of Madame Ngha’s tricks alternate with
technology, and inside and outside spaces. The perspectives of the intelligence center at Nakhon
narrative is carried by an aesthetics of deception in Phanom, where General Bishop tries to make sense
which a thing can potentially turn around to be, to of the incoming signals.
appear and to be used as something else by
changing the register of relations in which it flowers
out its effects.

In the book the North Vietnamese Chief of

Intelligence – Madame Ngha – discovers the
Acoubuoys with the help of local indigenous tribes
– the Jarai – with their ‘natural sensitivity’ for
“foreign objects” in the jungle. She sets up a
scheme of acoustic deception with sounds on
prerecorded tapes: on the one hand, the noises of
their trucks going along the Hồ Chí Minh Trail are
masked out by sounds of crickets and other natural
noises, and on the other hand recordings mimic the
movement of convoys somewhere else by playing
sounds of trucks there. In this way she develops
different strategies to abuse the American
bombers for her own goals.

She develops this idea in a conversation with the

native Dju, whose tribe gathers the animals
randomly killed by American air attacks instead of
hunting them themselves:

“The Plain of a Hundred Thousand Buffalo is one of

the best, but there are others almost as good. Dju
knows them all; but the flying men are stupid and
blind. They drop their stones anywhere. It is not the
way to carry on a good hunt.' […] 'I definitely
agree,' she [Madame Ngha] said. 'Dju speaks with
wisdom. Dropping stones at random! That is no
way to have a fine hunt.”[69]

She sonically misdirects the planes to ‘hunt’ animals

for local food supply. Then she uses the napalm
bombs to clear the forest and to cultivate the land
with rice fields. Thus it appears that the nature of
the jungle — which in a way supports the war
against the United States — is at the same time In the descriptions of how General Bishop deals
an ‘enemy’ as it interferes with the modernization with things two recurring and varied motifs can be
of the Vietnamese People, and the Americans are noted: The sounds start to border on music,
actually helping to overcome it by their efforts to aesthetic pleasures, ‘concerts’ of the jungle
use their military-technological predominance: In transmitted by radio and enjoyed in the enclosed,
the next step, the napalm bombing is used burn

continentcontinent.cc/index.php/continent/article/view/257
Issue 5.3 / 2016: 16 Jan Philip Müller

air-conditioned and – presumably – safe space of [1] R. Murray Schafer, “Radical Radio [1982],”
the general’s home. And this already points to the in Radiotext(e), ed. Neil Strauss (New York:
second aspect: the strange relations between Semiotext(e), 1993), 291-298, 293-294.
different insides and outsides that are at work at
this military base, only connected through
microphones to the actual battles. The strangeness [2] For different critiques of Schafer’s practices and
of these relations is played out in a scene where theories of soundscapes connected to the
the station’s Thai gardener is reprimanded for questions of their implicit values, see for
using chemical pesticides in the general’s garden, example: Mitchell Akiyama, “Unsettling the World
because as ecology is much debated in the Soundscape Project: Soundscapes of Canada and
American public lately, everybody should know that the Politics of Self-Recognition,” Sounding
these pesticides are very bad for the environment – out (August 20, 2015), https://soundstudiesblog.co
while in the environment outside the enclosed m/2015/08/20/unsettling-the-world-soundscape-pr
garden, the poison Agent Orange is used on an oject-soundscapes-of-canada-and-the-politics-of-
incredible scale to defoliate the jungle. self-recognition/; Sophie Arkette, “Sounds Like
City,” Theory, Culture & Society 21.1 (2004),
In the end, the general’s Vietnamese servant – who 159–168; Brandon LaBelle, Background noise.
is one of Madame Ngha’s agents – smuggles Perspectives on Sound Art (New York: continuum,
acoustic sensors into his home, disguised as nature 2006), 214-215; Holger Schulze, “Das Genre der
– beautiful orchids from the Vietnamese jungle. Soundscape. Eine Kritik und Verteidigung der
These orchids/sensors/radio-transmitters then Soundscape im 21. Jahrhundert,” in: Infrastrukturen
trigger an air raid and the destruction of the des Urbanen. Soundscapes, Landscapes,
American intelligence center itself. Netscapes, ed. Nathalie Bredella & Chris Dähne
(Bielefeld: transcript, 2013), 85–104; Jan Philip
The orchid – an Acoubuoy coming back as a flower Müller, “Soundscape Nashville. Milieus des
– might be a good image for the possibilities for Tonbandgeräts um 1974,” in Dähne/Bredella
recursions and oscillations between the different (ed.), Infrastrukturen des Urbanen, 47-84.
spatialities that the examples collected here seem
to connect.
[3] R. Murray Schafer, The Soundscape. Our Sonic
Environment and the Tuning of the World [1977]
(Rochester, VT: Destiny Books, 1994), 88-93.
*****

These reflections developed in my research on the [4] Cf. Sabine Breitsameter, “Hörgestalt und
history of sound installations and experimental Denkfigur – Zur Geschichte und Perspektive von R.
radio as part of the interdisciplinary research Murray Schafers ‘Die Ordnung der Klänge’,” in: R.
project "Radiophonic Cultures – Sonic Murray Schafer, Die Ordnung der Klänge. Eine
environments and archives in hybrid media Kulturgeschichte des Hörens (1977), ed. & transl.
systems" funded by the Swiss National Science Sabine Breitsameter (Mainz: Schott, 2010), 7-28,
Foundation (SNSF) in the frame of the Sinergia 16.
programme. I presented some first ideas of this
essay at the workshop "Sounding Out the
Anthropocene" (March 10.–11., 2016, Critical [5] For the field of literature see the overview of
Media Lab, Academy of Art and Design FHNW, different works: Philip Jason, “‘The Noise is Always
Basel). Many thanks to the organizers Felix Gerloff in My Head.’ Auditory Images in the Literature of
and Shintaro Miyazaki, to all participants for the the Vietnam War”, The Midwest Quarterly 37.3
inspiring discussions and to Friedlind Riedel and (Spring 1996), 243-255.
Seth Horowitz for two helpful remarks.

[6] This term would be loosely inspired by Joseph

Vogl’s description of the ‘becoming-media’ of the
Galilei’s telescope, in: Joseph Vogl, “Medien-

continentcontinent.cc/index.php/continent/article/view/257
Issue 5.3 / 2016: 17 Jan Philip Müller

Werden: Galileis Fernrohr,” in Mediale http://vietnamresearch.com/media/termer/. https://

Historiographien (Archiv für Mediengeschichte 1), en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_Gotta_Get_out_of_This_
ed. Lorenz Engell & Joseph Vogl (Weimar: Place.
Universitätsverlag Weimar, 2001), 115–123.

[15] Michael J. Kramer, The republic of rock. Music

[7] John Law, “Objects and Spaces,” in Theory, and citizenship in the sixties counterculture (New
Culture & Society 19.5/6, 2002, 91–105; 95. York: Oxford University Press, 2013), 135-137.

[8] Cf. Anthony Dunne, Hertzian tales. Electronic [16] Quote from a GI about his time in Vietnam
products, aesthetic experience, and critical 66/67, interviewed in NPR, All Things Considered,
design (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2006). “Vietnam: Radio First Termer.”

[9] Jacques Rancière, Disagreement: Politics and [17] Don North, “Voices from the Past: The Search
Philosophy (Minnesota: University of Minnesota for Hanoi Hannah, Part I,” Viet Nam Generation
Press, 2004), 21-42. Journal & Newsletter3.3 (November 1991), online:
http://www3.iath.virginia.edu/sixties/HTML_docs/T
exts/Scholarly/North_Hanoi_Hannah_01.html.
[10] Cf. “Vietnam: Radio First Termer,” (23 min.)
special program, All Things Considered, prod.
Alexis Muellner, National Public Radio (NPR), [18] “‘Hanoi Hannah’ on Vietnam” (Interview with
November 11, 1987. For a 59 minute version Brian Lamb), C-Span, April 25, 1992, www.c-
see: span.org/video/?26204-1/hanoi-hannah-vietnam,
www.interlockmedia.com/productions/viet_radio/i ca. at 4:37.
mages/1%20Audio%20Track.flv. See also: Hearts
and Minds (Vietnam).
[19] Hanoi Hannah, 16 June 1967, quoted in: North,
“Voices from the Past.”
[11] Bob Casey (Production Manager AFVN),
quoted from NPR, All Things Considered,
“Vietnam: Radio First Termer”, ca. 0:58). [20] Steve Weinstein, “An Earful of Vietnam War
Radio From NPR,” L.A. Times, November 11, 1987,
http://articles.latimes.com/1987-11-11/entertainme
[12] Adrian Cronauer, Good Morning, Vietnam! nt/ca-13554_1_pirate-broadcasters.
Adrian Cronauer on Censorship at the American
Veterans Center (AVC) Conference 2008,
https://youtu.be/tUgv0fXd4ns?t=4m49s. [21] North, “Voices from the Past.”

[13] For a reflection on this debate, [22] See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fragging. On

see: Christopher Sabis, Through the Soldiers' Ears: desertion and the GI Movements against the
What Americans Fighting in Vietnam Heard and Its Vietnam war, see also the documentary: Sir, No,
Effects, Senior’s Thesis, University of Rochester Sir! (2005, David Zeiger), www.sirnosir.com,
2000, online: http://hdl.handle.net/1802/9903. https://youtu.be/3nPJgeg6hpA.

[14] Cf. Cronauer, Good Morning, Vietnam!, [23] Interview with Trịnh Thị Ngọ, in: North,
youtu.be/tUgv0fXd4ns. See also the proposal for “Voices from the Past.” AWOL stands for “Absent
the documentary: NPR, All Things Considered, Without Official Leave”, the abandonment of duty,
“Vietnam: Radio First the not-being at one’s position/address.
Termer,”

continentcontinent.cc/index.php/continent/article/view/257
Issue 5.3 / 2016: 18 Jan Philip Müller

[24] See: Staff Film Report 66-43B: U.S. Army domatic.com/entry/2006-07-05T20_08_24-07_00.

Communications Vietnam (1966, Department of
Defense),
https://archive.org/details/gov.dod.dimoc.26999. [32] Transcript from the interview with Dave Rabbit
by Ragnar Daneskjold on “The Pirates
Week,” 16.04.2006 (part 1).
[25] Martin van Creveld, Command in
war (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press,
1985), 238. [33] Cf. Rabbit, 21 Days in the Saigon
Underground.

[26] Cf. van Creveld: Command in war, 241-260.

[34] Cf. Rabbit, 21 Days in the Saigon
Underground.
[27] Van Creveld: Command in war, 258.

[35] Nguyen on Radio First Termer, quoted

[28] An example is the “Funkerspuk” of 1918, in after Kramer, The republic of rock, 155.
which a network of militarily trained radio operators
threatened to spin off from military and state
control. Although this threat proved to be very [36] Rabbit at Radio First
easy to enclose or even hadn’t been really Termer, Radio-First-Termer-Pt1.flac-(2009).flac,
probable in the first place, this story was ingrained http://radiofirsttermerrestoration.com/?page_id=7,
into the discourse on radio as a medium of ca. at 43:26.
communication and/or broadcast and on the
regulatory politics in the Weimar Republic.
See Bernhard Siegert, “Eskalation eines Mediums. [37]
Die Lichtung des Radiohörens im https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hearts_and_Minds_(
Hochfrequenzkrieg,” in Welt auf tönernen Füssen. Vietnam).
Die Töne und das Hören, ed. Uta Brandes
(Göttingen: Steidl, 1994), 295-327, 317-318; Albert
Kümmel, “Innere Stimmen - Die deutsche [38] See Herbert A. Friedman, The Wandering Soul
Radiodebatte,” in Einführung in die Geschichte der Psyop Tape of Vietnam,
Medien, ed. Albert Kümmel, Leander Scholz & www.psywarrior.com/wanderingsoul.html.
Eckhard Schumacher (Paderborn: Fink [UTB], 2004),
175-197, 175-176.
[39] Friedman, The Wandering Soul Psyop Tape of
Vietnam.
[29] Marine veteran Bill Erhart in: NPR, All Things
Considered, “Vietnam: Radio First Termer.” On the
“bullshit band” also see: Kramer, The republic of [40] Stories provided by former members of the
rock,152-155. 33rd Trans Co. or 118th
AHC: http://www.118ahc.org/storiespage5.htm.

[30] Dave Rabbit (Clyde David DeLay), 21 Days in

the Saigon Underground. The Birth and Death Of [41] Cf. Gregory Whitehead, Project
Radio First Termer (2006), Jericho (October 21,
http://earthstation1.com/BiographyOfRFT.html. 2012),
https://gregorywhitehead.net/2012/10/21/project-
jericho/; Steve Goodman, Sonic warfare. Sound,
[31] See interview with Dave Rabbit by Ragnar affect, and the ecology of fear (Cambridge, MA:
Daneskjold on “The Pirates Week,” 16.04.2006 MIT Press, 2010),
(part 1) & 23.04.2006 (part 2). http://daverabbit.po 17-25;

continentcontinent.cc/index.php/continent/article/view/257
Issue 5.3 / 2016: 19 Jan Philip Müller

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_Range_Acoustic and the acoustic techniques of Igloo White

_Device. For the different applications that the cf. Jacob van Staaveren, Interdiction in Southern
Laos, 1960-1968 (Washington, DC.: Center for Air
manufacturer LRAD Corporation markets these Force History, 1993), online: http://www.afhso.af.mi
devices for, see: www.lradx.com/application/. l/shared/media/document/AFD-100927-078.pdf,
267; Chris Jeppeson, Acoubuoy, Spikebuoy,
Muscle Shoals and Igloo White (1999?), http://web.
[42] Cf. Friedman, The Wandering Soul Psyop Tape archive.org/web/20100112201840/http://home.att.
of Vietnam and Herbert A. Friedman, Project Quick net/~c.jeppeson/igloo_white.html; Gary E. Weir,
Speak, http://www.psywarrior.com/quick.html. “The American Sound Surveillance System: Using
the Ocean to Hunt Soviet Submarines,
1950-1961,” International Journal of Naval
[43] Friedman, The Wandering Soul Psyop Tape of History 5.2 (August 2006), online: www.ijnhonline.o
Vietnam. rg/wp-
content/uploads/2012/01/article_weir_aug06.pdf,
2; Jack Harris, Acoustical Techniques/Designs
[44] Friedman, The Wandering Soul Psyop Tape of Investigated During the Southeast Asia Conflict
Vietnam. 1966-1972 (Warminster: Naval Air Development
Center [Report No.: NADC-80040-40],
Communication Navigation Technology
[45] Cf. Lisa Gitelman, “Reading Music, Reading Directorate, 1980, Accession Number :
Records, Reading Race: Musical Copyright and the ADB053986), online:
U. S. Copyright Act of 1909,” The Musical http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/b053986.pdf.
Quarterly 81.2 (1997), 265–290, 267-270.

[50] Cf. Haider: Unattended Ground Sensors,

[46] Cf. Eric D. Haider, Unattended Ground Sensors 43-52.
and Precision Engagement, 1998 Master's Thesis,
Naval Postgraduate School Monterey, http://calhou
n.nps.edu/bitstream/handle/10945/32642/98Dec_ [51] Paul N. Edwards, The closed world. Computers
Haider.pdf, 15-20. and the politics of discourse in Cold War
America (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1997), 3.

[47] Cf. Anthony J. Tambini, Wiring Vietnam. The

Electronic Wall (Lanham: Scarecrow Press, 2007), xi- [52] See Edwards: The closed world, 3.
xii.

[53] See for example the film: Staff Film Report

[48] Other names used for basically the same or 66-43B: U.S. Army Communications Vietnam (1966,
similar electronic wall programs or parts of it in the Department of Defense),
course of its history and because „of partial https://archive.org/details/gov.dod.dimoc.26999.
compromises of their classified meanings“ (Project
CHECO Report, 1) were: Practice Nine, Illinois City,
Dye Marker, Dump Truck, Dutch Windmill, Muscle [54] “Accuracy in delivering and in plotting the site
Shoals, and Task Force Alpha. See Tambini: Wiring of delivery was crucial in assessing the information
Vietnam, xii, and Jesse C. Gatlin, Project CHECO produced by a sensor string. General McBride cited
Report: Igloo White (Initial Phase), 31 July 1968, accurate sensor delivery as the most pressing single
Pentagon, online: problem facing the entire DUTCH MILL
www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a485055.pdf, 1-3. operation.” Gatlin, Project CHECO Report: Igloo
White, 15, quoting after: Briefing, presented to
Brig. Gen. R. P. Keller, USMC, by Brig. Gen. W. P.
[49] For the connections of low frequency analysis McBride, Nakhon Phanom, Thailand, 23 Mar 68.
between telephone business, submarine detection,

continentcontinent.cc/index.php/continent/article/view/257
Issue 5.3 / 2016: 20 Jan Philip Müller

[55] Cf. Dan Hagedorn & Leif Hellström, Foreign see: Paul Dickson, The electronic
invaders. The Douglas Invader in foreign military battlefield (London: Boyars, 1976), 77.
and US clandestine service (Leicester: Midland Pub.
1994), 163.
[61] Cf. Edwards: The closed world, 125-143; van
Creveld: Command in war, 239-241, 252-255.
[56] Van Staaveren, Interdiction in Southern Laos,
282
[62] These two disruptions that seem to especially
mark the discourse on radiophony and how they
[57] Cf. Gatlin, Project CHECO Report: Igloo are connected would be crucial for a ‘radiophonic
White, 28. topology’. For the ‘scattered mass’; cf. Wolfgang
Hagen, "Zur medialen Genealogie der Elektrizität,"
in: Kommunikation, Medien, Macht, ed. Rudolf
[58] Cf. Harris, Acoustical Techniques; Acoustical Maresch; Nils Werber (Frankfurt am Main:
Working Group, Acquisition, Reduction and Suhrkamp, 2000), 133-173, and: Katja
Analysis of Acoustical Data. An Unclassified Rothe, Katastrophen hören. Experimente im frühen
Summary of Acoustical Working Group europäischen Radio, Dissertation Humboldt-
Studies (NADC Report No. AWG-SU), (Warminster, Universität, 2008 (Berlin: Kadmos, 2010), 11-15. For
PA: Department of the Navy, Naval Air the ‘acousmatic’ cf. Pierre Schaeffer,
Development Center, [printed by CBS "Acousmatics" (1966), in Audio culture. Readings in
Laboratories, Stamford, Connecticut], 1974, modern music, ed. Christoph Cox & Daniel Warner
Defense Technical Information Center (New York: Continuum, 2004), 76–81.
ADA025219), online:
http://handle.dtic.mil/100.2/ADA025219,
https://archive.org/details/DTIC_ADA025219. [63] Acoustical Working Group, Acquisition,
Reduction and Analysis of Acoustical Data, v.

[59] Hearings before the Electronic Battlefield

Subcommittee of the Preparedness Investigating [64] Acoustical Working Group, Acquisition,
Subcommittee of the Committee on Armed Reduction and Analysis of Acoustical Data, Ix.
Services United States Senate, Ninety-first
Congress, second session, November 18, 19, and
24, 1970 (Washington, DC: U.S. Government [65] Cf. Siegert, “Eskalation eines
Printing Office 1971), 33 (Wednesday November Mediums,” 307-315.
18, 1970: Ben J. Gilleas, Director of Investigations,
and Maj. Gen. John R. Deane, Jr. USA Director,
Defense Communications Planning Group [DCPG]). [66] Cf. Siegert, “Eskalation eines
Online: The text has been placed online in the Mediums,” 321-323.
Virtual Vietnam Archive of the Vietnam Project at
Texas Tech University. Start by going to Front
matter and pp. 1-47: www.vietnam.ttu.edu/star/ima [67] “The guerrillas had simply learned to confuse
ges/239/2390409006A.pdf, then change the "A" at the American sensors with tape-recorded truck
the end of the URL to B, C, D, and E to get the noises, bags of urine, and other decoys, provoking
later pages. the release of countless tons of bombs onto empty
jungle corridors which they then traversed at their
leisure.” (Edwards: The closed world, 4) I haven’t
[60] Laos: April 1971. A Staff Report prepared for been able to confirm these stories of
the use of the Subcommittee on U.S. Security counterintelligence against Igloo White.
Agreements and Commitments Abroad of the Cf. Dickson, The electronic
Committee on Foreign relations (United States battlefield, 79-81: “’These were fascinating ideas,’
Senate, August 3, 1971), 8. Online: says Israel [David R. Israel, Deputy Director of the
http://pdf.usaid.gov/pdf_docs/Pcaac084.pdf. Also newly formed Defense Communications Planning

continentcontinent.cc/index.php/continent/article/view/257
 Issue 5.3 / 2016: 21 Jan Philip Müller

Group (DCPG)], ‘and quite imaginative but things

never quite worked out like Boulle predicted. They
never really tried to spoof them on any scale. Sure
they shot some, burned others and in what was
perhaps the ultimate act of contempt we actually
heard them piss on one of our acoustic sensors; but
they never really played games with us’.” However,
it is already telling of the logic at work here, that it
seemed impossible to produce reliable numbers
and that countermeasures against the enemy’s
countermeasures were preconceived: For example
many of these sensors had built-in self-destruction
mechanisms for if one would try to tamper with
them or find out how they worked.

[68] Pierre Boulle, Ears of the jungle ( London:

Cassell 1974).

[69] Boulle, Ears of the jungle, 45.

continentcontinent.cc/index.php/continent/article/view/257

View publication stats

Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)