WAR RAINMAKING SUBJECT TO SUIT
By: Anthony Ripley
October 3, 1972
New York Times
U.S. Said to Violate Patent in Indochina Project
WASHINGTON, Oct. 3 – In a largely unnoticed lawsuit filed here more than three weeks ago, a manufacturer of cloud-seeding equipment charges that the United States is making rain in Indochina with a device he invent, in violation of his patent rights.
Bernard A. Power, president of the Weather Engineering Corporation of Canada Ltd. and its United States subsidiary, Weather Engineering Corporation of America, estimated that 1.9 million of the devices– explosive canisters filled with silver iodide crystals– had been produced for use in Southeast Asia.
Secretary of Defense Melvin R. Laird told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on April 18 that the Defense Department had not conducted any rainmaking activities over North Vietnam.
On July 3, the New York Times reported secret use of cloud-seeding over North Vietnam and South Vietnam and Laos, quoting both civilian and military sources in the Government.
Denial Repeated
Then, in a news conference July 6, Mr. Laird was again asked about any seeding operations. He repeated his denial concerning military operations over North Vietnam and declined comment on the situation elsewhere.
Mr. Power said by telephone from Montreal that the company was seeking $95-million for "full recovery of profits" for the devices, which he said cost $50 each.
Mr. Power said the estimate was based on the length of the monsoon seasons over Indochina and the size of the area involved, which he said he thought was the Ho Chi Minh trail network. The use covered the period from 1967 to present, he said.
Mr. Power said that the three-pound explosive canister and the method of dropping it from a plane into the clouds was tested in a demonstration at Harmon Air Force Base in Newfoundland in November, 1966, with military observers from Canada and the United States on hand.
The suit contends that in December, 1966, the company officers got in touch with Walt W. Rostow, who at the time was Special Assistant to President Lyndon B. Johnson.
Mr. Rostow referred them to Col. Robert N. Ginsburgh of the Air Force, who at the time was on Mr. Rostow's staff. He is now a major general in charge of Air Force public information.
The suit alleges that Mr. Power and Dewitt S. Copp, Washington representative of the company met with Colonel Ginsburgh on Jan. 10, 1967, "and disclosed the details of a plan to close infiltration trails to South Vietnam while at the same time greatly reducing the loss of lives normally attendant with the conventional procedures of attempting to close the trails by bombing."
Said to Describe Devices
That plan, the suit alleges, was to make the trail impassable through excessive rainfall. At the time they described their patented devices, exhibited models and discussed both tactical and strategic use.
In the telephone interview, Mr. Power said he had had no formal contract with the Department of Defense but had been told by Colonel Ginsburgh that the United States would either get in touch with them for a supply of the devices, use them without telling the company or do nothing.
"He said we would hear nothing until the war was over," Mr. Power said.
In March, 1971, he said he first heard that weather modification was being used in Southeast Asia in an article by Jack Anderson, the columnist and decided to see if his device was involved.
Since April, 1971, the suit alleges, the company has met with the General Counsel's office of the Defense Department trying to work out the matter to no avail.
"To date," the suit alleges, "the Department of Defense has been either unable or unwilling to supply plaintiffs with any information on the procedures or structures used in the weather modification program."
When the matter of military rainmaking came to light again this year, Mr. Power said, he was advised to file suit seeking to examine documents and question witnesses about the matter.
The device itself is a paper board tube wrapped with explosive cord that contains silver iodide. Protruding from one end is a lanyard that is attached to a delay fuse and three blasting caps.
The lanyard is attached to the inside of an airplane and the device shoved by hand through a hole in the plane's body, jerking the lanyard out to start the time fuse. It falls into the cloud and explodes, releasing the silver iodide crystals.