Geomorphology 157-158 (2012) 169–182

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Geomorphology
j o u r n a l h o m e p a g e : w w w. e l s ev i e r. c o m / l o c a t e / g e o m o r p h

Modern warfare as a significant form of zoogeomorphic disturbance

upon the landscape
Joseph P. Hupy a,⁎, Thomas Koehler b
a
Department of Geography, University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, Eau Claire, WI 54702, USA
b
Department of Geography, University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire 54702, USA

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: The damage exerted by warfare on the physical landscape is one, of many, anthropogenic impacts upon the
Received 10 March 2011 environment. Bombturbation is a term that describes the impacts of explosive munitions upon the landscape.
Accepted 9 May 2011 Bombturbation, like many other forms of zoogeomorphology, is a disruptive force, capable of moving large
Available online 13 July 2011
amounts of sediments, and denuding landscapes to the point where changes in micro and mesotopography
have long-term implications. The long term implication of bombturbative actions depends on the type and
Keywords:
Zoogeomorphology
duration of explosive device that rendered the disturbance, and the geographic context of the landscape
Bombturbation disturbed; i.e. cultural and physical factors. Recovery from bombturbative activity, in the context of this
Military geography research, is measured by vegetative regrowth and soil development in cratered disturbances. A comparison
Pedogenesis and contrast between the two battlefields of Verdun, France and Khe Sanh, Vietnam show that bombturbative
actions have significantly altered the topography at each location, thus influencing surface runoff and
processes of soil development. Principals of the Runge pedogenic model, or the energy of water moving
through the soil profile, best explain how the varying climate and parent material at each location influence
post disturbance soil development rates. Whereas the data collected at Verdun suggest that explosive
munitions have put that landscape on diverging path of development, thus rendering it much different post-
disturbance landscape, Khe Sanh displays much different recovery patterns. Preliminary research at Khe Sanh
indicates that reforestation and soil development following disturbance are not so much influenced by
bombturbative patterns as land use activities in the area of study.
© 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
To better understand the many agents capable of rendering change
upon the surface of Earth, geomorphologists often divide the field of
geomorphology down into various subfields, each of which describes
a particular geomorphic agent. Whereas the myriad of subfields can
be confusing, breaking geomorphology into these various categories
clearly illustrates that many agents act to shape the surface, beyond
the traditional geomorphic agents of wind and water, ultimately
influenced by the overarching force of gravity. Biogeomorphology is
one such subfield of geomorphology that breaks from those
traditional agents of change, and examines transformative processes
upon the surface through the unique lens of life itself shaping the face
of the planet. It follows then that zoogeomorphology studies how
animals exert an impact on the landscape, and much work has been
done in this realm since its introduction by Butler (1992). A quick and
rudimentary literature search will poignantly demonstrate that
animals have a role in shaping geomorphic processes (Whitford and
⁎ Corresponding author.
E-mail address: hupyjp@uwec.edu (J.P. Hupy).
Kay, 1999; Butler, 2007; Francis et al., 2009; Hjort and Luoto, 2009).
Arguably, however, humans are also animals and the impacts they
have rendered on the surface of Earth supersedes any past landscape
transformation, denudation or deposition, by other species in the
animal kingdom (McNeill, 2000). The anthropogenic element, or
anthropogeomorphology is yet another subfield that is well placed
within the subfield of zoogeomorphology (Goudie, 1997; Goudie,
2000; Goudie, 2006)).
In a world that contains 6.8 billion people, scant few places remain
untouched by anthrogeomorphic forces. Humans have proven
themselves ample geomorphic agents by moving, via mining
operations alone, more material over the course of the 20th century
than all other natural geomorphic agents combined (McNeill, 2000).
Whereas mining may be one of the more obvious forms of an
anthrogeomorphic agent that has received ample attention from the
geomorphic community, other anthrogeomorphic agents lack con-
siderable attention (Goldhaber et al., 2009; Hancock, 2009; Zuquette
et al., 2009). Warfare, one of the more unique forms of anthro-
geomorphic disturbance, is one such agent that has not received
attention until recently (Hupy and Schaetzl, 2008). Modern warfare is
a unique geomorphic agent because of its magnitude, duration, and
extent. Very few geomorphic agents, whether they are geologic or

0169-555X/$ – see front matter © 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.geomorph.2011.05.024
170 J.P. Hupy, T. Koehler / Geomorphology 157-158 (2012) 169–182
biogeomorphic, are capable of rendering the magnitude of change
exerted by warfare in such a short period of time, over such a wide
area, and in such intensity.
Environmental disturbances associated with warfare occur when
armies intentionally eliminate the cover or resource base of an enemy
or, more commonly, as an unintentional consequence associated with
the war effort. Based on these premises, environmental disturbances
associated with war can historically be placed into three general
categories (Hupy and Schaetzl, 2008):
• environmental disturbance and destruction from weaponry.
• direct consumption of resources such as timber, water, and food to
support armies.
• indirect consumption of resources by military industrial complexes
that supply the war effort.
A common thread among each of these disturbance categories is
that, when viewed from ancient times up until present, the scope of
environmental disturbance has continually and significantly in-
creased in magnitude (Hupy and Schaetzl, 2006). Technological
innovations from one war to the next have enabled humans to
increasingly inflict harm upon the enemy, and upon the environment.
Every aspect of modern war is of greater magnitude than that of
warfare prior to the industrial age; armies and battlefields are larger,
munitions are more powerful, and the disturbances are more
widespread. With few exceptions, such as U.S. strategy in the Second
Indochina War, damage to the environment has been mostly
incidental (Westing, 1977). That is, the damage inflicted upon the
environment in warfare occurred because the enemy happened to be
in that particular area, and it was the enemy who was targeted, not
the natural environment. Whether incidental or deliberate, this article
will focus mainly upon the direct impacts of battle on the soils of the
geomorphic landscape, or soilscape. In particular, this article empha-
sizes disturbance rendered by explosive ordnance, and is in many
ways a follow up to an article that presented the term ‘bombturbation’
(Hupy and Schaetzl, 2006). This will be done by discussing how
exploding ordnance disrupts the soilscape, elaborating upon the
various permutations for explosion-driven soilscape disruption on
two different battlefield case studies: Verdun, France and Khe Sanh,
Vietnam.
1.1. Bombturbation as geomorphic agent
By definition, bombturbation is the cratering of the soil surface and
mixing of the soil by explosive munitions, usually in warfare and other
related military activities. The term “explosive munitions” includes
the following:
1. Aerial bombs. Most commonly, aerial bombs are delivered from an
aerial platform, such as a plane, and free-fall because of gravity.
These devices are commonly known simply as “bombs.” Another,
smaller example of an aerial bomb would be a hand thrown device,
such as a grenade. The implication is that these devices are not
propelled by exploding gases, and rely on gravity for delivery to the
target.
2. Propelled explosives. These explosives are delivered to the target
from a remote location through the means of some type of
propellant, usually an explosive charge. The explosive charge can
be launched by the gasses produced by ignition of an explosive
propellant, such as bullets being fired from any common firearm or
artillery device. Or, just as commonly, they can be self propelled,
such as with missiles or rockets.
3. In situ explosives. These are passive in situ explosive devices that are
placed in the soil and later explode, through some form of a remote
detonator device. Common passive explosives in use today are
roadside bombs and land mines. Less common today, but common
in previous wars, are underground mines; these have formed some
of the largest bombturbative disturbances ever, as examples later
in this paper will show.
Bombturbation, common and widespread across all parts of the
globe, usually occurs in association with warfare, the areas affected
are spatially concentrated, e.g., on major battlefields (Fig. 1). For
example, on some WWI battlefields, over 50 million craters were
produced across a several hundred hectare area in a matter of a few
months (Horne, 1993). Bombturbation is usually a cratering phe-
nomenon, with the explosion leaving behind a pit that is variously
excavated of soil and underlying parent material, with an accompa-
nying rim of debris along the immediate edge of the crater (Fig. 2).
Deposition beyond the immediate rim is so dispersed that the
excavated deposit is not visible, and rarely measureable. The
bombturbative event could then be considered a denudational and
depositional geomorphic process, although the displacement of
materials is much more concentrated in the cratered area, therefore,
making bombturbation mainly a denudative geomorphic agent.
Sediment is so displaced around the crater that deposition is rarely
discernable beyond the crater rim.
Quantifying the amount of material displaced by exploding
munitions is, in large part, nearly impossible to tabulate; during
WWII alone, 1.3 billion kilograms of bombs were dropped on Europe
and 505 million kilograms of bombs were dropped on Germany by
American heavy bombers (Morrison, 1982). This number pales in
comparison with the 1.27 trillion kilograms of bombs dropped over
Indochina in the 8 years of U.S. involvement in the Vietnam war
(Westing and Pfeiffer, 1972). Estimates regarding the number of
munitions deployed in warfare are often conservatively based, as the
number of weapons deployed is difficult to keep accurate records in
warfare. These conservative estimates, however, easily place the
amount of soil displaced by explosive munitions over the course of the
20th century into billions of cubic meters. In Vietnam alone, Westing
(1996) estimated, using air force bombing records and average
226 kilogram bomb crater sizes (more commonly referred to as a
500 lb bomb), the amount of topsoil and subsoil displaced to exceed
3 × 10 9 m 3. Thus, the scope and magnitude of bombturbation are so
immense, and the degree to which it can impact soils is so
catastrophic, that it justifies singling it out as a major, singular
pedoturbative vector, and zoogeomorphic agent.
2. Bombturbation: historic context
Although soil disturbance and mixing, erosion and degradation, by
direct human action, have been ongoing since the inception of
civilization (Grieve, 2000; Grieve, 2001), only recently has the impact
of wartime operations from exploding munitions risen to importance
as a pedogenic disturbance factor (Hupy and Schaetzl, 2006). For that
reason, bombturbation as a significant form of pedoturbation is fairly
recent, limited mainly to warfare and conflict over the past 150 years.
This review of wartime munitions is intended to illustrate that, as
warfare has evolved, so has the potential for bombturbation
disturbances.
Prior to the introduction of modern gunpowder in the late 1870s,
black powder was used mainly as propellant for artillery and infantry
weapons (Gudmundsson, 1993). Compared to modern explosives,
black powder is relatively weak and also extremely difficult to control.
Although black powder was used to a limited extent in military
mining operations such as during the Union Army siege of Petersburg,
Virginia in the American Civil War, black powder was considered too
dangerous for use as an explosive artillery round. In the late 19th
century, however, Alfred Nobel introduced the world to smokeless
gunpowder, blasting caps, and a new “safer” form of explosive called
Trinitrotoluene, or TNT (Hogg, 1985; Hogg, 1987). Ironically, Nobel
introduced these explosives to save more lives in the mining industry
because of the instability and unreliability of black powder. Shortly
 J.P. Hupy, T. Koehler / Geomorphology 157-158 (2012) 169–182 171

Fig. 1. Aerial reconnaissance image, circa early 1916, of dense cratering on the Verdun, France battlefield. Fort Douamont, on the right side of the image, was subject to particularly
heavy artillery barrages as it was contested throughout the battle.
Source: International War Archive.

after this development, in 1899, the French introduced a highly development, artillery shells could be filled with the highly explosive,
explosive (HE) form of munitions that used chemical compounds yet stable cordite and fired from rifled, breech loading, artillery
even more powerful than TNT, such as cordite. With this new devices. Soon after that, the British followed with the more explosive

Fig. 2. Typical crater produced by bombturbative processes. In this scenario, the bombturbation (B) disturbed a soil developed over bedrock (B). Crater depth and width vary according
to the parent material of the soils, along with depth to water table. Crater bottoms tend to promote leaf litter accumulation, along with accelerated leaching and weathering processes.
172 J.P. Hupy, T. Koehler / Geomorphology 157-158 (2012) 169–182
substance melanite, and through the use of chemistry the world came
to know the possibilities of ever larger and more powerful HE rounds
(Bailey, 2004). These explosives, combined with the age of industri-
alization and rapid fire breech loaded artillery, ushered in a new form
of warfare capable of leveling forests and deeply cratering landscapes.
By the time of the First World War (WWI), explosive munitions
were being deployed at an unprecedented scale and the effects are
still seen on the landscape today. The result was wide swaths of
destruction, limited only by the range of artillery, which was well
beyond the visible range of the gunners (Hogg, 1987). Perhaps the
best known example of this swath of destruction is the line of
stalemate along the WWI western theater of operations in Europe.
Today this line is commonly referred to as the Western Front, which
stretches from the English Channel to the border of Switzerland
(Keegan, 1998). Landscape disturbance associated with the front
averages approximately 20 km on either side, with some areas
containing much more extensive damage than others.
Although WWI serves to illustrate the effects of bombturbation on
the landscape, in no other war in history was the soil landscape so
widely disturbed as in the Second Indochina War, or the Vietnam War
as it is referred to in the United States. In WWI and WWII, the damage
inflicted upon the forests and soilscape was incidental, in that the
damage was a side-effect of the intention to eliminate enemy forces.
The Vietnam War differed from previous wars of the 20th century in
that destruction of key components of the enemy's physical
environment was a deliberate military strategy. For example, a
major portion of the U.S. strategic effort in Vietnam was deforestation,
to eliminate cover for enemy troops, provide bases of operation, and
to create landing strips for aircraft and troops (Westing and Pfeiffer,
1972). When forests and the enemy taking cover in those forests were
targeted, the soils on that landscape became a target as well. Aerial
bombardment inflicted damage to the Vietnamese landscape at a
scale never before accomplished, although artillery accounted for a
large component of soilscape disturbance as well. Much of the damage
inflicted upon the forests through highly explosive, shrapnel-
producing munitions was the same type as seen in previous wars,
except that it was accomplished with larger and more effective 500 lb.
bombs, typically dropped from B-52 bomber formations (Littauer and
Uphoff, 1972). The U.S. Air Force bomber formations practiced “carpet
bombing,” in which aircraft would drop a blanket of bombs into an
area thought to be occupied by enemy forces. Carpet bombing left
Fig. 3. Cratered South Vietnam agricultural fields in March 1969. The linear pattern of the craters results from the path of B52 bombers. Photo by A.H. Westing, 1972.
wide swaths of disturbance, dotting the Vietnamese landscape with
millions of craters (Fig. 3), in swaths approximately 500 m wide and
over 1 km long (Orians and Pfeiffer, 1970). Conservative estimates
place the number of craters left behind from these carpet bombing
missions at around 26 million (Pfeiffer, 1969). Following aerial
bombardments in Vietnam, foresters described the Vietnam land-
scape as a moonscape of craters and scorched dirt. They proposed that
after the soil loses its protective forest cover, it may undergo
laterization — a process that turns exposed soils into dry, rock-like
laterite (Westing and Pfeiffer, 1972).
3. Case studies: comparison and contrast of two post war
battlefields
The following two case studies will characterize bombturbation as
an anthropogeomorphic process. The differences in landscape
evolution following disturbance for these two geographic regions
are strikingly different, yet similar in some respects. Each case study
illustrates how soil development and recovery is driven by water
moving through the soil profile, yet each case study clearly indicates
how landscape recovery depends on other variables as well. Each case
study is presented in chronological order to maintain a historical and
research based timeline of events. Although the Verdun, France case
study is based upon previously published material, the case study
makes for an excellent theoretical backdrop for the follow up case
study that took place in Khe Sanh, Vietnam.
3.1. Case study one: Verdun, France
The battle of Verdun (Fig. 4) is considered one of the largest battles
dominated by the use of artillery in world history (Horne, 1993;
Mosier, 2001). The battle typified the mandate of WWI, which stated
that, “Artillery conquers, infantry occupies.” Conservative estimates of
the number of artillery rounds fired in that battle attest to that claim.
In an area approximately 200 km 2, the Germans fired 34 million
rounds and the French 26 million in a period lasting approximately
from February through August 1916. The effects from these explosive
munitions remain prominent on the Verdun landscape, attesting to
the magnitude and legacy of bombturbative activity (Fig. 5). The
magnitude and duration of artillery barrages in heavily contested
portions of the battlefield, such as on the Thiaumont Platform (Fig. 5),
 J.P. Hupy, T. Koehler / Geomorphology 157-158 (2012) 169–182 173

Fig. 4. The Verdun, France battlefield. Soil study sites were established in fringe areas of the battlefield, away from where the heaviest disturbances occurred, to allow for comparison
of soils within craters to undisturbed soils adjacent to crater disturbances.

Fig. 5. Overlapping craters on the Verdun, France battlefield. This upland area of the battlefield was subject to particularly heavy artillery barrages for several months. Bombturbative
activities disturbed the once shallow soils over limestone bedrock to where disturbance exceeds 10 m before solid bedrock is found.
174 J.P. Hupy, T. Koehler / Geomorphology 157-158 (2012) 169–182
churned limestone bedrock and soil together to form a heterogeneous
clay like slurry – akin to glacial till – that exceeds 10 m in depth above
the original limestone bedrock. This occurs in areas where the original
soil thickness to bedrock was less than 1 m. In some instances effects
rendered by explosive munitions caused entire ridges to be lowered in
elevation by several meters. For example, because of the combined
effects of bombturbation, Hill 304 on the Verdun battlefield was so
disturbed that its elevation dropped from 434 m before WWI in 1915
to 430 m in 1918 (Mosier, 2001).
3.1.1. Physical setting
The Verdun area receives some of the highest amounts of
precipitation (700–800 mm annual mean) in Europe. Precipitation
events occur on 150–200 days of the calendar year (Montagne, 2003).
Mean January temperatures range from 0–2 °C in the Meuse River
Valley to 0–5 °C on the surrounding uplands. Average July temper-
atures range between 15 and 18 °C.
Pre-war deciduous forests in the Verdun area were dominated by
European beech (Fagus sylvatica), European hornbeam (Carpinus
betulus), European oak (Quercus sessiliflora) and English oak (Q.
pedunculata). Today the most common species is European beech
with large expanses of Austrian pine (Pinus nigra). Austrian pines
have been planted primarily in areas that are heavily visited, because
it is believed the trees cast a memorial like, soft lighting. Some
attempts have been made to diversify the forests, but the magnitude
of disturbance in some areas and the sheer size of the battlefield have
hindered efforts to restore the forest into its pre-war state.
Bedrock at Verdun consists of gently dipping limestones and shales
that comprise the eastern portion of the Paris structural basin
(Johnson). The dominant geologic/geomorphic feature of the region
is a series of northeast–southwest trending cuestas, all heavily
dissected by rivers and streams, thereby providing the region with
≈ 200 m of local relief. The French Fort Douaumont, at 396 m
elevation, is situated on the highest point of the battlefield whereas
the eastern portions of the battlefield, on the fringes of the Woevre
River valley are roughly 200 m above sea level. Erosion-resistant,
almost pure, limestone of the late to mid Jurassic Oxfordien (154–
146 Ma) Formation makes up the ridges whereas a weaker, marly
limestone, incorporated with thin sequences of shale, occupies the
valleys.
The Woerve Valley, east and below the limestone escarpments, is
underlain by soft, erodable shales and poorly-drained, clay-rich soils
(Johnson, 1921). In upland areas where a marl-rich limestone forms
the bedrock, perched water tables are common from fall until late
spring when snowmelt and spring rains impact frozen soil. Most soils
at Verdun have formed in residuum or colluvium, and thus, soil
formation in the region is influenced by the generally shallow
bedrock, landscape position, and the shallow-to-deep water tables.
Most of the soils in the valleys are poorly-drained, according to the
NRCS (United States. Natural Resources Conservation Service, 1999).
Upland soils are generally shallow to the “pure” limestone bedrock,
which produces little residuum (Duchaufour, 1982). Soils on ridge
tops are typically Calcic Browns. Steeper slopes that experience more
runoff and soil erosion contain Rendzina soils. When Rendzina-type
soils occur on ridge crests they are often slightly thicker and show
more development than when on slopes. Therefore, the ridgecrests
often contain Brunified Rendzinas and the ridge shoulder slopes
contain especially thin Rendzina type soils.
3.1.2. Verdun disturbance patterns
The dramatic changes rendered upon the micro and mesotopo-
graphy at Verdun profoundly influenced the pathways of soil
developmental upon that cratered landscape. In 2004, a study was
conducted on that battlefield to determine differences in disturbance
patterns across the battlefield, and the pathways of soil developmen-
tal within those cratered areas. For more information, see Hupy and
Schaetzl (2006) for survey methods and Hupy and Schaetzl (2008) for
information related to methods used to determine rates of soil
development within craters.
The Verdun battlefield contains soil spatial patterns and processes
that differ from the surrounding landscape, set off on a completely
different path of soil evolutionary development (Phillips, 1999;
Phillips, 2001). Now, nearly 100 years later, a complex pattern of
soil development is in place. Soil pedons within and adjacent to
cratered disturbances have set off on a course of soil developmental
evolution much different than similar counterparts on undisturbed
portions of the battlefield; this is the butterfly effect of war. Processes
such as littering, humification, leaching, lessivage and weathering,
which dominated the pre-war soil landscape, have been changed in
intensity and pattern as influenced by crater microtopography. Even
the human influence has been largely reduced. Agricultural villages,
prior to the battle, formed a dense patchwork of human habitation
patterns, only to vanish during the course of the battle. Today all that
remains are millions of artillery craters and countless unexploded
munitions beneath the surface. What was once agricultural land is
now covered with forest. In this regard, one could say with irony that
this particular disturbance has allowed the landscape to revert back to
the forested landscape it once was.
Besides changes in the spatial pattern of pedogenesis because of
crater microtopography, the actual types and intensities of soil and
geomorphic processes have also changed. Comparatively smooth
slopes that foster surface runoff are now pocked with craters that
range in size from several meters across and 1–2 m deep, to craters
that are 15 m in diameter with depths exceeding 10 m. These changes
have had major effects on the surface and subsurface hydrology, and
concomitantly, rates of soil development (Fig. 6). Pedogenesis is now
enhanced on ridge tops in crater bottoms because of the increased
infiltration of water contributions from organic matter contributions
(Runge, 1973; Schaetzl, 1990). In locations where large hummocks
divide the craters, however, the hummocks shed water and litter, and
soil development is slowed (Schaetzl, 1990). In locations where
perched water tables are prone to occur, or along some of the lower
elevations in the valleys, many of the crater bottoms are below the
water table for a significant portion of the year. Wetness here impedes
some of the pre-war processes of soil development, but allows for the
introduction of new pedogenic processes, e.g., gleyzation, or the
strengthening of the same in preferred sites.
Craters have acted as focal points for runoff, litter, and sediments
washed from the adjoining soil surface. Water (as runoff and snow)
and organic matter tend to concentrate in the craters. The concen-
trated movement of water tends to (1) attract micro and macrofauna,
which (2) accelerate the humification of the organic matter that is
present there (Schaetzl and Schwenner, 2006). The faster than
expected weathering of the bedrock fragments in the crater bottoms
is likely from the increased amounts of water moving through the
craters. In this regard, the gravitational energy associated with water
is driving soil development, and this type of development is
preferentially stronger within the craters, which are foci for water
movement (Runge, 1973).
Bioturbation has also dramatically affected pedogenesis and soil
“recovery” on the Verdun battlefield. The types and degrees of
horizonation, and the rapidity by which incipient soil horizons have
formed within craters, would not have occurred in the absence of
key bioturbation processes. Worm activity is notable, even deep into
the weathered C horizon material, in crater bottoms. Tongues of
humus-rich material, translocated as earthworm fras, penetrate
well into fractures within the C horizon, and expose these surfaces
to organic acids and accelerating weathering. Clay-enriched weath-
ering rinds are common on the limestone channers there. Without
earthworm activity and bioturbation, crater bottoms would have
thicker litter layers (O horizons) and minimal weathering
(Schaetzl, 1990).
 J.P. Hupy, T. Koehler / Geomorphology 157-158 (2012) 169–182
Fig. 6. Generalized diagram illustrating the impact of bombturbative activities on slope hydrology and, subsequently weathering and soil development.
3.2. Case study two: Khe Sanh, Vietnam
Although many areas in southern Indochina were devastated by
war, the Khe Sanh battlefield stands out in particular (Fig. 7). Khe
Sanh was the site of a massive offensive operation launched by the
National Vietnamese Army (NVA) against U.S. Marines at that remote
outpost. The NVA offensive bogged down into a prolonged siege
operation against the Marine base. Marine combat units were well
established on the hilltops surrounding the base, but all roads into the
combat base were controlled by the enemy, and all fire support came
via air power and artillery. Between February and April 1968, aircraft
delivered 90 million kilograms of munitions to the Khe Sanh
battlefield — more than all the tonnage delivered by Allied forces in
the Pacific Theatre of WWII (Littauer and Uphoff, 1972; Prados and
Stubbe, 1991; Page-Demroese et al., 2000). The combined effect of
thousands of artillery rounds and aerial bombs produced a scarred
landscape on the Khe Sanh battlefield (Fig. 8). Marine accounts used
words such as ‘hell’, ‘an inferno’, ‘a moonscape’, or ‘another world’ to
describe the area after prolonged bombardments.
The stigma of war is still attached to the Vietnamese countryside.
Images of destruction associated with this battlefield still reside in the
minds of many, with blame for lack of reforestation attached to the
bombings and defoliants. Contemporary literature and documentary
movies make note of the distinct patterns left on the landscape
because of the disturbances rendered by warfare (Webster, 1996). In
May of 2007, preliminary observations and data were collected on the
Khe Sanh battlefield. Whereas the battlefield remained heavily
cratered, it was revegetated, yet devoid of the pre-war triple canopy
forest that dominated the area. The region was visited once again in
May 2009 to address the question as to why the area remains devoid
175
of forest cover, and if the lack of forest is related to wartime
disturbance patterns.
3.2.1. Physical setting
The Khe Sanh battlefield is located in the central highlands of
Vietnam. The region is characteristically rugged, covered with a
tropical monsoon climate forest canopy (Sterling et al., 2006). Khe
Sanh itself is situated on small plateau at an elevation of approxi-
mately 450 m above sea level (Fig. 7). The plateau is part of a larger
mountain range, the Annamese Cordillera, which extends 2700 km
from Laos to southern Vietnam (Prados and Stubbe, 1991). Although
most of Vietnam is known for its monsoonal climate, Khe Sanh lies
within the central portion of Vietnam that, because of moist winds
from the South China Sea, has no annual dry season. For that reason,
the pre-war vegetation in the Khe Sanh area was especially dense and
consisted of tropical rainforest, buffalo grass, and bamboo forest. The
copious precipitation within this tropical rainforest, and the stable
upland plateau-like setting, have created conditions that lead to the
development of Oxisol soils (Winters et al., 1998). Characteristic of
tropical soils in geologically stable uplands, these Oxisols are heavily
leached and nutrient deficient.
The nutrient deficiencies and high secondary oxide clay contents
at Khe Sanh, and other highland areas in Vietnam, led many scientists
to believe, at or near the end of the war, that the landscape would
have a very difficult time recovering from the disturbances incurred in
the siege. They proposed that soils disturbed by explosive munitions,
such as at Khe Sanh, would bake into hard laterite clay, and no
vegetation would return to the area. The devastation they saw all
around them, and the limited knowledge of tropical soils at the time,
led them to these, what are now known to be, erroneous conclusions.
176 J.P. Hupy, T. Koehler / Geomorphology 157-158 (2012) 169–182

Fig. 7. The Khe Sanh, Vietnam Battlefield. Hills 881N, 881S, and 861 were particularly contested areas, and, therefore, were subjected to considerable amounts of bombing and
artillery fire. Map compiled by Mark Ingham.

Fig. 8. Remnants of 500 lb bomb craters dot a ridgeline north of hill 881N on the Khe Sanh Battlefield. The craters were likely formed during a B-52 bombing run during the 1968
battle.
Source: Image taken by J.P. Hupy, May 2009.
 J.P. Hupy, T. Koehler / Geomorphology 157-158 (2012) 169–182
3.2.2. Methods
Data collection was divided into three primary approaches: survey
of microtopography, physical soil attributes, and ground truthing for
remote sensing analysis. The microtopographic survey focused on two
areas, Hills 558 and 861 (Fig. 7). These two areas were chosen for
accessibly and safety reasons. When dealing with landscapes affected
by warfare, safety needs to be a concern because the area of interest is
often littered with unexploded ordnance (UXO). Indigenous groups
cleared the majority of UXOs from the hilltops, but many piles of the
dangerous remnants remained, so surveying a cleared area was very
important (Fig. 9). For that reason, Hill 558 was abandoned after a
preliminary microtopographic survey of 290 elevation points, because
of the thick elephant grass obscuring the many piles of UXOs. Instead,
focus was placed on a thorough survey of Hill 861. A TopCon GPT-3
100W total station was used to conduct a survey. The sampling
scheme was a stratified random sample, with more data points taken
in locations with high variation in microtopographic relief. The survey
on this hilltop collected 2236 data points over an approximate three
hectare area. These data were later imported into ArcGIS™, for
subsequent spatial and three-dimensional (3D) analysis.
Selective soil samples were taken from within crater bottoms and
the vicinity of craters on the hilltop of Hill 861, as well as the summits
of Hilltops 881S, 881N, and Hill 558. Funding did not allow for large
amounts of soils to be transported back to the United States.
Therefore, only a small number of soil samples were transported
back to the United States for textural analysis. Results from this small
data set indicated only small variations in clay content of these soils.
Each sample contained a high enough percentage of clay for each to be
classified as a clay or clay loam, according to the U.S. categorization
scheme (Service and U.S.N.R.C., 1999). Soils at the Khe Sanh combat
base, situated on the Khe Sanh Plateau, were classified as clay soils.
Fig. 9. Unexploded ordnances (UXOs), such as this artillery round, are commonplace on bombturbated landscapes. This makes excavation and surveying a difficult and often
dangerous task. Care must be exercised judiciously when selecting research study sites.
Source: Image taken by J.P. Hupy, May 2009.
177
Soils on the summits of hills 558, 861, and 881S, were classified as a
clay loam.
Several other physical soil characteristics were sampled on site:
Volumetric Water Content (VWC), soil temperature, and pH values. A
Time Domain Reflectometer (TDR) moisture probe with 20 cm rods
was used to determine VWC; the VWC values are reported without
calibration as this procedure was not feasible in the conditions at the
time. A portable electronic meter was used to gather soil temperature
and temperatures at locations where VWC values were sampled as
well. The location of each reading was recorded with a Trimble Nomad
GPS unit. Because differential correction was not available to provide
sub-meter accuracy, the sample location was noted in relation to its
location relative to the crater. For example, measurements taken from
the crater bottom were noted as such whereas those taken on the
crater side, or on crater rim, were noted with the measurement. A
portable weather meter also was used to gather information on wind
speed and temperature to reflect the variable meteorological
conditions in and around craters across the summit.
The land cover across the Khe Sanh battlefield varies significantly
from what was there in 1968. Whereas a survey of microtopography
and sampling of soil characteristics can provide insight towards
understanding of the contemporary battlefield geomorphic character,
it doesn't answer why the area is mainly devoid of tree cover.
Therefore, a GPS device was used to gather information on the variety
of land uses that now dot the modern battlefield for ground-truthing
purposes. This information was then implemented in a preliminary
supervised classification scheme using Thematic Mapper (TM)
imagery, comparing changes between 1973 and 2000. The ENVI
remote sensing software platform was utilized in the analysis.
Methods for preliminary analysis consisted of performing unsuper-
vised classification of the Khe Sanh battlefield, and surrounding area.
178 J.P. Hupy, T. Koehler / Geomorphology 157-158 (2012) 169–182
Change statistics were then calculated for the changes that occurred
between 1973 and 2000.
3.2.3. Khe Sanh disturbance patterns
The modern battlefield is no longer the moonscape described by
veterans in 1968, although it is a landscape quite different from the
one that existed before the Second Indochina War. Extensive cratering
can be found throughout the battlefield, with the heaviest concen-
trations of craters found on the heavily contested hilltops. Unlike the
craters at Verdun, these craters are not as visible, and only larger
craters left from 700 to 1000 lb bombs, likely leftover from B-52
bomber runs, are visible from a distance (Fig. 8).
The micro and mesotopography on the summit of Hill 861 is highly
altered due to bombturbative processes, mainly through artillery,
mortar fire, and aerially deployed bombs (Fig. 10). As noted in the
upper right inset of Fig. 10, several of the larger craters excavated
large sections from the sides of the hill. According to marine accounts,
the summit of this hill, along with Hills 881N and 881S was lowered
by several meters because of the extensive deployment of explosive
munitions at these locations. Along with the craters, remnants of the
trench lines and foxholes dug by the marines show up in the
microtopographic survey. These changes in the surface have implica-
tions on surface water flow. A pour point analysis, using the 3D
Analyst extension in ARCGIS was generated to simulate the difference
between surface water flow on an unaltered Hill 861 surface and the
surface generated using the survey data (Fig. 11). This rudimentary
model readily illustrated how surface water flow is affected by
cratering of the surface. Soils within the craters were visibly darker
and, generally maintained higher volumetric water contents than
soils outside the craters. The VWC numbers taken from Hill 881S are
high normal because of heavy rains that occurred while data
collection was taking place. Values collected from this hilltop were
ranged between 20 and 25%. Data collected on Hill 558 and other
observations show that VWC is significantly higher in crater bottoms
than in areas outside of the craters. For example, VWC numbers from
outside the craters were in the single digits to low teens, and numbers
collected in crater depressions were in the upper teens to low
twenties. Select areas of Hill 558 were also planted in coffee. Casual
observation noted that where coffee was planted in crater bottoms,
Fig. 10. Oblique view of terrain on Khe Sanh Battlefield with detail of current microtopography of hill 861 summit.
Source: Map compiled by Tom Koehler, University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire.
the plant was larger and more robust than plants outside the crater.
Several moisture values were gathered in these locations, and VWC at
the edge of the crater was 6%, and values in the crater bottom where
coffee was growing registered 15%. Temperature values were slightly
lower on crater bottoms compared to areas outside the crater on Hill
558 as well, with temperatures in the upper 5 cm of the soil in crater
bottoms registering 20 °C and registering 25 °C outside of the crater.
Soil temperatures from Hill 861 were fairly consistent, ranging from
approximately 23 to 26 °C. Soil pH was consistent, with average
values ranging between four and five. One of the greatest differences
observed on the summit where the survey was being conducted was
the differences in wind speed within and outside of the craters, and
across the summit itself. Winds were quite high during the survey,
registering over 8.89 m/s at 2 m above the surface, whereas in crater
bottoms at the same spot, winds were only approximately at 0.28 to
0.55 m/s. Crater bottoms at the summit also hosted the only woody
vegetation recolonizing the study area. The preference for woody
vegetation to establish itself is likely related to the following three
factors: (1) preferential collection point for soil moisture; (2) protec-
tion from high winds buffeting the summit; and (3) protection from
the many cattle grazing the vicinity. The third factor is likely the most
influential in determining the current land types of covers across the
battlefield, and is supported by preliminary analysis using remotely
sensed imagery, comparative photos between 1968 and present, and
observations made during data collection.
Preliminary analysis with remotely sensed imagery and historic
photography points to a landscape whose long-term re-vegetation
patterns are a consequence of economic activities, and not the
munitions and herbicides associated with the battle of Khe Sanh.
When comparing Landsat images between 1973 and 2000, clear
changes in land use patterns are observable, with many forested areas
converting over to some type of economic land cover (Fig. 12, Tables 1
and 2). The imagery from 1973 to 2000 was classified using an
unsupervised ISODATA classification scheme, at the Anderson Level 1
scale. The unsupervised classification method uses several bands of
imagery from the satellite and allows the computer to separate each
pixel into classes of land cover based on the information within each
band. Several notable patterns have been identified through this
analysis, most notably an overall increase in the amount of vegetation
 J.P. Hupy, T. Koehler / Geomorphology 157-158 (2012) 169–182 179

Fig. 11. Pour point analysis of craters on summit of hill 861. Model depicts that a high amount of surface water collects in crater bottoms of hillslope, instead of running down
hillslope, and eventually in valley bottoms. This water collection leads to high volumetric water content in craters when compared to adjacent soils.
Source: Map compiled by Tom Koehler, University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire.

across the study area. Areas that remain forested are on the steepest
slopes of the area. Several cases have been identified where land that
was deforested during the war has since grown vegetation, albeit not
the triple canopy forest that existed prior to the war. Many of these
areas are now places of economic growth, being used for cattle
grazing and crops such as coffee. The rural mountainous areas that
have not been used by the local population for economic activity
because of their inaccessibility have still shown an increase in
vegetation since 1973. Specifically, the change statistics show that
the barren soil in 1973 amounted to 7.479% of the study area, whereas
in 2000 the amount of barren soil was reduced to 3.575% of the study
area. This shows that these barren areas, stripped of their vegetation
from explosive munitions, did not undergo laterization and were
likely used for some sort of economic activity. Additionally, photos

Fig. 12. Unsupervised classification of the Khe Sanh battlefield, depicting land use and land cover changes from 1973 to 2000.
180 J.P. Hupy, T. Koehler / Geomorphology 157-158 (2012) 169–182

Table 1
Cover class changes obtained from unsupervised classification techniques between 1973 and 2000. The data suggests that bombturbation does not exert long terms changes to the
Vietnamese landscape. For example, of the 53% shrubs/unhealthy vegetation in the 1968 image, reverted back into thick forest by 2000.

Shadow Water/shadow Thick forest Shrubs Forest Barren Clouds Row total

Shadow 0.275 8.072 4.283 1.231 0.8 2.676 7.203 100

Water/shadow 7.082 2.798 0.518 0.172 0.065 1.04 0.377 100
Thick forest 32.199 64.003 68.149 53.759 44.385 31.318 37.303 100
Shrubs/unhealthy 28.319 11.299 16.354 29.11 23.403 25.18 11.947 100
Forest 16.415 2.05 2.882 10.521 28.002 5.587 5.714 100
Barren 9.665 3.605 2.503 2.458 1.172 21.401 2.933 100
Clouds 6.046 8.174 5.311 2.75 2.174 12.798 34.523 100
Class total 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 0
Class changes 99.725 97.202 31.851 70.89 71.998 78.599 65.477 0
Image difference − 77.789 − 68.383 75.374 − 31.481 − 10.689 − 31.358 81.686 0

taken by veterans in 1968 compared to a view of the landscape today
illustrates how recent post-war practices by the Vietnamese actually
deforested large segments of the landscape, not explosive munitions
or defoliants (Fig. 13). Based upon these image comparisons and
personal accounts by veterans, a pattern emerges that the steep slopes
are today forested, and the other areas are devoid of forest cover. An
opposite pattern existed in 1968, with many of the steep approaches
devoid of forest cover because they were used by NVA troops to attack
the hilltops. These steep slopes were targeted by U.S. aerial tactical
bomb sorties, artillery fire, and napalm strikes — yet these are the very
slopes that currently maintain the most biomass. Further research
seeks to examine moisture content, soil development, organic matter
content, and biomass within the craters on these forested steep slopes
to determine how they factor into reestablishment of vegetation in
these select areas of the battlefield.
To summarize, the modern Khe Sanh battlefield and landscape
manifests many land use patterns; the steepest slopes are forested,
moderately steep slopes are grazed by cattle, and the gentle slopes to
flat highland areas are mainly used for coffee production. Today, the
heavily cratered hilltops support the intensive efforts of cattle grazing,
and it is only in crater bottoms and steep slopes where woody, thick
vegetation is reestablishing itself (Fig. 14). Surprisingly, despite the
numerous UXOs, many portions of the battlefield are burned
frequently in order to prevent woody vegetation from taking hold.
Only crater bottoms and steep slopes are spared from these frequent
burnings. Not surprisingly, in a country roughly the size of California,
with over six million people, and with some of the highest rural
population densities in the world, people will make economic use of
the land as allowed. Hence, a lack of reforestation on this battlefield is
not a result of explosives and lingering constituents, or herbicides.
Instead, it was caused by post-war economic activity. The economic
growth figures for Vietnam attest to how much their economy has
grown since the introduction of a free market system in 1989, but
those numbers do nothing to describe changes rendered upon the
landscape associated with this shift in policy.
4. Summary of case studies
The soil displacement and mixing rendered by explosive muni-
tions, or bombturbation, are a significant zoogeomorphic agent. The
Table 2
Percentage of types of land covers in the years 1973 and 2000, and change in land cover
percentages for those land covers, on the Khe Sanh battlefield.
1973 2000
Thick forest 32.27% 45.15%
Shrubs/unhealthy 32.18% 22.28%
Forest 10.26% 9.59%
Barren 7.48% 3.76%
geomorphic changes rendered by the processes of bombturbation
should be considered more of an anthrogeomorphic agent rather than
a zoogeomorphic one, however, given that human activities exert
such strong influences on the landscape. Bombturbation is a relatively
recent geomorphic phenomenon, and is a by-product of modern
warfare, associated with the development and deployment of
explosive munitions. Geography clearly determines how landscapes
respond to anthropic disturbances such as bombturbation, in a human
and physical geographic sense. Summarily, the way a landscape
responds to changes rendered by bombturbation is dependent on
climate, geologic conditions, spatial dimensions of a given battle, and
post-conflict land-use patterns.
Local conditions have influenced soil development at each site;
both regions receive ample amounts of precipitation, yet Verdun has a
winter season while Khe Sanh does not. Along with topography,
geologic strata, and parent material influencing soil development in
the craters, a tropical climate oxidizes organic matter in crater
bottoms at Khe Sanh, where at Verdun craters tend to develop
massive amounts of organic material in slightly to moderately
decomposed states. The underlying geologic strata at Verdun also
tend to create conditions with perched water tables, whereas at Khe
Sanh the highly permeable tropical soils allow the water to move
rapidly through the soil profile. Cratered landscapes in both cases
exhibited soil characteristics that differed within the craters when
compared to areas outside the crater, and in non-cratered areas. In
both cases, the craters acted as a focal point for the accumulation of
water and organic matter. Vegetation regenerative growth within
craters remains dependent on several factors. If the craters were
produced in areas with a water table close to the surface, as was the
case in Verdun, soil development and vegetative growth are impeded,
and organic matter tends to accumulate. In the Vietnamese highlands,
where the water table is not in close proximity to the surface, and the
soils are low in organic matter, the craters foster vegetative growth,
and were observed to contain higher amounts of organic matter.
Patterns associated with varied in nature between each case study,
mainly determined by the nature of the fighting that took place. In the
case of Verdun, cratering was limited to a linear front, with the
majority of cratering taking place along the ridge tops. At Khe Sanh,
cratering was much more scattered, yet the heaviest cratering also
took place in the higher locations. Craters at Khe Sanh, when not on
the hilltops tended to occur in clusters associated with tactical
airstrikes and B-52 linear bombing runs. Some of the larger bombs at
Khe Sanh altered the mesotopography of the battlefield whereas at
Verdun the craters were overall much smaller. Craters at Khe Sanh,
delivered by aerial platforms were steeper sided and more symmet-
rical when compared to the craters created at Verdun. The steeper
% Change sided craters at Khe Sanh were also likely because of the lack of
39.92% bedrock near the surface.
− 30.77% Finally, when assessing the impacts of bombturbation as a
− 6.51% zoogeomorphic agent, one must look beyond the geomorphology,
− 49.77%
and examine human land use patterns on contemporary battlefields.
 J.P. Hupy, T. Koehler / Geomorphology 157-158 (2012) 169–182 181

Fig. 13. Images taken from same location on summit of Hill 558 looking east towards hill 950 in the background. Left image is from 1968 and the image on the right was taken in May,
2009. Note how steep slopes deforested from bombing and delfoliants in 1968 are now back in forest, while the 1968 forested valley is now rice fields, or deforested.
Source: Images courtesy of Tom Ford, USMC veteran of Khe Sanh. Image rendered my Thomas Koehler, University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire.

When the fighting ceased along the Western Front at the end of World
War I, battlefields, such as Verdun, France, were turned into large
memorials, with massive sections of the battlefield treated as mass
graves, left to be undisturbed. Besides tourism and light forest
management techniques within lightly to moderately disturbed
portions of the battlefield, the landscape remains relatively unaltered
by human activities. This current state is much different from before
the war when the Verdun vicinity was scattered with many villages of
100–500 inhabitants. Now only bricks remain in the forest where
those villages once stood. At Khe Sanh, the situation is much different.
Right up to when the siege began in 1968, accounts from soldiers in
the battlefield vicinity described an overpowering triple canopy
rainforest. Encounters with massive pythons and tigers were not
uncommon (Prados and Stubbe, 1991; Murphy, 2003). Following
events that unfolded at Khe Sanh from when conflict in the area ended
around 1975, the region has seen an ever increasing human presence.
Despite the damage rendered by the explosive munitions, the current
landscape is, in many ways, a by-product of economic-forces, and not

Fig. 14. Thick vegetation covers the bottom of a 700 lb bomb crater on the Khe Sanh Battlefield. This particular crater was likely reworked into a defensive position, and was later
excavated by the local populace for shards of shrapnel, to be sold on the market as scrap metal.
Source: Image taken by Joseph P. Hupy, May 2009.
182 J.P. Hupy, T. Koehler / Geomorphology 157-158 (2012) 169–182
so directly related to the consequences of war as many still believe.
Compared side by side, these case studies show that bombturbation is
a significant geomorphic agent, and that the science is still very young,
with still much more left to be known. By incorporating the principals
of zoogeomorphology into the research, many unanswered questions
have the potential of getting resolved.
Acknowledgments
Preliminary funding for this research was supported by a
Geomorphology Specialty Group award in 2003. Further funding for
the work in Verdun, France was supported by an NSF dissertation
improvement grant award. Preliminary funding for the work in France
was supported by the AAG Anne E. White award, and via other
University of Wisconsin System grants. Recent work conducted on the
Khe Sanh battlefield was supported via a Freeman Foundation grant
through the AsiaNetwork. Justin Berg and Tom Koehler performed the
majority of the field work in Vietnam.
I would like to extend personal thanks to Christina Hupy for her
preliminary efforts, and GIS expertise in getting both the Verdun and
Khe Sanh research working. Dr. Hupy also secured funding for the
2007 preliminary work in Khe Sanh. The Khe Sanh Veterans
Association, and a handful of Khe Sanh veterans made the field
work in such a dangerous area possible. Special thanks also go to Dr.
Randy Schaetzl and Alan Arbogast for their efforts in the Verdun work.
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