Tried to get loaded a day early… nope, plan B it is!

Where is that?

 

U.S. Navy Neptunes Over the Jungle
When I was there, North Island, there was some P2V aircraft that had been converted to gunships to fly low & slow over the rivers in Vietnam and other land targets. Due to heavy losses of crewmembers and aircraft, the squadron was only operational for a few months; 15 Nov. 1967 - 01 July 1968
The planes were so heavy with armament J-Pack (jet pack) were added; one on each wing beside the propeller engines to get enough power to get airborne with a full load.
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Lockheed’s P2V Neptune, which first entered U.S. Navy service in 1947, was the most capable maritime patrol-antisubmarine warfare aircraft of its era. But while most P2Vs flown by the U.S. and other navies and air forces operated over blue water, a dozen U.S. Navy P2Vs flew their patrols over the jungles of Southeast Asia.

In response to increased North Vietnamese infiltration along the network of roads and paths that comprised the Ho Chi Minh Trail through Laos, the U.S. Army in 1966 submitted a plan to use Air Force F-4 Phantoms to emplace seismic and acoustic sensors along the trails to detect traffic. The Pentagon accepted the Army’s plan, which called for a one-year development program, and Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara directed the Navy to create a squadron to fill the gap; he wanted the Navy unit operational by 15 November 1967. Events moved rapidly, so fast that when Observation Squadron (VO)-67 was commissioned on 15 February 1967, only 23 officers and enlisted men were on hand. Most of the squadron’s personnel were still in training with Patrol Squadron (VP)-31.

An SP-2E was modified (the aircraft had been redesignated the P-2 in 1962) and redesignated the OP-2E. The changes included removal of the distinctive magnetic anomaly detection tail boom and the wingtip fuel tanks; the addition of two SUU-11 7.62-mm mini-gun pods, ALE-29 defensive chaff dispensers in the tail, internally mounted cameras, and fiberglass propellers. Some aircraft had an APQ-131 Doppler radar in the chin position; long- range navigation receivers also were fitted.

Internally, the Neptunes were altered substantially. All ASW equipment was deleted, and self-sealing fuel tanks were installed. The aircraft got several new radios, a Norden bombsight to direct sensor emplacements, and provisions for manually fired M60 7.62-mm guns in waist positions. Painted in a dark, jungle-green camouflage, the OP-2Es took on a sinister appearance in keeping with their highly secretive missions, initially code-named Dune Moon, but later changed to Illinois City, Dye- marker, and finally Muscle Shoals.

The 12-plane squadron numbered 300 men when VO-67 arrived at Nakhon Phanom air base in Thailand on the target date of 15 November 1967. The squadron flew its first operational mission on 25 November, joining Air Force CH-3E helicopters in dropping sensors; EC-121 Super Constellations relayed sensor data to analysis centers.

On 11 January 1968, a Neptune flown by the squadron’s executive officer, Commander D. A. Olsen, and his crew of eight failed to return from a mission. Investigators determined that the plane had flown into a cliff in bad weather after dropping sensors.

The next loss occurred on 17 February when an aircraft was hit by ground fire while dropping sensors from an altitude of 500 feet. Escorting Phantoms called the pilot to tell him that his starboard engine was on fire. Climbing back into the cloud layer, the pilot acknowledged, saying he was returning to Nakhon Phanom and that he was “pretty beat up,” indicating additional battle damage. Minutes later, an orbiting 0-2 aircraft sighted burning wreckage in the jungle along the Neptune’s flight path. All nine crewmen perished.

These losses plus other battle damage made it apparent that the lumbering Neptunes could not survive in areas of antiaircraft concentration. On 18 February, a conference convened to discuss the means of decreasing the OP-2E’s vulnerability to ground fire. As if to underscore the problem, the squadron’s third combat loss occurred on 27 February when a Neptune was shot down during a mission over Laos. The plane had flown into a hornet’s nest of 37- mm fire, and one projectile smashed through the fuselage, killing an enlisted crewman and starting a fire that filled the aircraft with flames and smoke. The aircraft commander, flying from the right seat at the time, ordered the crew to bail out immediately. Seven were rescued, but the aircraft commander, one of the last to leave the plane, never was found.

The conference made several recommendations, including a limitation to one pass over a target area, alternative target areas, minimum weather requirements, and the suggestion that the use of smoke markers from accompanying observation aircraft be reduced, especially if the target was plainly visible. But the problem was overtaken by events, and the squadron was disestablished on 1 July 1968. The Air Force took over the program—renamed Igloo White—and F-4 Phantoms replaced the Neptunes.

 

Off topic, but @Nahbrown is a military man and may be interested.
The P2V Neptune was the Navy submarine hunter. It was replaced with the P3. That's why the P2V was converted to a gunship since they were headed to the aircraft graveyard. The converted P2V's, now gunships, were then stationed in Thailand as a squadron.

 

We can't see it in its entirety until we're on the outside, looking back in.