Michael Herr in Dispatches, his book about the Vietnam War, relates that a soldier would occasionally ingest C4 from a Claymore mine in order to cause temporary illness so that he would be sent on sick leave.
Also heard that since it burns, troops in Vietnam would break off small pieces as firestarter or cooking rations, hence the warning about how it burns and makes toxic gases.
There are plenty of (likely apocryphal) stories of new Explosive Ordinance Disposal (EOD) recruits being fed C4 and chased around with a stun gun. The old timers tell the new recruit that electricity will cause C4 to detonate. In reality, it’s a potent laxative and will give them the shits in a matter of minutes. So the recruit is stuck running away from a taser that they think will make them explode, while desperately trying not to shit themselves.
Apparently C4 burns quite well and is still pretty stable while aflame. There are anekdotes of soldiers using it as emergency fuel to cook water for their rations
I’m almost certain I’ve heard stories about soldiers eating or even burning c4^1 for shits and giggles. Not surprised they have to put a warning label on it, though I doubt it does any good.
^1 : iirc c4 by itself is very safe because it has to be exposed to a sudden increase in pressure and heat to detonate (e.g. a shock wave, or supposedly, stomping on it while it’s on fire). Just burning it or throwing it at a wall won’t make it explode.
I have heard that, if just lit on fire with a match or whatever, C4 simply burns rather than exploding, and I have heard this has been used to heat at least one meal.
Yes you can burn it. C4 needs a fairly deliberate effort to explode. There have been issues where improperly set large shots of C4 end up on fire all over the area rather than exploding. Which is a suboptimal situation.
For eating, the way I heard is that people would stick a piece inside their lip ala a tobacco dip. Supposedly the contact with the inner lip causes some kind of heightened feeling. I can’t prove that one though.
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