Supporting the SecretWar CIAAirOperations in Laos,1955-1974 William M. Leary Thelargestparamilitaryoperations successfulphotoreconnaissance pro everundertaken by the CIAtook gram, and engaged in numerous place in the smallSoutheastAsian clandestinemissionst~singnight- Kingdom ofLaos. For morethan 13 visiongiasses and state-of-the-art years, the Agencydirectednative electron,icequipment.Without Air forces that foughtmajorNorthViet Americaspresence, the CIAseffort nameseunits to a standstill. in Laoscould not hav~been Although the countryeventually fell sustained. to the Communists, the CIA remainedproud of its accomplish ments in Laos. As Director of A DistortedView CentralIntelligence(DCI)Richard Air America, Helms laterobserved:This was a for the It AirAmericas has fared an airlinesecretly majoroperation Agency... publicimage tookmanpower; it tookspecially poorly. The 1990movieAirAmer owned by theCIA, qualifiedmanpower; it was danger ica is largelyresponsib~e for this. It difficult. The he was a vital ous; it was CIA, featured, a cynical CIA~officerwho contended, did a superbjob. arranged for the airline to fly opium component in to the ac~lministrativecapital of Vien the tiane for a corrupt general Agencys AirAmerica, an airlinesecretly Asi~n looselymodeled on VangPao, a mili operations owned by the CIA, was a vitalcom taryleader of the mountain-region- ponent in the Agencysoperations in in Laos. basedH,mongethnicgroup. The Laos. By the summer of 1970, the film depicts the CIA as having airlinehad some two dozentwin- r~ian the opiI~mprocessed intoheroin in a 9 enginetransports,another two dozen down the from the short-takeoff-and-landing(STOL) factoryjust ~treet favorite ,bar ofAir pilots. aircraft, andsome 30 helicoptersded Americas TheAsiangeneral, in return, sup icated to operations in Laos. There pliedm~n to fight the war, plus a weremorethan 300 pilots,copilots, financialkickback to the CIA. Ulti flightmechanics, and air-freightspe mately, ~we learnthat the Communist cialistsflying out of Laos an4 anti-Communist in Laos Thailand.During1970, Air America versus war was mer1ely a facade for the real war, airdropped or landed 46 million which was fought for c~ontro1 of the pounds of foodstuffsmainlyrice areasopiumfields. in Laos. Helicopterflighttime reachedmorethan4,000hours a month in the sameyear. AirAmer AirAmericapilots in this film are ica of crewstransported tens portraye~J as skilled at landingdam thousands of and troops refug~s, agedairplanes, but basically as a flewemergencymedevacmissiqns wildlyu~iprofessionalmenagerie of and rescueddownedairmen through partyan~mals,including a few bor out Laos,inserted and extractedroad- derlinepsychotics. These ill watch flew teams, nighttimeairdrop disciplin~edairmen are not the vil missionsover the Ho Chi Minh lains of the story; they are merely William M. Leary is a Professor of monitored infil Trail, sensorsalong pawns ir~ a druggamethattheyeither History at the University of Georgia. trationroutes,conducted a highly disdain or opposeoutright. 71 Air Operations Thestory ofthe realAirAmerica begins in 1950,when A Bum of CAT it Rap the CIAdecided Incorporated, provided airplanes and crews for secretintelli that it required an genceoperations.7 The connectionamongAir America, the CIA, and the drugtrade in Laos air transport lingers in the publicmind. Thefilm, In the 1950s, the CIAs air propri to conduct capability as it was known in the lexicon according to the credits, was based on etary, ChristopherRobbinssbookabout covertoperations of intelligence, was used for a variety the first in of covertmissions. During the airline, published 1979 in Asia in under the titleAirAmerica.2 support Koreanwar, for example, it made AlthoughRobbinslaterclaimedthat ofUS policy morethan 100 hazardousoverflights of mainlandChina,airdropping the moviedistorted his book,3 it objectives. closelyfollowed the bookstheme if agents andsupplies. not its details. Bothmovie and book 9 contend that the CIAcondoned a drugtradeconducted by a Laotian Supportingthe French client; bothagree thatAirAmerica betweenChina and the Gulfof provided the essentialtransportation Siam.5 CATalsobecameinvolved in the French for the trade; and both the portray war againstCommunistinsurgents in pilotssympathetically. Indochina. In the French litheCIAwas not involved in the April 1953, drugtrade, it did knowabout it. As appealed to PresidentEisenhower for Robbinsprovidesfactualdetails that formerDCIWilliamColbyacknowl the use of US Air Force C-i 19 trans the movielacks. CitingAlfred W. edged, the Agency did littleabout it ports and crews to fly tanks and heavy McCoys 1972study, ThePolitics of during the 1960s, but latertook equipment to theirhard-pressedforces in Laos. such the Heroin in SoutheastAsia, he relates actionagainst the traders as drugs Having equipment, French the howAirAmericahelicopters col became a problemamongAmerican emphasized,mightmean lected the opiumharvests of 1970 troops in Vietnam. The CIAsmain differencebetweenholding and losing 8 and 1971,thenflew the crop to Vang focus in Laosremained on fighting Laos. Paos base at LongTieng in the the war, not on policing the drug mountains of northern where it trade.6 Laos, Whilereluctant to commitAmerican turnedintoheroin at the was gen militarypersonnel to the war in eralsdruglaboratory.4 Indochina, the Eisenhoweradminis How It Began tration was anxious to assist the French. This led decision to use My nearly two decades of research to a CAT to an airlift in US Air indicate thatAirAmerica was not Thestory of the real Air America pilots fly involved in the drugtrade. As Joseph begins in 1950,when the CIA Force-supplied C-i19s. In early of CAT Westermeyer,whospent the years decided that it required an air trans May, a group personnel arrived at ClarkAir ForceBase in the 1965 to 1975 in Laos as a physician, portcapability to conductcovert for 72 hours of concen publichealthworker, and researcher, operations in Asia in support of US Philippines trated and school wrote in Poppies,Pipes, andPeople: policyobjectives. In August1950, ground flight on the unfamiliar C-i19s. On 5 American-ownedairlinesnever the Agencysecretlypurchased the May, flew six of the now knowinglytransportedopium in or assets of Civil Air Transport(CAT), they transports, the tricoloredroundels of the out of Laos, nor did theirAmerican an airlinethat had beenstarted in bearing French Air Force, to Gia Lam air pilots everprofitfrom its transport. ChinaafterWorldWar II by Gen. base,outsideHanoi. Yet everyplane in Laosundoubtedly Claire L. Chennault and Whiting carriedopium at sometime, Willauer. CATwouldcontinue to fly unknown to the pilot and his superi commercialroutesthroughoutAsia, OperationSQUAWbegan the next orsjust as hadvirtuallyevery acting in everyway as a privately day. It continueduntil 16 July,with pedicab,everyMekongRiversam ownedcommercialairline. At the CATpilotsmakingnumerous air pan, and everymissionaryjeep sametime,under the corporateguise drops to Frenchtroops in Laos. 72 Air Operations Laotianindependence suitedthe policy of theUnitedStates, With the waning of the Vietminh Laotianindependencesuited the pol so long as the offensive,which was due more to the icy of the UnitedStates, so long as weatherthan to Frenchresistance, the governmentremained the governmentremainednon-Corn withdrawn.9 of the CATcrewswere non-Conununist. munist.~ Laosrepresented one dominds in SoutheastAsia that con cernedPresidentEisenhower and The war in Indochina,however, con 9~ of State FosterDulles. tinued to go badly for the French. In Secretafr John the had little November1953,Frenchparatroop Although country intrinsic its ers occupiedDienBien Phu in value, geographicalposi northwesternVietnam, 10 milesfrom tion placed it in the center of the CAToperationscontinued in and established ColdWar in SoutheastAsia. If Laos the Laosborder, an Indochinaafter the fall of DienBien airhead. Gen. Henri the fell to the Communists,Thailand Navarre, Phu. Betweenmid-Mayand mid- Frenchmilitarycommander,wanted might be next,according to the dom August, C-i19s droppedsupplies to ino And the of to lure the Vietminh into a setpiece theory. collapse isolatedFrenchoutposts and deliv battle in whichsuperiorFrench fire Thailandwouldlead to Communist eredloadsthroughout the country. could be used to effect. domination of SoutheastAsiaand power good CAT also supplied 12 C-46s for Among the manymistakesmade by perhapsbeyond.2 OperationCOGNAC, the evacua the French in their placing troops tion of civiliansfromNorthVietnam 220 milesfromHanoi was theirmis to SouthVietnamfollowing the sign calculation of the air transport US Aid ing of the GenevaAgreement on 21 resourcesneeded to keeptheir iso July 1954.Between 22 August and 4 latedforcessupplied. Col.Jean-Louis Under an agreementsigned in 1950, October,CATflew 19,808men, Nicot,head of the French Air Trans the UnitedStates had beensupply women, and children out ofNorth portCommand in Indochina,lacked ing and military aid to Vietnam. It also carriedmembers of ecoflomic sufficientaircrews to meet theArmys Laos. Following the GenevaConfer the CIAsSaigonMilitaryMission demands.Unlessadditionalassis ence,Washingtondecided to expand north of the 17thparallel.Attempts tancecould be obtained, the French this program. In January1955, it by the CIA to establishstaybehind garrisoncould not be kept established the UnitedStatesOpera 10 paramilitarynetworks in the north, supplied. tionsMission(USOM) in Vientiane however, futile. 1 proved to administereconomicassistance. At In earlyJanuary1954,Washington