Viet Minh "Airforce" 1948/49 French Indochina
 

Hello!
During the early stages of the war the Viet Minh chartered a mumber of aircraft for smuggle weapons etc. purchased on the open market or supplied by other Asian countries incl. The Philippines.
French Armee de l' Air destroy a mumber of this umarked planes and the Viet Minh abandoned this method of obtaining supplies. The nationalities of the crews of the destroyed aircraft remain a mistery and the French records I know give no indication if they were ever identified!! Beside from China and Russia what reason have hat The Pilippines to support the Communist Vieh Minh? And/or where there a lot of "freelancers" runnig their own bussines which smuggle? Aircres without an "job" must be no problem after the early years after ww II and planes?
A lot of questions!!!
h.

Re: Viet Minh "Airforce" 1948/49 French Indochina
 

Hans,

Not sure if answer in link, but may be worth scrolling thru: https://media.defense.gov/2019/Feb/2...ology%20v1.pdf

Also early years post-war.

Grüss,

Leendert

Re: Viet Minh "Airforce" 1948/49 French Indochina
 

Perhaps it is worth remembering that during WW2 the US were very anti-colonialism and there could well have been interest in "hands-off" support of nationalist forces. (The Philippines, Puerto Rico etc are of course quite another matter...) Attitudes were to change quite quickly.

Re: Viet Minh "Airforce" 1948/49 French Indochina
 

This link goes to the book "A War of Logistics: Parachutes and Porters in Indochina, 1945-1954".

https://books.google.com/books?id=IN...945%22&f=false


On page 164 (toward the bottom and following) is a discussion of material being flown in from the Philippines by American pilots. While the page initially seems to be blocked, scroll up and down and few times and the page appears (at least for me). The source was author Bernard Fall (who wrote "Street Without Joy"). He maintained that American pilots were flying arms and material into Viet Minh airfields near Vinh and Thanh Hoa in unmarked airplanes. The same pilots and planes were later found operating "privately chartered aircraft" for the Laotian government. The French intelligence services established a network of agents in the Philippines to report on the operations (departures of both ships and planes for Viet Nam). French forces in Viet Nam were then able to intercept and destroy many such ships and planes and the traffic was reduced after 1947.