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  3. Foreign Relations of the United States, 1952–1954, Indochina, Volume XIII, Part 1
  4. Document 503

751G.5622/1–1354: Telegram

The Chargé in France ( Achilles ) to the Department of State

top secret
Paris , January 13, 1954—7 p.m.
[Received 4:38 p.m.]

2604. Repeated information Saigon priority 274. Eyes only Secretary and Chief of Mission. Reference: Embtels 25971 and 2598.2 I saw Jacquet this morning at his request. The government emergency request for Indochina which we had been told would be presented to us today was not because it is still clearing Pleven’s and Laniel’s offices. It should be delivered to us tomorrow. It will ask for an additional squadron of 25 B–26s with complete operational and maintenance crews plus an unspecified number of mechanics to service other B–26s which have been requested separately.

New request is entirely apart from 10 B–26s referred to by Bodet and reported in Saigon’s 1151 to Department repeated Paris 3513 and 18 B–26s referred to in Laniel’s letter of December 30 to Dillon transmitted to Department in Embtel 2478 repeated Saigon 250.4 Bodet and Laniel requests overlap and refer to same planes except that quantity increased from 10 to 18.

[Page 960]

Jacquet reiterated expected battle in Dien Bien Phu might be decisive one. He stressed urgency of obtaining operational squadron and in response to my query as to exact degree of urgency, he mentioned 10 or 12 days.

I told him that request for planes and mechanics would certainly be considered urgently and sympathetically but that request for pilots and flight crews for combat operation obviously raised most serious questions.5

Achilles
  1. Dated Jan. 12, p. 954.↩
  2. Dated Jan. 12, p. 956.↩
  3. Dated Jan. 3. p. 937.↩
  4. Dated Jan. 4. p. 938.↩

  5. In telegram 2605 from Paris, Jan. 13, Achilles transmitted the following additional information: “After talking with Norstad I sent word to Jacquet that in former’s opinion experienced French pilots and air crews could be trained to operational readiness in B–26s in ten days, and that facilities to do so were available in France and presumably also in Japan should Washington order it done.

    “Jacquet’s response was definitely favorable. Accordingly believe request for crews was based on genuine operational rather than political factors.” (751G.5622/1–1354)

    Gen. Lauris Norstad, USAF, was Air Deputy, Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers, Europe.

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