53. Editorial Note
In a memorandum to the Joint Chiefs of Staff, January 22, the Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs, John N. Irwin, II, responded to a request from the Joint Chiefs of Staff of December 30, 1958, for replacement of 30 of the Vietnamese Air Force’s current F–8F aircraft with 30 AD–4 aircraft. Irwin questioned the advisability of introducing AD–4 aircraft at the time because the utilization rate of F–8F aircraft by the Vietnamese aircraft was “Very unsatisfactory.” Irwin traced this unsatisfactory performance to poor maintenance, logistics, and supply caused by the change-over from a French operation to a United States system. For [Page 136] this reason and because of a general tightening of the 1959 Military Assistance Program, the Department of Defense considered it advisable to withhold the proposed substitution of aircraft until at least FY 1960 when it expected an improvement in Vietnamese training and maintenance. (Memorandum from Irwin to the JCS, January 22; Department of Defense, United States-Vietnam Relations, 1945–1967, Book 10, page 1183) The request from the Joint Chiefs of Staff to the Secretary of Defense for the 30 AD–4 aircraft, December 30, is in JCS Records, CCS 092 Asia (6–25–58) (2).