Air America was an American passenger and cargo airline established, under a different name, in 1946 and covertly owned and operated by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) from 1950 to 1976, adopting the Air America name in 1959. It supplied and supported covert operations in Southeast Asia during the Vietnam War, including allegedly providing support for drug smuggling in Laos. Its slogan was "Anything, Anywhere, Anytime, Professionally".
It was not a "normal airline," but did many of the flights that a normal airline would do. Despite the fact that it was owned and operated by the CIA, it quickly became the largest air carrier in the region, and therefore performed many of the normal operations of an airline. They transported hundreds of millions of dollars worth of cargo each year, and operated otherwise regularly scheduled passenger flights. They resupplied humanitarian workers in the field, supplying rural villages with lumber, chickens, seed, rice, and other items. They also searched for drowning victims at sea.
The airline can trace its roots to 1946, when it was founded by former American military aviator Claire Lee Chennault and diplomat Whiting Willauer as Chinese National Relief and Rehabilitation Administration Air Transport to airlift supplies and food into the war-ravaged Republic of China. It was soon pressed into service to support Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek and the nationalist Republic of China Armed Forces in the civil war between them and the communist People's Liberation Army under Mao Zedong. Many of its first pilots were veterans of Chennault's World War II combat groups, popularly known as Flying Tigers. By 1950, following the defeat of the nationalist forces and their retreat to Taiwan, the airline faced financial difficulties. In August 1950, the CIA bought the company and renamed it to Civil Air Transport, until 1959, when it changed its name to Air America. The first two transports of Air America arrived in Vientiane, Laos, on August 23, 1959.
Air America aircraft, including the Curtiss C-46 Commando, Pilatus PC-6 Porter, de Havilland Canada DHC-4 Caribou, Lockheed C-130 Hercules, and Fairchild C-123 Provider, along with Sikorsky UH-34D, Bell 204B, Bell 205, and Boeing CH-47C Chinook helicopters, flew many types of cargo to countries such as South Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia. It operated from bases in those countries and also from bases in Thailand and as far afield as Taiwan and Japan. It also on occasion flew top-secret missions into Burma and the China.
From 1959 to 1962 the airline provided direct and indirect support to US Special Forces "Ambidextrous", "Hotfoot", and "White Star", which trained the regular Royal Laotian armed forces. After 1962 a similar operation known as Project 404 fielded numerous US Army attachés (ARMA) and air attachés (AIRA) to the US embassy in Vientiane.
From 1962 to 1975, Air America inserted and extracted US personnel, provided logistical support to the Royal Lao Army, the Hmong Army under command of Royal Lao Army Major General Vang Pao and combatant Thai volunteer forces, transported refugees, and flew photo reconnaissance missions that provided intelligence on Viet Cong activities. Its operations were some of the first launched by the U.S. as it became increasingly involved militarily in Southeast Asia. Its civilian-marked craft were frequently used, under the control of the Seventh/Thirteenth Air Force, to launch search and rescue missions for US pilots downed throughout Southeast Asia. Air America pilots were the only known private US corporate employees to operate non-Federal Aviation Administration-certified military aircraft in a combat role. Dan Kurtz, originally from Michigan, masterminded the civilian masquerade of commercial pilots that in reality were covert CIA operatives flying rescue and supply missions in the late '60s.
By mid-1970, the airline had two dozen twin-engine transport aircraft as well as Boeing 727 and Boeing 747 jets plus two dozen fixed wing short-take off-and-landing aircraft in addition to 30 helicopters dedicated to operations in Burma, Cambodia, Thailand, and Laos. There were more than 300 pilots, copilots, flight mechanics, and airfreight specialists based in Laos, Vietnam, and Thailand. During 1970, Air America delivered 46 million pounds (21,000 metric tons) of food in Laos. Helicopter flight time reached more than 4,000 hours a month in the same year.
Air America flew civilians, diplomats, spies, refugees, commandos, sabotage teams, doctors, war casualties, drug enforcement officers, and even visiting VIPs like U.S. President Richard Nixon all over Southeast Asia. Part of the CIA's support operations in Laos involved logistical support for Hmong militia fighting the North Vietnamese forces and their Pathet Lao allies. Thousands of tons of food were delivered via Air America routes, including live chickens, pigs, water buffalo, and cattle. On top of the food drops (known as "rice drops") came the logistical demands for the war itself, and Air America pilots flew thousands of flights transporting and air-dropping ammunition and weapons (referred to as "hard rice") to friendly forces.
When the North Vietnamese Army overran South Vietnam in 1975, Air America helicopters participated in Operation Frequent Wind evacuating both U.S. civilians and South Vietnamese people associated with the South Vietnamese regime. The infamous photograph depicting the final evacuation, by Dutch photographer Hubert van Es, was an Air America helicopter taking people from an apartment building at 22 Gia Long Street used by USAID and CIA employees.
Air America planes sometimes transported drugs during the Laotian Civil War, though there is debate about whether Air America and the CIA were actively involved or merely allowed others to transport drugs. During the war, the CIA recruited people from the Hmong population to fight the Pathet Lao rebels and their North Vietnamese allies. Because of the conflict, many Hmong depended upon poppy cultivation for money. According to historian Alfred W. McCoy, because the Plain of Jars had been captured by the Pathet Lao in 1964, the Laotian Air Force was no longer able to land C-47 transport aircraft on the Plain of Jars, which McCoy says transported opium. According to McCoy, as the Laotian Air Force had few light planes that could land on the dirt runways near the mountaintop poppy fields, Air America used as it was the only airline available in northern Laos.
Air America were alleged to have profited from transporting opium and heroin on behalf of Hmong leader Vang Pao, or of "turning a blind eye" to the Laotian military doing it. This allegation has been supported by former Laos CIA paramilitary Anthony Poshepny, former Air America pilots, and other people involved in the war. It is portrayed in the movie Air America. However, University of Georgia aviation historian William M. Leary writes that Air America was not involved in the drug trade, citing Joseph Westermeyer, a physician and public health worker resident in Laos from 1965 to 1975, that "American-owned airlines never knowingly transported opium in or out of Laos, nor did their American pilots ever profit from its transport." Aviation historian Curtis Peebles also denies that Air America employees were involved in opium transportation.
Historian Alfred W. McCoy stated that:
After pulling out of South Vietnam in 1975, there was an attempt to keep a company presence in Udon Thani, Thailand. After this fell through, Air America was dissolved on June 30, 1976, and the operating authority certificate was cancelled by the Civil Aeronautics Board on January 31, 1974. Air Asia, the subsidiary that held all of the Air America assets, was later purchased by Evergreen International Airlines. All proceeds, a sum between 20 and 25 million dollars, were returned to the US Treasury. The employees were released unceremoniously with no accolades and no benefits even for those who suffered long-term disabilities, nor death benefits for families of employees killed in action. Such benefits as were afforded came from worker's compensation insurance required by contracts with the U.S. Air Force that few knew about. The benefits were not awarded easily. Many disabled pilots were ultimately compensated under the Longshore and Harbor Workers' Compensation Act after lengthy battles with CIA officials who denied their connection to the airline for years, and many died of their injuries before they could be compensated adequately. Accident reports were said to have been falsified, redacted, and stonewalled by CIA officials who continued to deny any relationship to the events described in them.
Air America pilots have attempted to have their pensions enhanced.
During its existence Air America operated a diverse fleet of aircraft, the majority of which were STOL capable. There was "fluidity" of aircraft between some companies such as Air America, Boun Oum Airways, Continental Air Services, Inc, and the United States Air Force. It was not uncommon for USAF and United States Army Aviation units to lend aircraft to Air America for specific missions. Air America tended to register its aircraft in Taiwan, but operated in Laos without the B- nationality prefix. US military aircraft were often used with the "last three" digits of the military serial as a civil marking.
Air Asia was a wholly owned subsidiary of Air America which provided technical, management, and equipment services for Civil Air Transport. Air Asia was headquartered in Taipei and its main facilities were in Tainan, Taiwan. It is now located in the Tainan Airport. It is the only surviving member of the Pacific Corporation, but currently it is owned by Taiwan Aerospace Corporation and is no longer related to the Central Intelligence Agency.
In the 1980s, a Los Angeles-based passenger airline, originally known as Total Air, revived the Air America name, operating Lockheed L-1011 TriStar wide body aircraft with scheduled service between Baltimore (BWI), Detroit (DTW), Honolulu (HNL), London (LGW) and Los Angeles (LAX).