The Air Force in the Vietnam War - Air Force Association

Strategic Airlift
S
trategic airlift in the Vietnam War
was provided by the Military Airlift
Command, which transported two million
tons of materiel and two million
passengers between the United States
and Southeast Asia. In the early part of
the war, strategic airlift was especially
important because the harbors and roads
in South Vietnam were not yet able to
handle the volume of cargo that would
eventually come in by sealift.
Throughout the conflict, strategic airlift
was crucial whenever time was important.
On several occasions, strategic
airlift deployed Army units from bases
in the United States to Vietnam.
In 1965, MAC allocated 34 squadrons
to strategic airlift for Vietnam. Most
of them flew C-124s, aging airlifters
known as “Old Shaky,” with clamshell
doors that opened in the nose so vehicles
could be driven on and off. They were
augmented by even older airplanes, such
as C-97s, from the Air National Guard
and the Air Force Reserve. MAC also
contracted with commercial airlines
for most passenger travel into and out
of Southeast Asia. Before additional
facilities were built to disperse the arriving
flights, Tan Son Nhut in Saigon had
the highest traffic density of any airport
in the world.
The main strategic airlifter of the war
was the C-141 Starlifter, which made
its first delivery to Vietnam in 1965. It
was twice as fast as the propeller-driven
C-124, and it could carry twice the load.
The huge C-5 had even more capacity,
but it did not make its first delivery to
Vietnam until August 1971 in the later
phase of the war.
The C-141 made daily shuttle flights
between the United States and Southeast
Asia, taking cargo in and bringing out
people and casualties. The C-9 joined
the aeromedical evacuation mission in
Vietnam in 1972. Between 1965 and
1973, MAC airlifters evacuated a total
of 406,022 patients from Southeast Asia,
168,832 of them battle casualties.
4