South Vietnam 1957 F8F Bearcat Saigon Military Assistance Advisory Group MAAG C-47 VNAF Airailimages

Watch South Vietnamese F8F Bearcats in service.
Vintage film from November 1957 shows the young air force of South Vietnam, and American Military Assistance Advisory Group (MAAG) personnel. The film includes some of the Grumman F8F Bearcat fighters transferred by France and the U.S. to South Vietnam as the French disengaged from Indochina. South Vietnam possibly received a total of more than 120 Bearcats over the years, and probably had fewer than that number in service at any time.
Silver South Vietnamese C-47s are seen on Tan Son Nhut air base, home of the South Vietnamese air force near Saigon. Vietnamese students receive maintenance instruction, and pilots are filmed as they walk the ramp to fly the F8Fs. The well-worn F8Fs were replaced between 1958 and 1960 with a variety of American-supplied aircraft including T-28s and A-1 Skyraiders.

Scenes in this footage show the characteristic South Vietnamese Air Force insignia, patterned after the United States' national insignia, but distinct in its additional use of yellow and red to differentiate it from American insignia.

The advisory group photographer making this film occasionally captured steam-powered mixed trains, and scenes of Vietnamese civilians. Glimpses of the city, probably Saigon, are seen. The imposing white building looks like to old Independence Palace in Saigon. This building was attacked by two dissident South Vietnamese Skyraider pilots in February, 1962, leading to its replacement with a new structure. The footage ends with Vietnamese in training in an audio lab where a sign reads: "Only English Will Be Spoken in Class."

I'm Fred Johnsen for the Airailimages Channel. Thanks for watching. You are the reason we do this.