Page:Pentagon-Papers-Part V. B. 2. b.djvu/137



It Is the understanding of the United States Government that the conversations between the French Ministers of Defense and Finance and the United States Secretaries of State and Defense produce the following results:

1. The Secretary of Defense informed the French Delegation the United States would dispatch to Indochina one squadron of B-26 bombers, these aircraft to be diverted from the American supply pipeline to the Korean Theater. The French Delegation Was informed that there planes would be completely equipped for combat but that no American personnel would be involved in their operation after delivery had been accomplished. The Trench Delegation was advised that it would be impossible for logistic reasons to deliver these planes before December 1.

2. The Secretary of State advised the French Delegation that, without reference to the French request for budgetary assistance to Indochina in the amount of 60 billion francs, the United States Government would undertake to supply all those items identified in the French request for assistance of March 1950 as confirmed and supplemented by the Melby-Erskine report of August 1950. The French Delegation was further informed that, since it was apparent that the French request for 60 billion francs, for budgetary assistance in Indochina bore no important relation to the project of forming large national armies in Indochina, the United States would expect the C O P Y Rh