Unlikely Oasis Skyraider Reunion
We’ve covered the legacy of the Toyota Wars and the saga of French Jaguar Diplomacy in blunting Gaddafi’s Libyan legions in Chad in the 1980s, but another, even more shoestring, story often goes untold.
Between 1973 and 1978, a group of a half-dozen Korean War-era ex-USN A-1N/NA Skyraiders known to history as the Sky Tchadiens were being flown for the Chadian forces by a collection of French mercenary pilots and two Gabonese Air Force president’s squadron (Groupement Aérien Présidentiel) lieutenants on loan, Jacques Borne (nicknamed “Sarcife”) and René Gras, who, of course, were all just sheep-dipped French Air Force officers.
In the below, Borne is seen in a red scarf, while Gras is seen in a green.
From left to right: Pierre Grosjean, René Gras, Fayolle, and Jacques Borne (Coll. F. Borne)
Underwing are French-designed and produced 60-pound SERAM T-10 100mm rockets, typically carried by Dassault Ouragan or Mystère aircraft in strike roles. Combined with light GP bombs and the Raiders’ 20mm cannon, they proved strong medicine on attack runs.
Operating as a “light aviation support squadron” (Escadrille Légère d’Aviation d’Appui 1/22 “Ain”), they were officially stationed at Fort-Lamy (now N’Djamena, Chad) but forward-deployed in pairs to Faya-Largeau, an oasis in the north of the country.
At the Faya-Largeau oasis strip, the desert was so deep and loose that planes often sank to the wheel hubs and aircraft patrols took off near-simultaneously as visibility after the first plane went to full power was nil for several minutes after.
From there, they flew dune-height strafing, bombing, and rocketry runs over Libyan-backed insurgent camps and columns and lived to (not) tell the tale.
An average of 35 operational recon, strike, and support sorties were logged every month, which is impressive for two forward-deployed aircraft and just six in the whole country.
The French dubbed the 12,000-pound (empty) Skyraider “La Bête” (The Beast), and they flew them throughout the 1960s and 70s not only in Chad but also in Algeria, Djibouti, and Madagascar.
In all, they acquired 20 ex-USN AD-4s, 88 ex-USN AD-4Ns, and 5 ex-USN AD-4NAs in the early 1960s, some of which were later passed on third-hand to Cambodia, as well as the aforementioned Gabonese and Chadian planes.
At least a dozen ex-Navy Skyraiders flew with ELAA 1/22 in Chad at one time or another in the 1970s (BuNos 126882, 126912, 126935, 126959, 126969, 126970, 126979, 126994, 126996, 126997, 127888, and 127894).
Retired by the French Air Force in 1979, at least one Beast is preserved in Djibouti at Base Aérienne 188 “Colonel Massart” while another, AD-4NA BuNo 126979, which flew with EC 2/20 Ouarsenis in Algeria, is on display at the Musée de l’Air et de l’Espace.
First flown by the Navy on 24 September 1952, BuNo 126979 left NAS Norfolk in April 1960, flew with EC 2/20 in Algeria as 20-QA, then with EAA 601 at Châteaudun, and later with ELAA 1/22 in Chad from 1971 through 1975 as 22-DD before she was struck off in 1976.
She reportedly still has a base coat of Navy blue under her French livery.
U.S. Navy Douglas AD-4/-4L Skyraider aircraft from Attack Squadron VA-175 Devil’s Diplomats on the deck of the aircraft carrier USS Franklin D. Roosevelt (CVB-42). VA-175 was assigned to Carrier Air Group 17 (CVG-17) aboard the FDR for two deployments to the Mediterranean Sea in 1951-52. U.S. Navy National Museum of Naval Aviation photo No. 1996.253.2860