The Secret US Air War in South Vietnam, 1962

B-26C light bombers lined up on the runway at Bien Hoa Airfield, South Vietnam, 1962.

The Geneva Accords of 1954, which established the two Vietnams, was an effort to implement a ceasefire between French colonialist and Vietnamese nationalists led by Ho Chi Minh. Under the Accords, neither North nor South Vietnam was permitted to join any military allia…