" OUR STAKE IN TROUBLED MOROCCO " 1953 B-36 BOMBER BASE MOHAMMED V YUSEF OPERATION REFLEX 18844

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Made as an episode of the "March of Time" TV show in 1953, "Our Stake in Troubled Morocco" was produced and written by Louis de Rochemont and his brother, the film begins with a news anchor-style narrator, Westbrook Van Voorhis, announcing that the editors of Time will bring the audience’s attention to the French protectorate of Morocco and events happening there in relation to the United States Air Force defenses (00:29). At 01:30, the United States Air Force is depicted in Morocco under the terms of a treaty signed by Maurice Challe, a French general during the Algerian War who became the commander of the French Air Force in Algeria from 1955 to 1960, along with general officer in the United States Air Force, Pierpont M. Hamilton. The terms of the treaty included authorization for the United States to build and operate bases in Morocco for the defense of Western Europe after the Korean War and Cold War tensions escalated with NATO fearing events to come. The building and engineering operations are described, while footage of the bases being constructed are shown along with heavy machinery and both native citizens and soldiers taking part in the process (01:45-03:00). The bases include Nouasseur Air Base and Sidi Slimane Air Base. B-36 aircraft land on these bases as major components in the defense against Soviet Union forces. The aircraft operators get used to the runways and we see footage of them in the air (03:06-04:06). The narrator goes on to describe Arab extremists supported by Communists attempting to interfere. Casablanca police are fortified by French and native forces, while Moroccan people are searched by the French regime and riots ensue. Sultan of Morocco from 1927 to 1953, Mohammed V Yusef, is depicted at 05:25. Moroccan schooling by the French, the Arab struggle for independence, and the agriculture of the area is highlighted in this documentary series to give context to the daily lives of people during a time of preparing for war (10:15-17:20). Morocco’s Sultan along with his advisors and the French Moroccan Protectorate form the governing body while events unfold, but tensions are high and French authority dictates the final rule with riots and unrest underhand (17:45-22:01).

Nouasseur Air Base near Casablanca in Morocco, was a United States Air Force base. The USAF air base siting in the former French Morocco developed out of the Allied presence there at the close of World War II. In the early 1950s, SAC developed an "Operation Reflex" strategy between its southern bases and Morocco, with B-36 and B-47 wings rotating to North Africa for extended temporary duty as a staging area for bombers pointed at the Soviet Union. During the middle and late-1950s, SAC adopted a dispersal program—spreading out its potential as a Soviet target by placing its aircraft, weapons, and personnel on many more bases, with each bombardment wing having two additional installations to which it could disperse. Nouasseur was one of a ring of overseas SAC air bases located from Greenland to North Africa. With the destabilization of the French government in Morocco, and Moroccan independence in 1956, the government of Mohammed V wanted the US Air Force to pull out of the SAC bases in Morocco, insisting on such action after American intervention in Lebanon in 1958.

The United States agreed to leave as of December 1959, and was fully out of Nouasseur Air Base, closing the facility in December 1963.Today, Nouasseur AB is known as Mohammed V International Airport. It currently hosts helicopters of the Royal Moroccan Navy.

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