Air America / Civil Air Transport (CAT)

The Civil Air Transport (CAT) formed after World War II using surplus aircraft from the war. In 1946 it began airlifting supplies and food into war-ravaged China, under contract with the Chinese Nationalist government and later the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). With the Defeat of the Chinese Nationalist in 1949, CAT evacuated thousands of Chinese to Taiwan. The CIA bought the airline to use for missions to aid in the fight against communism in Asia. It continued to fly scheduled passenger flights while using other aircraft to fly covert mission. In 1959 CAT was renamed to Air America and continued to fly missions to fight communism in Vietnam.