ESHS/HSS Annual Meeting

The Battle for Technical Assistance: British and U.S. Aid for Civil Aviation in West Asia, 1945-1960

• In Event: Cold War Science in Asia

English Abstract

Although historians have explored rivalry between the Soviet Union and the U.S. in development aid, there is currently little work on rivalry between Britain and the U.S. This paper explores the contested nature of technical assistance in civil aviation in West Asia in the early years of the Cold War, and argues that this aid played a critical role in both shaping emerging national aviation systems and in expanding the aerial influence of the great aerial powers. Through training programs, technical advisors, access to parts and equipment, and even equity stakes, British and U.S. airlines attempted to create partners for their own operations and bolster their presence and goodwill in allied countries in the region. British and U.S. governments also assisted with financial aid. The British airline BOAC targeted airlines in ex-colonies such as Egypt and Iraq, as well as existing colonies such as the Trucial States and Aden. The U.S. airlines Pan American and TWA, meanwhile, assisted airlines in Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan. Countries such as Iran, Jordan, Turkey, Lebanon, and Pakistan emerged as battle grounds where assistance was received from airlines of both the U.S. and Britain, or switched over from one to the other. As local states built up their own expertise, and a new generation of jet airliners proliferated in the 1960s, technical assistance from airlines died away to be replaced by model-specific training from aircraft manufacturers, or by services offered by a new growing breed of commercial aviation consultancy firms.

Author

• Waqar Zaidi, Lahore University of Management Sciences