States. This would allow the Department of Defense to close a number of facilities such as Naval Air Station (NAS) Patuxent River, Maryland, and Eglin AFB, Florida, while retaining a robust test capability at bases such as Edwards AFB and NAS Point Mugu, California. Again, hundreds of millions of dollars could be saved yearly, if only Congress and the Administration would allow it. So the next time you hear a member of Congress whining about the inefficiency and bloat in the U.S. military, send them a letter, fax, or e-mail, and ask them when they last closed a base in their home state or district! The burden of their pork is being borne by folks like General Ralston and his combat aircrews.
Despite these problems, ACC remains the single most powerful air force in the world today. In spite of the challenges and financial burdens that they bear, they will always do their best with what we the taxpayers care to give them. Let us hope that it is enough, and that they will not come back saying, 'You could have done better.'
The 366th Wing: A Guided Tour
Audentes Fortuna Juvat — Fortune Favors the Bold.
You really have to want to get there, and it is not easy — some fifty miles outside Boise, Idaho, down Interstate 84 to a turnoff onto a road that seems to dead-end into nowhere. After about ten of the most desolate miles you will ever drive, you arrive at the gate. Your next impression is surprise, for what you have found is a state-of-the-art military facility in the middle of the Idaho desert, a place with the unlikely name of Mountain Home Air Force Base (AFB). The buildings are modern and trim, the flight line is vast and spacious. Then you notice the sign, 'Home of the Gunfighters.'
And so you get your first introduction to the most exciting combat unit in the U.S. Air Force today, the 366th Wing. Note that I say 'Wing.' Not 'Fighter Wing' or 'Bombardment Wing,' but just 'Wing.' The 366th is made up of five flying squadrons, including a mix of fighters, bombers, and tankers, thus, its unofficial title of 'Composite Wing.' As such, it is controversial, since single-type aircraft wings have been the norm in the United States Air Force since World War II. Mixing up different kinds of aircraft in the same wing makes hardcore traditionalists very nervous. The traditionalists are wrong… in this case. If the Air Force is to meet all of its worldwide commitments, especially with the huge drawdown in Air Force strength since the end of the Cold War, they're going to need an edge. The 366th and the composite wing concept is just such an edge.
THE COMPOSITE WING CONCEPT
The 366th is the product of Air Force experience in Operation Desert Storm… as well as what might have happened during Operation Desert Shield in August 1990 if Iraq had continued south into Saudi Arabia after the invasion of Kuwait. In that anxious time, because of its long reach and ability to react quickly, airpower was critical to the defense of the Saudi oil fields. And yet, except for a pair of United States Navy (USN) Carrier Air Wings (CVWs), American airpower was slow to reach the area; and the two CVWs would have had a hard time stopping any Iraqi advance south. It took weeks to deploy enough air units to block an Iraqi strike into Saudi Arabia or the Emirates. Worse yet was the condition of their units when they arrived. Munitions and supporting equipment they would need to sustain an air campaign were scarce.The official badge of the 366th Wing, the 'Gunfighters.'
When the forces were at last deployed, there were doubts about how effective they would be in this 'come as you are' war — without time for the kind of detailed planning and meticulous preparation military organizations love. As it happened — fortunately — General Chuck Horner had six months (August '90 to January '91) to get his forces and supplies in place, plan his strikes, and train his forces before he initiated offensive air operations. But the next dictator with expansionist ambitions may not be so foolish as to give us six months to get ready.
Time. Time is the enemy if you are responding to a fast-breaking situation. Time always seems to be on the other guy's side. Given time, that dictator might gain recognition for his actions and (alleged) grievances in the halls of international organizations like the United Nations. He might also have time to dig in his forces and make their position too costly to recapture. Time can kill you. The British effort to retake the Falkland Islands from Argentina in 1982 ultimately hinged on their ability to rapidly move a handful of Harrier and Sea Harrier jump jets into the area to provide air cover for their forces. The planes had to travel eight thousand miles by ship. And the hard-fought air campaign barely resulted in victory.
Time… Quick response of integrated, combat-ready airpower in a come-as-you-are war…
These thoughts buzzed around the collective brains of ACC. In Desert Shield we were lucky, they knew. But they also knew we needed something better than luck. One idea they tried came from the USAF's past — composite wings. These units have gone by many names. In World War II they were Air Commando Wings. During the Cold War they were Tactical Reconnaissance Wings. Whatever the name, they were created and used to solve an immediate problem.
In Saudi Arabia during the Gulf War at Al Kharj Air Base, the 4th Composite Wing (Provisional) was made up of an F-15C squadron from the 36th Tactical Fighter Wing (TFW) at Bitburg Airbase (AB), Germany, two squadrons of F-15Es from the 4th TFW at Seymour Johnson AFB, South Carolina, and a pair of Air National Guard (ANG) F-16 squadrons from New York and South Carolina. Another, even more unusual, composite unit was based at Incirlik AB in Turkey. Dubbed the 7440th Composite Wing, it was made up of no less than a dozen squadrons and detachments flying several different kinds of aircraft, a miniature air force unto itself. The 7440th was charged with running the air effort out of Turkey during Desert Storm (under the operational code name of Proven Force). And it represented the American effort in northern Iraq during and after the war, when it became the covering element for Operation Provide Comfort, the Kurdish relief effort in northern Iraq.
After the war, the lessons from Desert Storm were carefully analyzed to see what might have been done better, faster, and more efficiently. For the USAF leadership back in the Pentagon, one obvious lesson was the need to rapidly move integrated, combat-ready airpower into a crisis area, where it would either help defuse the developing crisis or actually begin combat operations, while follow-on forces arrived to take over the main effort.
As a result of these studies, the concept of special-purpose composite wings for specific missions was resurrected. Many different people within the Air Force had a hand in making this happen. General Mike Dugan, who was USAF Chief of Staff prior to Desert Shield and Desert Storm, proposed the idea to the USAF Air Staff. Following the war, the idea gained support from officers like Chuck Horner and Colonel John Warden who conducted a study of the concept. The final decision came from then-USAF Chief of Staff General Merrill 'Tony' McPeak in the fall of 1991. As part of his general reorganization of the Air Force in 1992, McPeak authorized the creation of the 23rd Wing at Pope AFB, North Carolina, and the 366th Wing at Mountain Home AFB, Idaho. The 23rd was charged with supporting the rapid deployment units of the XVIII Airborne Corps (the primary ground component of CENTCOM), particularly the 82nd Airborne Division at nearby Fort Bragg, North Carolina, while the 366th Wing was formed to provide a rapidly deployable air interdiction force to deter or defeat enemy forces, and to provide a nucleus for other arriving air forces in an area. Both units were 'stood up' in January 1992, being formed on the shells of two wings that were in the process of being shut down.
Getting the two wings up and running has created great challenges, the largest of which has been the cost of operating a unit with five different kinds of aircraft, ranging from fighters and bombers to tankers. Adverse publicity from a midair collision at Pope AFB didn't help either. In March 1994, a pair of 23rd Wing aircraft, an F-16 and a C-130, crashed into each other. The wreckage of the F-16 then struck a C-141 loaded with paratroopers from
