Instruct: Given a question, retrieve passages that can help answer the question.
Query: When was the Eleventh Air Force established?
Six months after Eleventh Air Force had been redesignated in Alaska, another headquarters, also named Eleventh Air Force, was established on 13 May 1946 and activated at Olmsted Field, Pennsylvania, on 13 June 1946. This new organization was assigned to Air Defense Command.
During World War II, the airport was used by the United States Army Air Forces extensively during the Italian Campaign. It was used by the Twelfth Air Force as a combat airfield, which stationed the following units at the airport: 79th Fighter Group (January–May 1944, P-40 Warhawk/P-47 Thunderbolt); 47th Bombardment Group (March–April 1944, A-20 Havoc); 33d Fighter Group (April–May 1944, P-40 Warhawk). When the combat units moved out, Air Transport Command used the airport as a major transshipment hub for cargo, transiting aircraft and personnel for the remainder of the war.
Following World War II, the National Security Act of 1947 established the U.S. Air Force as a sister service of the Army and Navy. The concurrent establishment of major commands within the Air Force brought wholesale realignments, including creating new wings with subordinate groups and squadrons. The Air Force established the 9th Strategic Reconnaissance Wing on 25 April 1949 and activated it on 1 May. The Air Force also activated and redesignated the 9th Bomb Group and its subordinate squadrons, making them the 9th Reconnaissance Group, and the 1st, 5th and 99th Reconnaissance Squadrons. The 5th Reconnaissance Squadron's new home was Fairfield-Suisan (later Travis) AFB, California. For the next 11 months, squadron crewmembers flew RB-29s on visual, photographic, electronic, and weather reconnaissance missions.
Early in 1940, the question of air defense of the Alaska Territory came into the limelight when President Roosevelt pointed out in his message to Congress requesting funds for fortification of Guam and Wake Islands and other strategic points in the Pacific that airfields were needed in Alaska. The original request for $12,000,000 to be appropriated for the construction of Alaskan defenses was cut to $600,000, but still was sufficient to begin the construction of an air base at Anchorage, Alaska. Thus was begun the construction of Elmendorf Field, primary fourth-echelon base for all future Eleventh Air Force operations. Construction of the airfield began on 8 June when 25 locally hired men began clearing brush, the Army intending it to be a permanent airfield.
When the United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) was founded on 20 June 1941, it included provisions for Air Ground Control Parties to serve with the United States Army at the division, corps, and Army headquarters. The Air Ground Control Parties functions were to regulate bombing and artillery in close conjunction with the ground troops, as well as assess bomb damage. They were thus the first of similar units to try to fulfill the functions of the FAC without being airborne. However, these units were often plagued by turf wars and cumbersome communications between the respective armies and air forces involved. As a result, it could take hours for an air strike requested by ground troops to actually show up.
When the United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) was founded on 20 June 1941, it included provisions for Air Ground Control Parties to serve with the United States Army at the division, corps, and Army headquarters. The Air Ground Control Parties functions were to regulate bombing and artillery in close conjunction with the ground troops, as well as assess bomb damage. They were thus the first of similar units to try to fulfill the functions of the forward air controller (FAC) without being airborne. However, these units were often plagued by interservice rivalry and cumbersome communications between the respective armies and air forces involved. As a result, it could take hours for an air strike requested by ground troops to actually show up.
The Fifth Air Force (5 AF) is a numbered air force of the United States Air Force Pacific Air Forces (PACAF). It is headquartered at Yokota Air Base, Japan. It is the U.S. Air Force's oldest continuously serving Numbered Air Force. The organization has provided 70 years of continuous air power to the Pacific since its establishment in September 1941.
The facility was established in 1942 as Naples Army Airfield by the United States Army Air Forces. It was initially assigned to the Southeast Training Center (later Eastern Flying Training Command). Provided basic (level 1) flight training to flight cadets by Embry-Riddle Co; Fairchild PT-19s were the primary trainer used. Along with the flight training, was a sub-base to Buckingham Army Airfield for flexible gunnery training, which the 75th Flying Training Wing supervised. Inactivated on November 1, 1945, being turned over to the War Assets Administration for conveyance to civil control as a public airport.
Members of the 81st again deployed to Aviano Air Base in October 1998, supporting NATO air presence during the crisis in Kosovo, Yugoslavia. The 81st FS returned to Aviano Air Base in January 1999 for a regular contingency rotation, but then stayed to support Operation Allied Force. The squadron supported air operations from Aviano Air Base until 11 April 1999, when it moved to Gioia del Colle, Italy. From there, the unit flew more than 1,400 combat missions throughout Operation Allied Force and led the first large force packages in A-10 history. The 81st also led the first two successful combat search and rescue task force missions, which involved coordinating all rescue assets resulting in the rescue of downed F-117 and F-16 pilots.
The United States was attacked on September 11, 2001 by al Qaeda terrorists who hijacked commercial airliners and crashed them in coordinated strikes into both towers of the World Trade Center in Lower Manhattan, New York City and the Pentagon in Washington, D.C. The fourth plane crashed into a field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, and its target was likely a prominent building in Washington, D.C., most probably either the Capitol Building or the White House. Within three hours of the start of the first hijacking and two hours after American Airlines Flight 11 struck the World Trade Center, Rumsfeld raised the defense condition signaling of the United States offensive readiness to DEFCON 3, the highest it had been since the Arab-Israeli war in 1973.
The Air Force mission at Langley is to sustain the ability for fast global deployment and air superiority for the United States or allied armed forces. The base is one of the oldest facilities of the Air Force, having been established on 30 December 1916, prior to America's entry to World War I by the Aviation Section, U.S. Signal Corps, named for aviation pioneer Samuel Pierpont Langley. It was used during World War I as a flying field, balloon station, observers’ school, photography school, experimental engineering department, and for aerial coast defense. It is situated on 3,152 acres of land between the cities of Hampton (south), NASA LaRC (west), and the northwest and southwest branches of the Back River.
Over the following decades most countries with any substantial military capability established their own independent air forces.The South African Air Force was formed on 1 February 1920 and the Royal Australian Air Force was formed shortly afterwards on 31 March 1921, although it was not until 1922 that the head of the Service was titled as Chief of the Air Staff, placing him on a par with his Australian Army and Navy counterparts. The Canadian Air Force was formed at the end of World War I, and was abolished and reorganized several times between 1918 and 1924. It became the permanent Royal Canadian Air Force when it received the "Royal" title by royal proclamation on 1 April 1924. It did not however become independent of the Canadian Army until 1938 when its head was also designated as Chief of the Air Staff. Similarly, the Royal New Zealand Air Force was established in 1923 as the New Zealand Permanent Air Force but did not become independent of the New Zealand Army until 1937. Other British-influenced countries also established their own independent air forces. For example, the Royal Egyptian Air Force was created in 1937 when Egyptian military aviation was separated from Army command.The Afghan Air Force was established on 22 August 1924,with support of The Soviet Union and Great Britain, but the civil war destroyed most of the planes and it wasn't until 1937,when King Mohammed Nadir Shah took power and reestablished the Afghan air Force.
The RCAF had established a presence at the Uplands (Ottawa) Airport, in August 1940, under the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan, as No. 2 Service Flying Training School began operations. With the war ending, No.2 SFTS closed on 14 April 1945, the Station became home to Headquarters RCAF Maintenance Command, and when Maintenance Command relocated, in 1947, RCAF association with the site ceased. RCAF flying activities resumed at Uplands, with the re-activation of several WW2 fighter squadrons, they designated again for service in Europe. No.439 Squadron was first re-formed in September 1951, at Uplands, as was No.416 Squadron, in September 1952, both departing for in Europe in 1953, they flying the F86 Sabre.
In September 1947 the combat elements of the Army Air Forces separated from the U.S. Army, forming the United States Air Force. But a few Air Force support functions, such as medical care, remained U.S. Army responsibilities for the next two years. Starting in 1948, the Air Force and the Air Surgeon, Maj. Gen. Malcolm C. Grow (1887-1960), began to convince the U.S. Army and the administration of President Harry S. Truman that the Air Force needed its own medical service. In the summer of 1949, Air Force General Order No. 35 established a medical service with the following officer personnel components: Medical Corps, Dental Corps, Veterinary Corps, Medical Service Corps, Air Force Nurse Corps, and Women’s Medical Specialist Corps.
The United States Air Force (USAF) is the aerial and space warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the five branches of the United States Armed Forces, and one of the seven American uniformed services. Initially formed as a part of the United States Army on 1 August 1907, the USAF was established as a separate branch of the U.S. Armed Forces on 18 September 1947 with the passing of the National Security Act of 1947. It is the youngest branch of the U.S. Armed Forces, and the fourth in order of precedence. The USAF is the largest and most technologically advanced air force in the world. The Air Force articulates its core missions as air and space superiority, global integrated intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance, rapid global mobility, global strike, and command and control.
After the Luftwaffe's specialist ground attack aircraft, the Junkers Ju 87, suffered heavy losses in attacks on Britain, it was decided to use modified Messerschmitt Bf 109s and Messerschmitt Bf 110 as fighter-bombers. The first unit equipped with these aircraft, "Erprobungsgruppe" 210, began conducting operations against shipping in the English Channel in the third week of July. The unit began operations against ground targets on 12 August, when aircraft from its three squadrons ("staffel") simultaneously attacked radar stations near Dover, Pevensey, Rye and Dunkirk. The unit continued fighter-bomber operations throughout July, but suffered heavy losses during raids on inland targets; casualties among the Bf 110s were particularly high, and it became clear that these large and relatively slow aircraft were not suited to the fighter-bomber role. Nevertheless, the Luftwaffe decided to expand its fighter bomber force, and an additional group equipped with modified Bf 109s became active in August. On 2 September Hermann Göring, the Commander-in-Chief of the Luftwaffe, directed that one squadron of each Bf 109 group was to be equipped with fighter-bombers, and that these aircraft were to be used to attack the British aircraft industry and other industrial facilities.
When the U.S. Air Force was established as a separate executive department under the National Security Act of 1947, Secretary of the Air Force W. Stuart Symington, requested FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover to loan General Carroll to the services to organize a U.S. Air Force agency for investigative and counterintelligence functions. He organized and directed this new organization, the AFOSI, along the lines of the FBI rather than the U.S. Army's Criminal Investigation Command (USACIDC or CID). General Carroll was tendered a commission as a colonel, U.S. Air Force Reserve, January 12, 1948. He was ordered to active duty in the grade of brigadier general May 6, 1948, and promoted to major general August 11, 1950.
"The Eleventh Hour" was first broadcast in the US on BBC America on 17 April 2010 and in Canada on the same date on Space. It set a record for BBC America, with an average of 1.2 million viewers and 0.9 million in the adults aged 25–54 demographic. The episode aired in Australia on 18 April on ABC1. It could also be viewed on ABC's website iView two days prior to the television air date, on 16 April. The show was broadcast two weeks after airing in Britain, as the BBC required a fortnight to edit down the "Doctor Who Confidential: Cut Down". There was no room for the accompanying "Doctor Who Confidential" due to the hour-long running time, but ABC holds the rights and has made it available on iView. The episode aired in New Zealand on 2 May on Prime.
Upon establishment of the Australian Air Board on 9 November 1920, Williams and his fellow AAC officers dropped their army ranks in favour of those based on the Royal Air Force. Williams, now a wing commander, personally compiled and tabled the Air Board's submissions to create the Australian Air Force (AAF), a service independent of both the Army and the Royal Australian Navy. Though the heads of the Army and Navy opposed the creation of an independent air arm for fear that they would be unable to find air cover for their operations, support from Prime Minister Billy Hughes, as well as prominent parliamentary figures including Treasurer Joseph Cook and Defence Minister George Pearce allowed the proposal to succeed. The AAF was duly formed on 31 March 1921; Williams deliberately chose this day rather than 1 April, the founding date of the RAF three years earlier, "to prevent nasty people referring to us as 'April Fools'". The "Royal" prefix was added five months later. Williams proposed an ensign for the AAF in July 1921, based on the Royal Air Force flag but featuring the five stars of the Southern Cross within the RAF roundel and the Commonwealth Star in the lower hoist quarter. This design was not adopted for the RAAF, the government employing instead a direct copy of the RAF ensign until 1949, when a new design using the stars of the Australian Flag was chosen.
Caribou Air Force Station was the first of five, United States Air Force, Air Material Command (AMC) installations that were constructed during the period of 1951 – 1953. Each of the five installations was built specifically to provide operational storage of the nuclear stockpile, and to provide a specified number of weapons to their adjacent Strategic Air Command (SAC) bases. The first four installations were built and occupied by 1953. The fifth installation, although completed in 1953, would not be utilized until 1955. The first installation, code named “Site Easy” was originally known as the “North River Depot”. It was constructed between 1951-1952, and operations began in 1952. Funds were provided in 1951 to the Armed Forces Special Weapons Project (AFSWP), for the planning and construction of an ordnance storage site in the vicinity of a new Strategic Air Command Base. The AFSWP was directed to utilize the services of the Corps of Engineers, Department of Army, for planning and construction, and was made responsible for monitoring such work, and for operational security measures during these phases. The original directive to the AFSWP stipulated that upon completion of construction the installation would be turned over to Headquarters, Air Material Command for operational responsibilities.
Ground Attack Aviation or Fighter-Bomber Aviation (Lovačko-Bombarderska Aviacija) was in the second plan of JRV. All attack aircraft were home-made. The new aircraft like J-22 Orao attack aircraft and G-4 Super Galeb light-attack trainer were replacing older J-21 Jastreb light-attack and G-2 Galeb light-attack trainer aircraft. The First Corps of AF and AD had two fighter-bomber squadrons and one reconnaissance squadron equipped with ground attack reconnaissance aircraft. 252nd from Batajnica Airbase was under direct command of its Corps of AF and AD (unlike other squadrons which were under the command of their Regiments/Brigades). It was equipped with older J-21 Jastreb light attack aircraft and G-2 Galeb trainer/attack aircraft, Utva-66 utility aircraft and new G-4 Super Galebs. Under command of the 97th Aviation Brigade (which was in 1st Corps of AF and AD) there was one fighter-bomber squadron, 240th, equipped with Jastrebs and one reconnaissance squadron, 353.IAE, equipped with IJ-22 Orao reconnaissance-attack aircraft. The Third Corps of AF and AD had two major fighter-bomber aviation units, 98th Aviation Brigade and 127th Fighter-Bomber Aviation Regiment. 98th Aviation Brigade from Skopski Petrovac in Macedonia had three squadrons, two fighter-bomber squadron and one reconnaissance squadron. Fighter-bomber squadrons were 241st equipped with J-22 Orao attack aircraft, 247th with Jastrebs and 354th IAE was equipped with IJ-21 Jastreb reconnaissance aircraft. 127th Fighter-Bomber Aviation Regiment at Golubovci Airbase comprised two fighter-bomber squadrons, 239th equipped with G-4 Super Galebs and 242nd equipped with Jastrebs and J-22 Orao aircraft. The Fifth Corps of AF and AD had most fighter-bomber aviation units, one Aviation Brigade and two Fighter-Bomber Aviation Regiments. 82nd Aviation Brigade, at Cerklje Airbase, Slovenia, had two fighter-bomber squadrons and one reconnaissance squadron. Two fighter-bomber squadrons were 237.LBAE equipped with J-21 and NJ-21 Jastrebs, and 238th equipped with J-22 and NJ-22 Orao aircraft. Reconnaissance squadron was 351st equipped with IJ-21 Jastreb and IJ-22 Orao reconnaissance-attack aircraft. 105th Fighter-Bomber Aviation Regiment at Zemunik-Zadar Airbase comprised two fighter-bomber aviation squadrons, 249th equipped with Super Galebs, 251st with Galebs and one aviation squadron, 333rd equipped with Utva 75 training aircraft, An-2 transport aircraft, Gazelle helicopters and Super Galebs. 185th Fighter-Bomber Aviation Regiment at Pula Airport has compos of one fighter-bomber squadron, 229th equipped with G-4 Super Galebs and one fighter squadron, 129th equipped with MiG-21 aircraft in versions MiG-21PFM, MiG-21US and MiG-21UM.
These operations led to a joint mission on 11 September 1943, when Eleventh Air Force dispatched eight B-24 Liberators and 12 B-25s. However the Japanese were alert and reinforced their defenses. 74 crew members in three B-24s and seven B-25 failed to return. Twenty two men were killed in action, one taken prisoner and 51 interned in Kamchatka, Russia. It had proven that the Kurile Islands could be attacked, but new methods had to be devised as the raid lost Eleventh Air Force over half its offensive striking power. No more combat missions were flown in 1943.
Under the USAAF, it was re-designated as Alaskan Air Command' on 18 December 1945, without any change in headquarters location. Alaskan Air Command was established at the same Major Command echelon as the other overseas combat commands, the United States Air Forces in Europe, Far East Air Forces and Caribbean Air Command, with its mission being the air defense of the Territory of Alaska.
Several changes took place following the occupation of Kiska. The Eleventh Air Force became a component of Task Force "Y", still under Navy jurisdiction. Vice Admiral Frank Jack Fletcher was named ComNorPac and Major General Davenport Johnson relieved General Butler as commander of the Eleventh Air Force. One of General Johnson's first acts was the establishment of the Eleventh Air Force Instrument flying school and the promotion of an intensive training program in navigation and instrument flying, as well as the accelerated development of radio and navigation aids in the Aleutian Islands. Because of the tremendous advances brought about by intensive instrument training and the increased aids to navigation and radio, planes that used to be grounded by weather, were now flying regular schedules. Troop Carrier Command and Air Transport Command planes were operating in the Aleutian Islands with airline regularity.
In November 1943 a second airfield, Casco Cove Army Airfield was constructed on Attu for long-range bombing operations.
Eleventh Air Force carried out another bombing mission against northern Kurils on 5 February 1944, when it attacked with six B-24s from the 404th Bomb Sqdn. (28th BG) and 16 P-38s from the 54th Fighter Sqdn. (343d FG). March 1944 saw Eleventh Air Force bombers over the Kuriles on daylight armed reconnaissance missions. Not many, but a sufficient number to convince the Japanese that there were aircraft in the Aleutian Islands and that the Kuriles were in constant danger of air attack. During the crucial period, while other United States forces were advancing in the South Pacific, the Japanese were forced to keep much-needed aircraft, in the Kuriles and Hokkaido as defense against possible attack from the North.