RAF Molesworth

Template:GBthumb RAF Molesworth is a Royal Air Force base located near Molesworth, Cambridgeshire, United Kingdom with a history dating back to 1917. It is one of three bases in Cambridgeshire currently occupied by the United States Air Force; RAF Molesworth, RAF Alconbury, and RAF Upwood are considered the "Tri-Base Area".

Early history

The Royal Flying Corps selected a site for an airfield near the village of Old Weston in Cambridgeshire during World War I. The first flying unit to arrive at the base was 75 Squadron. It remained at this airfield until the end of the war. After the war, the airfield was abandoned. Some of the buildings were taken over by the surrounding farms with many of them still in use today.

World War II

RAF use

At the start of World War II the Air Ministry selected the area as the site for what would become RAF Molesworth. The base was built in 1940 and 1941. The first unit, 460 Squadron, formed at the base on November 15 1941 with Vickers Wellington IVs. 460 Squadron departed the field on January 4 1942. 159 squadron moved in shortly afterwards, however this unit did not remain long, moving to the Middle East on January 12.

USAAF use

Molesworth was one of the early Eighth Air Force stations assigned to the United States Army Air Force (USAAF), and during 1942 the facility had all its runways extended to American specifications for heavy 4-engined bombers, with the main being 2,000 yards long and increasing the number of hardstands to fifty. It was given USAAF designation as Station 107.

From 16 September 1943 though 18 June 1945, Molesworth served as headquarters for the 41st Combat Bombardment Wing of the 1st Bomb Division.

15th Bombardment Squadron

RDB-7B (RAF Douglas A-20C-1-DO Havoc Boston III), Serial AL672, shown as a staff communications aircraft for 8th AF HQ at RAF Bovingdon. This aircraft was originally belonged to 15th Bombardment Squadron (Light) and used on 4 July 1942 a low-level attack on Luftwaffe airfields in the Netherlands

See also: 27th Fighter Wing

The first USAAF tenant on Molesworth was the 15th Bombardment Squadron, arriving on June 9 1942 from RAF Grafton Underwood. The squadron flew the British Boston III light bomber. The 15th was originally part of the 27th Bombardment Group (Light), based in the Philippine Islands, however the group's planes (A-24's), did not arrive by December 7 1941. Due to the deteriorating situation in the Philippines after the Japanese attack, they were diverted to Australia where they reformed into a combat unit and fought in the Dutch East Indies and New Guinea Campaigns.

When the 27th Bombardment Group was inactivated and transferred back to the United States for reeqipping, the surviving members of the group were first transferred back to the United States, then to the UK where they received their Bostons from No. 226 Squadron RAF.

On July 4, 1942, six American crews from the 15th Bomb Squadron joined with six RAF crews from RAF Swanton Morley for a low-level attack on Luftwaffe airfields in the Netherlands. The squadron commander, Capt. Charles Kegelman was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross and its British equivalent for his valor on that Fourth of July mission--the first Eighth Air Force airman to receive the nation's second highest combat decoration.

The 15th flew most of its missions from Molesworth in its Bostons, and did not receive USAAF Douglas A-20 Havoc aircraft until 5 September. The squadron was transferred to RAF Podington until September 15 where it flew a few missions before being transferred to Twelfth Air Force for support of Allied landings in North Africa on October 15 1942.

303d Bombardment Group

B-17G-25-DL Fortress 42-38050 Thunderbird, 359th BS.

With the departure of the 15th Bomb Squadron, Molesworth was occupied by the B-17 Flying Fortresses of the 358th Bombardment Squadron, the first of four squadrons that would comprise the 303d Bombardment Group. The 303d would remain at Molesworth until shortly after V-E Day in late May 1945.

The 303d Bombardment Group consisted of the following squadrons:

• 358th Bombardment (Code VK)
• 359th Bombardment (Code BN)
• 360th Bombardment (Code PU)
• 427th Bombardment (Code GN)

The 358th flew the first mission for the group on November 17 1942. The group would become one of the legendary units of the Eighth Air Force. Initially missions were conducted against targets such as aerodromes, railroads, and submarine pens in France until 1943, then flying missions into Germany itself. The 303d took part in the first penetration into Germany by heavy bombers of Eighth Air Force by striking the U-boat yard at Wilhelmshaven on January 27, 1943 then attacked other targets such as the ball-bearing plants at Schweinfurt, shipbuilding yards at Bremen, a synthetic rubber plant at Huls, an aircraft engine factory at Hamburg, industrial areas of Frankfurt, an airdrome at Villacoublay, and a marshalling yard at Le Mans.

The 303d received a Distinguished Unit Citation for an operation on January 11, 1944 when, in spite of continuous attacks by enemy fighters in weather that prevented effective fighter cover from reaching the group, it successfully struck an aircraft assembly plant at Oschersleben.

The group attacked gun emplacements and bridges in the Pas de Calais area during the invasion of Normandy in June 1944; bombed enemy troops to support the breakthrough at St Lo in July 1944. It struck airfields, oil depots, and other targets during the Battle of the Bulge, and bombed military installations in the Wesel area to aid the Allied assault across the Rhine in March 1945.

The last mission for the 303d was flown on April 25 1945. when it attacked an armament works in Pilsen. During its combat tour the group flew 364 missions comprising 10,271 sorties, dropped 26,346 tons of bombs and shot down 378 enemy aircraft with another 104 probables. The group also saw 817 of its men killed in action with another 754 becoming prisoners of war.

On May 31 1945, the 303d Bomb Group left Molesworth, moving to Casablanca, French Morocco.

Legacy

The 303d Bomb Group was deactivated in Morocco on July 23 1945. Personnel demobilized and the B-17 aircraft sent to storage.

Redesignated 303d Bombardment Group (Very Heavy). Activated at Andrews Field Maryland 1 July 1947. Assigned to Strategic Air Command. There is no evidence that the group was manned during 1947 and 1948. Inactivated on 6 September 1948.

The United States Air Force 303d Bombardment Wing, Medium was organized and activated on 4 September 1951 at Davis-Monthan AFB Arizona. Manned and equipped with Boeing B-29 "Superfortresses". The wing was bestowed the honors and history of the USAAF 303d Bombardment Group in 1952. Reequipped with Boeing B-47 "Stratojet" 1953. Trained for strategic bombardment and air refueling operations to meet SAC's global commitments. Discontinued, and inactivated, on 15 June 1964.

The Cold War

On July 1 1945 the Americans turned the station back to the RAF, who quickly chose it to be a training base for their new jet aircraft. The first jet unit, 1335 Conversion Unit, arrived on July 27, flying Gloster Meteor IIIs. It would be joined over the next year by several transient aircraft detachments and units.

On October 10 1946, 1335 Conversion Unit moved from RAF Molesworth. The base was then inactivated and placed in a 'care and maintenance' status.

As the Cold War increased in intensity, the US Air Force began looking to expand in Western Europe. RAF Molesworth was chosen in 1951 to become home to the 582d Air Resupply Group. The station was enlarged with main runway extensions and modern facilities. After much runway work by the 801st Engineer Battalion, the group moved from Great Falls, Montana to the base in February 1954.

HU-16 Albatross of the 582d Air Resupply Group - 25 Oct 1955

Although the unit was identified as an Air Resupply Group, equipped with twelve B-29s, four Grumman HU-16 Albatross, Amphibians, three C-119 Flying Boxcars (able to use RATO gear) and a C-47. The unit's name was deliberately misleading, as the mission of the 582d was search and rescue of reconnaissance aircraft forced down over Soviet occupied territory.

During 1956 the 86th Bomb Squadron from RAF Alconbury deployed to Molesworth with B-45 Tornadoes while the runway at Alconbury was being repaired and resurfaced. Also WB-50 weather reconnaissance aircraft from the 53rd Weather Recon Squadron arrived from RAF Burtonwood.

On October 25 1956 the 582d was redesignated the 42d Troop Carrier Squadron. which was directly controlled by Third Air Force. The 42d flew HU-16s, C-47s, C-119s and C-54 Douglas Skymaster cargo transport aircraft from Molesworth until May 3 1957 when it moved 13 miles up the road to RAF Alconbury. However the squadron had a short life at Alconbury and was deactivated on December 8 1957. The C-54's and C-47's were sent to Rhein-Main Air Base West Germany, and the C-119s were sent to the 322nd Air Division at Evreux-Fauville Air Base France.

The 60s, 70s and early 80s: Decreasing use

With the departure of the 42d TCS, the WB-50s of the 53d Weather Recon Squadron was the sole operational tenant at Molesworth, until departing for Alconbury on April 26 1959. After the 53d left, Molesworth was put into a standby status, with the occasional aircraft using the base. In 1973 the airfield was officially closed.

Little work was done on the base until 1980, with the buildings and hangars being used only by USAF ground units for military storage and as a site for the auction of surplus stores. Molesworth did serve as an American education centre, with an elementary and junior high/high school offering grades 1 - 6 and 7 - 10 respectfully, for dependants of servicemen and women from nearby bases including RAF Chicksands, RAF Chelveston and RAF Alconbury.

In the early 1980s, RAF Molesworth was chosen to become a base for the US Air Force's mobile nuclear armed Ground Launched Cruise Missiles or GLCMs (although the majority of GLCMs were deployed at RAF Greenham Common).

Beginning in 1980 the ARC Eastern Region with the approval of the Ministry of Defence, began a two-year demolition project at Molesworth, razing of many deteriorating buildings and the removal of the wartime and early cold war runways and other unused structures. By 1983, the only remaining structures were a small arms firing range, used by USAF personnel for target practice, a compound for surplus and obsolete USAF vehicles manned by civilian USAF employees, a derelict watchtower on the western perimeter of the base, and a warehouse. The base was unfenced and openly accessible to all. Local farmers grazed sheep on wired-off sections where the runway had formerly been, a solitary pest controller known locally as John the Rabbit-Catcher lived in a caravan just outside the former site of the north-west gate, and local people practised for their driving tests on the remaining concrete road surfaces.

The mid-80's: Anti-nuclear protests

The decision to base 64 GLCMs at Molesworth made the base a focus of protest. On December 28, 1981, members of the Fellowship of Reconciliation on a pilgrimage from Iona Abbey to Canterbury Cathedral established a Peace Camp at the south-east gate of the base for the purpose of permanent witness and protest against the planned deployment. Unlike its forerunner and inspiration Greenham Common Women's Peace Camp, Molesworth People's Peace Camp included men as well as women. The Christian (particularly Quaker) presence at the Camp remained constant throughout its existence, and was soon supplemented by people of many other faiths (particularly neo-paganism) and none, and by people of various leftist and counter-cultural persuasions. The camp became a link in a Europe-wide network of centres for non-violent direct action in opposition to NATO's plans to deploy Pershing II and GLCM missiles. In spite of deliberately provocative activity by camp residents, including numerous trespasses onto the base, there was little in the way of direct confrontation between protesters and the very few military service personnel who used the base during the first three years of its existence.

In the summer of 1983, the original Peace Camp's small collection of caravans and buses was evicted from the land adjoining RAF Molesworth's south-east gate. Its small wood-framed multi-faith peace chapel, Eirene (Greek for "Peace"), was demolished. A small band of determined and hardy protesters remained there in defiance of the eviction order, living in tents and hand-made temporary structures. A new Eirene was built from planks and polythene sheeting.

The evicted vehicles relocated on a bridleway to the west of the base. It turned out that not only was this bridleway the border between Cambridgeshire and Northamptonshire, but the border actually crossed from one side of the track to the other halfway along its length, right in the middle of the new site. This confused the issue of legal ownership so that no attempt was ever made to evict the protesters there.

One of the protesters who moved to the new site, an ex-RAF serviceman named Chris Noone, put in many months of hard physical labour to build a large rockery at the original site using the rubble from the ripped-up runway. He had been present at the British nuclear tests at Christmas Island in the 1950s and had suffered from radiation sickness for 15 years. This place of reflection and memory became known as "Peace Corner". An American protester added to it with a memorial to US military personnel who fell victim to the USAF's indiscriminate use of the toxic Agent Orange defoliant in Vietnam.

In the autumn of 1983, protesters planted a crop of winter wheat inside the disused base for the benefit of those starving in Ethiopia. This was several months before Michael Buerk's historic broadcasts broke the story to the wider world. At the same time, a much more solid and permanent peace chapel, also called Eirene, was built just inside the base perimeter, next to the wheat crop, again using rubble from the base.

In August 1984 The Molesworth Green Gathering took place inside the base. As an act of defiance of NATO nuclear policy, a radical section of the British Green movement decided to conscientiously break the law of trespass and peacefully occupied the south-east part of the interior of the disused base. A weeks-long gathering, more festival than conference, developed first into The Green Village, then into Rainbow Fields Village after the arrival of the Peace Convoy following its eviction from Nostell Priory in Yorkshire. By January 1985 the population of the village rose to more than 200, including a Brahman bull called Dharma Raj.

On February 6, 1985, 1500 police and troops were deployed to the site to secure the base for the MOD. This was the single largest mobilisation of police and troops since the war. For the Royal Engineers it was their largest operation since the bridging of The Rhine in 1944.

Following the eviction of Rainbow Village, Molesworth was the focus of large anti-nuclear protests at Easter 1985 and February 1986, during one of which Bruce Kent, one of the leaders of CND, symbolically attempted to cut through the fence in full view of the police. A dedicated protest presence remained outside the base well into the 1990s.

On December 12 1986 the 303d Tactical Missile Wing was activated. However, the missiles and the wing did not stay long. The United States and the Soviet Union signed the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty in 1987 which led to the removal of all nuclear missiles from the base by October 1988. The 303d TMW deactivated on January 30 1989.

Once again, the fate of RAF Molesworth was uncertain. However, on 11 January 1990 the RAF announced new construction would begin later that year to house the US European Command's new intelligence analysis center. This facility would become known as the Joint Analysis Center (JAC).

The role of the JAC is to process and analyze military information from a variety of sources for the benefit of the United States and NATO. Responsibility consists of eighty-three countries across Europe, Africa and the Middle East. The JAC reports to the Director of Intelligence (J2), Headquarters, United States European Command, in Stuttgart-Valhingen, Germany.

Current status

File:423ABG-Emblem.png

The current host unit for RAF Molesworth is the 423d Air Base Group (ABG), headquartered at nearby RAF Alconbury. Molesworth employs over 750 personnel to include US and foreign military as well as US and British civilians. Because of past gaps in operations and demolishing of buildings and infrastructure, RAF Molesworth contains very limited support operations. As such, it relies solely upon the 423d ABG for all non-JAC related support functions like dining facilities, postal services, banking and telecommunications connectivity.

With the end of the Cold War, the JAC found it necessary to redefine itself in a new era. During the 1990s and into the 21st Century the JAC has provided intelligence support for US and NATO missions in the Middle East and the Balkans while also providing global assistance in the War on Terrorism.

With flight operations at RAF Alconbury ceasing in 1995, the JAC became the only organization supported by the 423d ABG. Should the JAC close or move to another base, the 423d ABG would no longer be needed and RAF Molesworth would most certainly be declared excess along with RAF Alconbury and RAF Upwood. However, with the NATO announcement in January 2006 of their plan to open their own intelligence centre at the base it is unlikely that it will close any time in the near future.

Although the nuclear missiles have been gone for almost two decades, the infrastructure (storage bunkers, launch tower, machine guns pits, and such) is still intact and offers a unique reminder of the Cold War. Additionally, a monument to the 303d BG resides just inside the main entrance to the base and is accessible to the public.

Trivia

• Bob Hope entertained base personnel on July 6 1943.
• American journalist and news correspondent Walter Cronkite flew on a 303rd BG mission while reporting the war.
• American servicemen from RAF Molesworth married more English women during World War II than servicemen from any other American base in England.
• Two Type-Two hangars and one J-Type hangar are the only surviving remnants of the World War II era.
• A six-story air traffic control tower was built during the late 1950s but was never used and razed several years later.
• The original name of the Joint Analysis Center was supposed to be Joint Intelligence Center. Then UK Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher objected to the name and it was changed.

See also

• List of RAF stations
• United States Air Forces in Europe
• United States Air Force in the United Kingdom
• USAAF Eighth Air Force - World War II

References

• Ravenstein, Charles A., Air Force Combat Wings Lineage and Honors Histories 1947-1977, Office of Air Force History, 1984

• Endicott, Judy G., USAF Active Flying, Space, and Missile Squadrons as of 1 October 1995. Office of Air Force History

• USAAS-USAAC-USAAF-USAF Aircraft Serial Numbers--1908 to present

External links

• Heritage of the 303rd
• The short happy life of the Glick-em
• Airfield Focus 40: Molesworth. Author: John N. Smith. Publisher: GMS Enterprises
• RAF Molesworth entry at GlobalSecurity.org
• Official Web Site of the Eighth Air Force
• Bomb Groups of the Eighth Air Force
• UPI article on NATO opening intel center at RAF Molesworth
• Molesworth at Controltowers.co.uk
• 303d Bomb Group Website
• M&C article on NATO opening intel center at RAF Molesworth
• Aerial Photo From Multimap.Com