16th Air Expeditionary Wing

16th Air Expeditionary Wing
Active	1944-1946 2001-Present
Country	United States
Branch	United States Air Force
Part of	United States Air Forces in Europe
Garrison/HQ	Aviano AB, Italy

Two F-16s from Aviano Air Base, Italy, drop away from the fuel boom after gassing up from a KC-135 Stratotanker over the Adriatic Sea. The jets were refueled by the New Jersey Air National Guard's 108th Air Refueling Wing, McGuire Air Force Base, N.J. The 108th ARW is part of the 16th Expeditionary Operations Group, a small U.S. Air Force detachment located on this French air base. The 16th Expeditionary Operations Group is a unit of the 16th Air Expeditionary Wing, U.S. Air Forces in Europe..

The United States Air Force's 16th Air Expeditionary Wing is an Air Expeditionary unit of the United States Air Forces in Europe as part of the Global War on Terrorism.

The current status of the 16th AEW is not disclosed by the USAF. The task of developing a comprehensive listing of Air Expeditionary units present in Southwest Asia and other combat areas is particularly difficult as the events of 11 September 2001 and the Global War on Terrorism has made such an effort significantly difficult. The USAF seeks to improve operational security (OPSEC) and to deceive potential enemies as to the extent of American operations, therefore a listing of which units deploying where and when is unavailable

Mission

The 16th AEW was activated under temporary orders for a specific purpose or mission. Once the subject mission is completed, the 16th AEW will be inactivated.

Units

It is believed that the unit is located at Aviano AB, Italy. It may operate expeditionary sites at Camp Bondsteel, Kosovo; Camp Able Sentry, The Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia; Sarajevo and Tuzla AB, Bosnia-Herzegovina; Taszar AB, Hungary; Zagreb, Croatia and Naval Air Station Sigonella and San Vito Air Station, Italy; in addition to a contingency processing center at Rhein-Main AB, Germany.

• 16th Expeditionary Operations Group, Istres AB
• 401st Expeditionary Air Base Group, Tuzla AB
• 406th Expeditionary Air Base Group, Taszar AB
• 620th Expeditionary Air Base Group, Camp Able Sentry
• 2nd Expeditionary Air Support Operations Squadron, Camp Bondsteel
• 16th Expeditionary Air Support Operations Group, Sarajevo
• 16th Expeditionary Support Squadron, Rhein-Main AB
• 99th Expeditionary Reconnaissance Squadron, NAS Sigonella
• 775th Expeditionary Support Squadron, San Vito AS

Weapons Systems Operated

• Boeing KC-135E/R Stratotanker
• General Atomics MQ-1A Predator UAV
• Lockheed U-2R
• General Dynamics F-16 Flying Falcon

History

World War II

Operational Units

• 15th Bombardment Squadron 1944-1946
• 16th Bombardment Squadron 1944-1946
• 17th Bombardment Squadron 1944-1946
• 21st Bombardment Squadron 1944

Aircraft Flown

• Boeing B-29 Superfortress

Stations Assigned

• Dalhart AAFld, TX 1 Apr 1944
• Fairmont AAFld, NE 15 Aug 1944-7 Mar 1945
• Northwest Field, Guam 14 Apr 1945-15 Apr 1946

Constituted as 16th Bombardment Group (Very Heavy) on 28 Mar 1944. Activated on 1 Apr 1944. Trained for combat with B-29's.

Moved to Guam, Mar-Apr 1945, and assigned to Twentieth AF. Entered combat on 16 Jun 1945 with a bombing raid against an airfield on Moen. Flew first mission against the Japanese home islands on 26 Jun 1945 and afterwards operated principally against the enemy's petroleum industry. Flying unescorted in the face of severe enemy attack, the 16th bombed the oil refinery at Shimotsu, the Mitsubishi refinery and oil installations at Kawasaki, and the coal liquefaction plants at Ube, Jul-Aug 1945, and was awarded a DUC for the missions.

After the war the group dropped food and supplies to Allied prisoners of war in Japan, Manchuria, and Korea, and participated in several show-of-force missions over Japan.

Inactivated on Guam on 15 Apr 1946.

Cold War

During the Cold War, the 16th Bombardment Training Wing was authorized by Strategic Air Command on 31 Jul 1985, but was never activated.

External links

• 16th AEW Globalsecurity.org