WWIII Aircraft Losses: 4 ATAF, Central Front D+0 (9 July, 1987) Part III

WWIII Aircraft Losses: 4 ATAF, Central Front D+0 (9 July, 1987)  Part III The third part of 4 ATAF losses on D+0 will cover the remainder of USAFE assets based in the Federal Republic on the first morning of war. Canadian and West German squadron losses will also be looked at in the next entry. …

WWIII Aircraft Losses: 4 ATAF, Central Front D+0 (9 July, 1987) Part I

WWIII Aircraft Losses: 4 ATAF, Central Front D+0 (9 July, 1987)  Part I We are moving south from 2 ATAF into the operating area of its sister allied air force. The first day of war presented different opportunities and challenges for 4 ATAF. Its airbases and other facilities did not receive even half of the …

Memories of WWIII: Destination Bitburg Part III

Lieutenant Colonel Franklin Andrew Baker, USAF (Ret.)- “The next morning, Drool (Major Ed Leahy, 27fth TFS operations officer) and I hit the ground running. By first light Drool was busy working out air plans with the Bitburg wing staff and contemporaries from our sister squadrons there. For most of the morning on 5 July, I …

Holiday Wargaming Patchwork 2022

The Christmas season always provides me the opportunity to catch up with wargaming odds and ends. Whether it be a forlorn examination of all the tabletop titles I’ve purchased in the previous year and haven’t taken out of the box yet, or selecting a PC game and making an empty promise to dedicate 12 straight …

Memories of WWIII: Destination Bitburg Part II

Lieutenant Colonel Franklin Andrew Baker, USAF (Ret.)- “We touched down at Bitburg in the early afternoon of July 4th. Independence Day and a Saturday, though my first impression of the airbase revealed signs of neither. The airbase was a madhouse of activity and drove home how seriously USAFE was taking this crisis. To be frank, …

D+18 0000-0400 Zulu 27 July, 1987 Part II

Central Front Freden, FRG, 0000 Zulu, 27 July, 1987 (0200 local time) 1st Brigade/1st Cavalry Division’s crossing of the Leine was underway in earnest by 0200 hours. At Freden and Greene, 2nd Brigade’s battalions had the bridgeheads secure and pushed out 8 kilometers east of the river to give 1st Brigade a buffer against potential …

The Central Front D+2 (11 July, 1987) Part IV

CENTAG’s commander General Glenn Otis, US Army, found himself far more optimistic than his Soviet counterparts on the morning of D+2. The major attacks that were launched against his front on D+1 had all been defeated or contained. The US V and VII Corps stood practically in the same places they had twenty-four hours ago. …