Eleventh Air Force

History

The Eleventh Air Force (11 AF) is a Numbered Air Force of the United States Air Force Pacific Air Forces (PACAF). It is headquartered at Joint Base Elmendorf–Richardson, Alaska.

11 AF plans, conducts, controls and coordinates air operations in accordance with the tasks assigned by the commander, Pacific Air Forces, and is the force provider for Alaskan Command, the Alaska North American Aerospace Defense Command Region and other unified commanders. The Commander, Eleventh Air Force, also serves as Commander, Alaskan Command, and as commander of the Alaskan North American Aerospace Defense Command Region. The NORAD mission is accomplished largely through the PACAF Regional Support Center (PRSC), the 611th Air and Space Operations Center, and units of the Alaska Air National Guard (AK ANG). Together, they carry out air surveillance, and command and control forces that provide tactical warning and attack assessment in defense of Alaska.

Established on 28 December 1941 as the Alaskan Air Force at Elmendorf Field, Alaska Territory. it was initially part of the United States Army Air Forces. It provided air defense of Alaska during World War II and fought in the Aleutian Islands Campaign. It was re-designated as the Alaskan Air Command in late 1945, and became responsible for the air defense of Alaska. With the collapse of the Soviet Union, it was transferred to the control of PACAF in 1990 and reduced to the status of a Numbered Air Force.

Text from Wikipedia: Eleventh Air Force, CC BY-SA 4.0, lightly trimmed.

Key dates

1. 1920
   Military aircraft began flying in Alaska in 1920 when the Black Wolf Squadron, or The Alaska Flying Expedition, made The New York to Nome Flight.
2. 1935
   It was named after Major Arthur K. Ladd, killed in a flying accident near Dale, South Carolina on 13 December 1935.
3. 1940
   The first "troops" of the Alaskan Air Force advance echelon to arrive in Alaska included a six-year-old Martin B-10 on 12 August 1940.
4. 1943
   On 11 January 1943, American Army troops went ashore on the unoccupied Amchitka Island, barely 75 statute miles from Kiska, and a month later, on 16 February, the first aircraft, a P-38 and a P-40, landed on Amchitka Army Airfield, a quickly-built airstrip.
5. 1944
   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).
6. 1945
   U.S. military maintained interest in these plans when they ordered the expansion of bases in the western Aleutian Islands, and major construction began on Shemya for a possible invasion of Japan via the Northern route in 1945.
7. 1945
   Under the USAAF, it was re-designated as Alaskan Air Command' on 18 December 1945, without any change in headquarters location.
8. 1992
   The 11th Air Force was reorganized as an objective Numbered Air Force during 1992–1993 and its headquarters reduced to only 100 authorizations.
9. 1998
   Air Force personnel in Alaska were also integrated into the Air and Space Expeditionary Force deployment cycles, from the program's formal launch in 1998.

Dates and events quoted from the same Wikipedia article (CC BY-SA 4.0).

Records that place someone with this unit

A unit history doesn't name everyone who served. These records do:

• Morning reports (include Army Air Forces units)
• Search Army and AAF morning reports, 1912–1946 (National Archives Catalog)
• Air Force organizational records and lineage (AFHRA)

More history

• Air Force Historical Research Agency
• Wikipedia: Eleventh Air Force