There, it replaced the 1st Aero Squadron, whose members were sent to Columbus Airfield, New Mexico as part of the Punitive expedition against Pancho Villa.

[2] In December 1916, Congress authorized the lease of a 700-acre tract of land seven miles south of San Antonio, Texas for a new airfield to accommodate the rapidly expanding Aviation Section of the Signal Corps.

By March 1917, men from the 3rd Aero Squadron were hard at work clearing the cotton plants from the land and laying foundations for hangars and mess halls at what would become Kelly Field.

[3] On 29 August 1917 the 3rd Aero Squadron left Kelly Field for Fort Sill, Oklahoma with 12 Curtiss R4 airplanes under the command of a Captain Weir to establish a new training airfield.

After being organized, the squadron was transferred by train to San Francisco, California, where it boarded a ship bound for Manila, in the Philippine Islands, arriving on 18 August.

In the Philippines, the squadron received a wide variety of second-line hand-me-down aircraft transferred from units in the United States during the austere years of Air Corps procurement during the 1920s and 1930s[6] As a result of the rising tensions with the Japanese Empire in 1940, the defenses of the Philippines were judged to be abysmal, and a reinforcement effort was made to defend the islands against any Japanese aggression.

These obsolete aircraft were replaced in early 1941 with impressed export versions of the Seversky P-35 being designated EP-106 by the company that were manufactured for the Swedish Air Force.

On 24 October 1940, President Franklin Roosevelt signed an executive order requisitioning all the undelivered EP-106 aircraft and impressing them into the USAAC.

[6] On 1 September 1941, the squadron was moved to the new Iba Airfield, in an effort to disperse the fighter strength of the 4th Composite Group.

[8] The first word of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor was received by commercial radio between 0300 and 0330 hours local on 8 December 1941 in the Philippines.

Within 30 minutes radar at Iba Field, Luzon plotted a formation of airplanes 75-miles (120-km) offshore, heading for Corregidor Island.

By 1130 hours, the fighters sent into the air earlier landed for refueling, and radar disclosed another flight of Japanese aircraft 70-miles (112-km) West of Lingayen Gulf, headed south.

The P-40's sent on patrol over the South China Sea returned to Iba with fuel running low at the beginning of a Japanese attack on the airfield.

On 9 December, the 3rd Pursuit Squadron was ordered to move to Nichols Field, to provide air defense of the Manila area.

[6][8] With no supplies or replacements available from the United States, ground crews, with little or no spares for repairing aircraft, used parts which were cannibalized from wrecks.

[6][8] With the surrender of the United States Army on Bataan, Philippines on 8 April 1942, the remainder of the 24th Pursuit Group withdrew to Mindanao Island and began operating from Del Monte Airfield with whatever aircraft were remaining.

[1] 3rd TFS aircraft engaged in combat operations over Cambodia and Laos during the spring and summer of 1973, supporting friendly western governments in those nations against Communist aggression.

[9][10] With the end of active combat in Indochina, in March 1974, the 354th transferred several more aircraft to the 3rd TFS prior to its return to Myrtle Beach AFB.

"Commando Scrimmage" covered skills such as dog fighting, aerial refueling, airborne command posts and forward air controllers.

These missions were flown as a deterrent to the Communists in Vietnam as a signal that if the Paris Peace Accords were broken, the United States would use its airpower to enforce its provisions.

[10] The USAF presence at Korat RTAFB ended in 1975, and on 15 December, the 3rd TFS was transferred to Clark Air Base, Philippines, replacing the 68th Tactical Fighter Squadron, which had been inactivated earlier.