[8] GHQ AF organized 5th Air Support Command at Bowman Field, Kentucky in September 1941, drawing its personnel and equipment from the 16th Bombardment Wing, which was simultaneously inactivated.

HALPRO was quickly diverted from its original mission to a new one—interdictory raids from airfields in Egypt against shipping and North African ports supporting Axis operations.

[10] On 28 June 1942, Major General Lewis H. Brereton arrived at Cairo to command the U.S. Army Middle East Air Force (USAMEAF), which was activated immediately.

Several USAAF units were sent to join USAMEAF during next weeks in the destruction of Rommel's Afrika Korps by support to ground troops and secure sea and air communications in the Mediterranean.

Wigglesworth was authorized by Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur Tedder to select targets for all U.S. heavy bombers.

"A development of some importance in the career of USAMEAF manifested itself administratively on 12 October (1942) when orders were cut assigning nine officers to the IX Bomber Command, which organization was then and for a month afterwards unofficial.

Subsequent negotiations carried the point with the British, who even turned over their 160 Squadron (Liberators) to the operational control of IX Bomber Command.

On 12 October a small staff moved into Grey Pillars [RAF headquarters in Garden City, Cairo[11]], and thenceforth USAMEAF's bombers operated only under the "strategic" direction of the British.

"—The Army Air Forces in World War II[12]In the Second Battle of El Alamein under General Bernard Montgomery attacks by British troops depleted the Axis tanks and Field Marshal Erwin Rommel began the withdrawal from Egypti.

Other targets attacked were shipping and harbor installations in Libya, Tunisia, Sicily, Italy, Crete, and Greece to cut enemy supply lines to Africa.

In February 1943, after the Afrika Korps had been driven into Tunisia, the Germans took the offensive and pushed through the Kasserine Pass before being stopped with the help of both Ninth and Twelfth Air Force units in the battle.

NATAF was one of the three major sub-commands of the Northwest African Air Forces (NAAF) under Lieutenant General Carl Spaatz.

Ninth Air Force groups attacked airfields and rail facilities in Sicily and took part in Operation Husky, carried paratroopers, and flew reinforcements to ground units on the island.

During the winter of 1943–1944 Ninth Air Force expanded at an extraordinary rate, so that by the end of May, its complement ran to 45 flying groups operating some 5,000 aircraft.

Operational missions involved attacks on rail marshaling yards, railroads, airfields, industrial plants, military installations, and other enemy targets in France, Belgium, and the Netherlands.

The groups assigned were a mixture of experience, but training would be needed to confront the expected massive movements of troops of the 82nd and 101st Airborne Divisions.

[19] Between 1 May and the invasion on 6 June, the Ninth flew approximately 35,000 sorties, attacking targets such as airfields, railroad yards, and coastal gun positions.

Because of their short range, operational combat units would have to move to quickly prepared bases close to the front as soon as the Allied ground forces advanced.

Ninth Air Force groups made numerous moves within France, the Low Countries and western Germany to keep within range of the advancing battle front before the end of hostilities in May 1945.

As part of Operation Market-Garden, the Ninth Air Force transferred its entire IX Troop Carrier Command with its fourteen C-47 groups to the 1st Allied Airborne Army in September 1944.

Those troop carrier groups flew many of the C-47s and towed CG-4 Waco gliders for the Allied airborne unit drops—Operation Market Garden—to take the bridges northwest of Eindhoven at Son (mun.

In December 1944 through January 1945, Ninth Air Force fighters and bombers were critical in defeating the Wehrmacht during the Battle of the Bulge.

Others were assigned to the new United States Air Forces in Europe and were moved to captured Luftwaffe airfields to perform occupation duties.

Finally, with the mission completed, on 2 December 1945 the Ninth Air Force was inactivated at USAFE Headquarters at Wiesbaden Germany.

During these NATO deployments, exercises with Army infantry and armored units were conducted to enhance the Close Air Support role in Europe.

From 1991, the 4404th Composite Wing (Provisional) served as a forward force, for most of that period flying from King Abdul Aziz AB, Saudi Arabia.

During this "phony war," American pilots gained invaluable experience in air-to-ground tactics that could not be duplicated in practice missions back at home.

The dangers of the Air Force's new role were highlighted when the expeditionary wing lost its first female member in the line of duty in Iraq.

A1C Elizabeth Jacobson, 21, was killed in a roadside bombing while performing convoy security near the U.S. detention center at Camp Bucca in southern Iraq."

The Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps flew thousands of missions in support of U.S. ground troops in Iraq this fall, including attacks by unmanned Predator aircraft armed with Hellfire missiles, military records show.