The Polish Air Force can trace its origins to the second half of 1917 and was officially established in the months following the end of World War I in 1918.

Military aviation in Poland started even before the officially recognised date of regaining independence (11 November 1918).

[2] When the Russian Revolution began and the tsardom gradually lost control of the country, Polish pilots took advantage of the chaos and formed spontaneous aerial units in areas of present-day Belarus, south Ukraine, and by the Kuban river.

[7] Poland was under German and Austro-Hungarian occupation until the armistice, but the Poles started to take control as the Central Powers collapsed.

Initially, the Polish air force consisted of mostly German and Austrian aircraft, left by former occupiers or captured from them, mostly during the Greater Poland Uprising.

These planes were first used by the Polish Air Force in the Polish-Ukrainian War in late 1918, during combat operations centered around the city of Lwów (now Lviv).

[8] On 2 November 1918 pilot Stefan Bastyr performed the first combat flight of Polish aircraft from Lwów.

[9] When the Polish-Soviet War broke out in February 1920, the Polish Air Force used a variety of former German and Austro-Hungarian, as well as newly acquired western-made Allied aircraft.

In 1933, Zygmunt Pulawski's first high wing, all-metal aircraft, the PZL P.7a, was designed and produced, with 150 entering service.

[8] As far as bombers are concerned, the Potez 25 and Breguet 19 were replaced by an all-metal monoplane, the PZL.23 Karaś, with 250 built from 1936 onwards, but by 1939 the Karas was outdated.

In 1938 the Polish factory PZL designed a modern twin-engine medium bomber, the PZL.37 Łoś (Elk).

As an observation and close reconnaissance plane, Polish escadres used the slow and easily damaged Lublin R-XIII, and later the RWD-14 Czapla.

On 1 September 1939, at the beginning of the invasion of Poland, all the Polish combat aircraft had been dispersed to secondary airfields, contrary to a commonly-held belief, based on German propaganda, that they had all been destroyed by bombing at their airbases.

Part of the Polish Air Force was destroyed in the campaign; the surviving aircraft were either captured or withdrawn to Romania, Hungary, Lithuania, Latvia, Slovenia or Sweden, whose air forces subsequently employed these aircraft for their own use (in the case of Romania until 1956).

The ship SS Lassell with 14 Hawker Hurricanes on board left Liverpool on 28 August 1939, deliveries from France were also on way when the conflict broke out.

[13] In 2002, the F-16C/D Block 52+ from the American company Lockheed Martin was chosen as a new multirole fighter for the WLiOP, the first deliveries taking place in November 2006 and continued until 2008 under Peace Sky program.

All Polish F-16s can carry modern US precision ordnance, ranging from the JDAM/JSOW to the latest in export-certificate-authorized air-to-air weaponry (including the AIM-120C-5 and AIM-9X).

In the aftermath of the presidential Tu-154 crash in 2010 and later Polish-led investigation, the 36th Special Aviation Regiment, responsible for transporting the President and the Polish Government, was disbanded, while the defense minister resigned.

Between June 2010 and December 2017 most official flights were served by two leased Embraer E-175 operated by the LOT Polish Airlines.

[18] On 27 February 2014 Poland signed a €280 million contract with Alenia Aermacchi for 8 M-346 Master advanced training jets.

[21][22] On 11 December 2014 Polish officials signed a contract with the United States for the purchase of 70 AGM-158 Joint Air to Surface Stand off Missile, for US$250 million.

[24] On 11 September 2019, the Department of Defense Security Cooperation Agency announced that Poland had been cleared to purchase 32 F-35A fighters, along with associated equipment, for an estimated cost of $6.5 billion.

The badge is called gapa and represents silver eagle in flight with gold laurel wreath in the bill.

The gapa is worn in the usual place on the upper left breast above the pocket, but unlike other air forces it is suspended on a chain.