USAFE-AFAFRICA plans, conducts, controls, coordinates and supports air and space operations in Europe, parts of Asia and all of Africa with the exception of Egypt to achieve U.S. national and NATO objectives based on taskings by the two combatant commanders.

On 15 June, Spaatz arrived in England to establish Headquarters, Eighth Air Force at Bushy Park, 15 miles (24 km) west-south-west of London.

A major postwar mission for USAFE was Operation Lusty, in which former Luftwaffe jet aircraft, such as the Messerschmitt Me 262A and Heinkel He 162A were located on various airfields around Munich and shipped to the United States for inspection and evaluation.

EATS operated both cargo and personnel transport routes in non-Communist controlled areas to support the American, British and French occupation forces, along with units in Greece (Athens Airport) and Italy.

There were also EATS terminals and detachments at Tempelhof Airport, West Berlin, RAF Bovingdon, Hertfordshire, UK, and Paris-Orly Airfield, France.

In preparation for the future, the British Royal Air Force (RAF) and USAFE began a series of mapping flights over Soviet-controlled territory in Germany that led to numerous skirmishes and high tensions.

Between the autumn of 1945 and 1947, mapped areas in west and central Europe, North Africa and the Atlantic Islands on a large scale in Operation Casey Jones.

In Germany, Fürstenfeldbruck Air Base near Munich, Giebelstadt near Würzburg, and Rhein-Main near Frankfurt were rebuilt to accommodate Boeing B-29 Superfortress bombers.

In response to the currency reform action by the West, on 23 June the Soviets cut off electrical power to a large part of the western sectors of Berlin.

Yet it would take many hundreds of cargo flights each day to provide the 12,000 tons of food, fuel, clothing and medicine it was estimated was necessary to sustain the two million people of western Berlin.

By the spring of 1949, USAFE announced that there were incidents of Soviets firing at cargo aircraft with anti-aircraft artillery, and of barrage balloons being allowed to float within the corridors.

[12] Even with the Korean War raging in the early 1950s, Europe received a higher priority of air power than Korea by the Truman Administration and the Department of Defense.

However, Air Materiel Command finally attained global responsibility for USAF logistics support, and AMF, European Area was transferred to it on 1 January 1956.

When the Western allies objected to this proposed peace treaty, Khrushchev began speaking about restricting the West's aerial access to Berlin and preventing the entry of East Germans into the city.

On the night of 12 August 1961 the Soviet backed East German government began erecting the Berlin Wall to prevent this flow of workers from communism, precipitating a new Cold War crisis that had been brewing for the previous twelve months.

Tack Hammer and Stair Step forces had served their purpose; their rapid deployment to France had unequivocally demonstrated the United States' determination to defend Berlin.

Older reconnaissance and fighter aircraft were redeployed from France to Southeast Asia to supplement the U.S. Pacific Air Forces engaged in the Vietnam War.

Yet it was primarily the good weather that drew USAFE to Spain for weapons training, which at that time was still mainly held in Libya utilizing the ranges at Wheelus Air Base.

As compensation for the permanent use of these Spanish bases, the CASA aircraft factory at Morón AB was brought in to maintain the F-102A air defense fighters that the USAFE had stationed in Spain, Germany and the Netherlands.

As the American-Libyan relationship worsened throughout the second half of the 1960s, a growing number of USAFE fighter-bomber squadrons in England and Germany went to Zaragoza and gunnery ranges in Spain for weapons training.

In Ankara, the 7217th Air Base Group managed the logistical support for more than 40 units and agencies, as well as the needs of the American Embassy and U.S. Defense Attaché Office.

NATO carried out its plans to station cruise missiles in Europe despite strong protests from the peace movements and heavy diplomatic pressure in the European Parliament.

The historic Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, ratified in 1988, mandated the first-ever elimination of an entire class of weapons from U.S. and Soviet inventories.

The end of the Cold War saw a clamoring for a "peace dividend", and questions from many U.S. and Western European officials about the appropriate size and purpose of American military forces in Europe.

In July 1994, with President Clinton in attendance, the British, French, and American air and land forces in Berlin were inactivated in a ceremony on the Four Ring Parade field at Tempelhof Central Airport.

From December 1998 to March 1999, U.S. and coalition aircraft over northern Iraq came under almost daily fire from Iraqi surface-to-air missile sites and anti-aircraft guns.

[21] During the first months of 1999, Coalition activity over northern Iraq was temporarily halted as aircraft were moved to Italy to take part in Operation Allied Force.

[25] USAFE airmen are engaged in a wide range of active U.S. military efforts in Europe and Africa, including realistic U.S. and NATO exercises and operations in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Somalia.

The 449th Air Expeditionary Group (449 AEG) at Camp Lemonnier, Djibouti flies a multitude of missions for Combined Joint Task Force – Horn of Africa (CJTF-HOA).

[32] The 409th Air Expeditionary Group (409 AEG) carries out surveillance and reconnaissance missions across the entire Africa Command area of responsibility, from multiple locations.