A-10s over Kosovo (illustrations removed)

My memory of how the 74th FS got involved in OAF is a little hazy, but I think it all started with a planned deployment for the 81st FS to Kuwait. The boys from Spangdahlem were supposed to go down to Al Jaber AB, Kuwait, for a standard desert rotation to participate in Operation Southern Watch, also known as OSW. They were scheduled to arrive in Kuwait around late March or early April 1999, but there was a glitch in the plan.

By early March 1999, the 81st FS had been tasked to be on call for the situation that was brewing between the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY) and NATO over the disputed region of Kosovo. There was no way the squadron could be on call and still meet its OSW tasking, so reinforcements had to be brought in. This is the point in time when the 74th got involved.

I guess I’ve heard about a million reasons why the 74th FS was chosen to participate in helping the Spang guys with their predicament, but I think it all had to do with geographical location and timing. Geographically, the A-10s at Pope were the closest to Germany, and it just made sense to me that we should be going. The 75th FS, our sister squadron at Pope, had just participated in an operational readiness inspection (ORI) for our wing at Moody AFB and had been on a pretty aggressive deployment schedule prior to the ORI. I don’t think our local leadership at Pope was willing to send the 75th guys after all their recent time on the road. That left us, the 74th Flying Tigers, to foot the bill.

The plan, at least the way it was briefed to us, was for the 74th FS to fly six or eight jets over to Germany to be the “on call” guys for NATO. At this time, NATO was fairly sure that Milosevic would capitulate and comply with all its demands, just like he had done in the past when threatened with military intervention. After we arrived in Germany, the 81st would then move out to the desert for a vacation in exotic Southwest Asia. The 81st could meet its OSW obligation and we could provide immediate help for NATO if needed. This sounded like a logical solution. The hard part would be to decide who would stay home and who would go to Germany.

The “list,” as it was affectionately called, contained all the names of the individuals chosen to participate in this pop-up deployment. It was not surprising that every pilot in our squadron wanted to go. We all had visions of flying at low altitude over the entire European continent without any concerns except where we would be eating that night. I was told very early in the process that I was on the list, and I knew it would be a tough thing to relay to my wife. I imagined what her response would be. I could already hear her saying, “You’re going where? For how long? Why?” I know the list changed several times, but my name remained. I waited until I knew for sure that I was going to Germany before I broke the news to my wife. During that time, things in Kosovo had taken a bad turn. The Serbs were not going to comply with NATO’s demands, and now there would be an armed response.

Obviously, the Spang Hogs were not going to Kuwait with the current situation in eastern Europe, and their immediate priority was to support anything NATO needed. Well, the bombs started dropping on 24 March, and OAF started to take shape. We, the 74th FS, were now told that we would fly four jets over to Spangdahlem to be a “rear echelon” force. Our primary purpose would be to fly with the few pilots of the 81st who were not mission ready (MR) and upgrade them to combat status. This was not the most noble of missions when there was a war to be fought, but that is what we were ordered to do. Certainly they (whoever “they” may have been) would not let a group of fully trained, combat-ready Hog drivers sit around an empty squadron staring at each other across a mission-planning table, wondering what training profile they would fly the next day.

On Sunday, 11 April, the 74th pilots on the list were contacted and told to be ready to deploy to Germany within 48 hours. Our tasking was still a bit nebulous. We were now being told there was a distinct possibility we would be joining the Spang boys in Italy to take part in OAF. It was at this point I felt obligated to let my wife in on the news, and I searched for the right words to tell her.

My wife is always one to worry, so I kept the whole deployment possibility a secret until it became certain I was going. Looking back on it all, I wonder if I should have kept her informed as I received details of the trip to Europe. However, there was no sense getting her upset at the mere chance of going on this thing, and I would do it the same way if I had to do it again.