On This Day in History

1994: Two 56th Rescue Squadron helicopter crews from Keflavik AB save eight Dutch mariners from a sinking vessel near the coast of Iceland.

  1944: MEDAL OF HONOR. Brig Gen Frederick W. Castle leads some 2,000 heavy bombers against German airfields. On the way an engine fails, and his unescorted B-17 becomes a target to enemy fighters. After

  1965: Operation BLUE LIGHT. Through 23 January, the Military Airlift Command transports the 3d Brigade, 25th Infantry Division, from Hawaii to Pleiku, South Vietnam, to offset communist forces in the area. The movement includes

2006: The 437th Airlift Wing and the 315th Airlift Wing (Air Force Reserve Associate) at Charleston AFB, S. C., fly a 20-ship formation of C-17 Globemaster IIIs, the largest C-17 formation to date ever from

    1944: Gen Henry H. Arnold becomes General of the Army (5 stars) and the first airman to hold this rank.

1972: Operation LINEBACKER II: President Nixon orders this 11-day all-out bombing campaign against targets in Hanoi and Haiphong, one of the most heavily defended areas of the world. Altogether, the USAF completes 714 B-52 and

1903: Orville Wright makes the first sustained, controlled power airplane flight in the Kill Devil Hills, near Kitty Hawk. In the fourth and longest flight of the day, flown by Wilbur, the Wright Flyer flies

1998: Operation DESERT FOX/PHOENIX SCORPION IV. The US and Great Britain initiate the operation against Iraq after Iraq prevents UN weapons inspectors from continuing their work. In the 4-day operation, cruise missiles and aircraft strikes

1944: A Noorduyn C-64 Norseman carrying famed bandleader, Maj Glenn Miller, disappears over the English Channel. Miller, pilot John Morgan, and Lt Col Norman Baessell were flying to Paris, France, from Twinwood Farm airfield in

1988: W. Stuart Symington, the first Secretary of the Air Force, dies at his home in New Canaan, Connecticut.