AFGSC’s New Plan to Deploy Bombers Across the Globe
April 29, 2020 | By Brian W. Everstine
Air Force Global Strike Command will regularly rotate a small number of bombers to the Pacific and Middle East theaters to maintain a regular deterrence presence and to conduct combat operations as needed, but it will no longer operate out of bases such as al-Udeid Air Base, Qatar, or Andersen Air Force Base, Guam, for extended periods. The move keeps USAF strategically relevant and operationally unpredictable, AFGSC boss Gen. Timothy Ray said during an AFA Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies virtual event April 29.
The sixteen-year-old “Continuous Bomber Presence†at Andersen Air Force Base, Guam, ended April 16 as the 69th Bomb Squadron returned home to Minot Air Force Base, N.D. Two weeks earlier, the 20th Bomb Squadron returned to Barksdale Air Force Base, La., from a four-month deployment to the Middle East, which included combat sorties and establishing a presence in the region to deter Iran.
“We can come and go anytime they need us, we don’t need to be there physically,†Ray said.
https://www.airforcemag.com/afgscs-new-plan-to-deploy-bombers-across-the-globe/
