The Iraqi Air Force (IQAF) (Arabic: Al Quwwa al Jawwiya al Iraqiya القوة الجوية العراقية) is the Iraqi Armed Forces branch responsible for aerial warfare. Other roles include the policing of international borders and surveillance of national assets. The IQAF also acts as a support force for the Iraqi Navy and the Iraqi Army and it also allows Iraq to rapidly deploy its developing Army.
The Iraqi Air Force was first founded in 1931, during British rule of Iraq with only a few pilots. Aside from a brief period during the Second World War, The Iraqi Air Force operated mostly British aircraft until the 14 July Revolution in 1958, when the new Iraqi government began increased diplomatic relationships with the Soviet Union. The air force used both Soviet and British aircraft throughout the 1950s and 1960s. When Saddam Hussein came to power in 1979, the air force grew very quickly when Iraq ordered more Soviet and French aircraft. Its peak came a few years after the long and bloody Iran-Iraq War, in 1988, when it consisted of over 950 aircraft, becoming one of the largest air forces in the region. Its downfall came during the Gulf War and continued while coalition forces enforced no-fly zones. The remains of Iraq's air force was destroyed during the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Currently, the IQAF is rebuilding and receiving most of its training and aircraft from the United States.
Read more about Iraqi Air Force: History, Air Force Commanders, Order of Battle
Famous quotes containing the words air force, iraqi, air and/or force:
“I recently learned something quite interesting about video games. Many young people have developed incredible hand, eye, and brain coordination in playing these games. The air force believes these kids will be our outstanding pilots should they fly our jets.”
—Ronald Reagan (b. 1911)
“I will cut the head off my baby and swallow it if it will make Bush lose.”
—Zainab Ismael, Iraqi housewife. As quoted in Newsweek magazine, p. 31 (November 16, 1992)
“That air would disappear from the whole earth in time, perhaps; but long after his day. He did not know just when it had become so necessary to him, but he had come back to die in exile for the sake of it. Something soft and wild and free, something that whispered to the ear on the pillow, lightened the heart, softly, softly picked the lock, slid the bolts, and released the prisoned spirit of man into the wind, into the blue and gold, into the morning, into the morning!”
—Willa Cather (1873–1947)
“Circumstances define us; they force us onto one road or another, and then they punish us for it.”
—Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev (1818–1883)