Cold War
The 175th was reassigned to the 133rd Fighter Interceptor Wing along with units from Fargo, Duluth and Minneapolis in November 1950. The unit was called to active duty during the Korean War on 1 March 1951 and moved to Ellsworth Air Force Base, Rapid City, South Dakota, to provide support for the Convair B-36 bombers of the 28th Bombardment Wing stationed there. The unit was returned to state control and reorganized on 1 December 1952.
Two Lockheed T-33 Shooting Star trainers were assigned to the unit in July 1954 to start the transition of the pilots into jet aircraft. The first jet assigned was the F-94A/B Starfire. On 16 April 1956, the 175th Fighter Interceptor Squadron became part of the newly constituted 114th Fighter Interceptor Group, headquartered at Sioux Falls.
In May 1956, the first F-94C Starfire was received and in 1958, the F-94s were retired for the more powerful and longer range Northrop F-89 Scorpion. After two years this plane was already replaced by the Convair F-102 Delta Dagger.
In 1960, the unit received the F-102As and was placed under the direct supervision of the Aerospace Defense Command. The 114th FIG was assigned to the 132d Fighter Wing. As part of taking over a more active role in the defense of the continental United States, aircrews were placed on five-minute alert, and four aircraft were armed and ready to intercept and destroy enemy targets.
A significant change was encountered in May 1970 when the 114th Fighter Group, Aerospace Defense Command, was redesignated to the 114th Tactical Fighter Group, Tactical Air Command. The F-102s were replaced with the F-100D Super Sabre. The mission became that of controlling the combat skies from enemy use and to reinforce the combat forces on the ground. The South Dakota ANG deployed with their F-100s to Italy and Norway. In March 1976, news was received that the unit's F-100D aircraft would be replaced by the A-7D Corsair II. The last Super Sabres left Joe Foss Field in June 1977.
In 1979, the unit began a 12-year era of participation in Operation Coronet Cove at Howard Air Force Base, Panama Canal Zone, providing for defense of the Panama Canal. Both aircrew and support personnel were extended there in the summer of 1979 during the Nicaraguan Revolution. The unit was awarded the Armed Forces Expeditionary Streamer for combat duty as a part of Operation Just Cause during 1989-1990. Overseas deployments with the A-7 included Portugal, the United Kingdom and Belgium.
The 114 TFG received the first F-16C/D fighters in August 1991 with the official conversion from the A-7 to the F-16 occurring on 1 January 1992. The unit was redesignated as the 114th Fighter Group on 16 March 1992 and became a part of the newly formed Air Combat Command on 1 June 1992.
Read more about this topic: South Dakota Air National Guard, History
Famous quotes containing the words cold and/or war:
“How dost, my boy? Art cold?
I am cold myself. Where is this straw, good fellow?
The art of our necessities is strange
And can make vile things precious.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“It was the most ungrateful and unjust act ever perpetrated by a republic upon a class of citizens who had worked and sacrificed and suffered as did the women of this nation in the struggle of the Civil War only to be rewarded at its close by such unspeakable degradation as to be reduced to the plane of subjects to enfranchised slaves.”
—Anna Howard Shaw (1847–1919)