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Show fUG By Airman Huston I st Class Cindy Editor, Fighter Country The 34th Fighter Squadron welcomes a new commander in a ceremony May 28 at 1 0 a.m. in Hangar 37. Lt. Col. Kurt F. Neubauer, 4th FS operations officer, will replace Lt. Col. Kurt Dittmer, as the 34th FS commander. Colonel Dittmer leavees Hill AFB to start his new role as Deputy Commander of the Operations Group at Luke AFB, Arz. "My duty to you the 34th Fighter Squadron members is three-folto ensure we have trained pilots, trained maintainers, and a healthy fleet, said Colonel Neubauer. "But the squadron isn't about me it's about the Rams making things happen. Show me how to make it better." The colonel feels his greatest challenge in commanding the 34th FS is reducing the turmoil caused by the high optempo. "I've been very fortunate to spend most said Colonel of my career flying the Neubauer. "My operational assignments stateside, in Korea, and in Southwest Asia help me appreciate the demands of high optempo on today's airmen." change-of-comma- nd d: F-1- 6," What's "There are three crucial aspects to leadership," said Colonel Neubauer. "Courtesy treating people with dignity; clarity staying focused on our squadron's purpose; and courage seeing things through to their conclusion." "Colonel Neubauer is going to be great as the new 34th FS commander," said Colonel Dittmer. "His biggest challenge is going to be learning the maintenance side of the house, but the 34th has top notch airmen to help him with that." "Usually as commander, one is so overloaded with other commitments they don't have the time to go out and meet the airmen in their command. I hope Colonel Neubauer can work past the obstacles and get out and meet the men and women of the 34th FS," he added. Colonel Neubauer has been a part of the Air Force for the past 1 8 years and has played quite a few roles during those years. The colonel's previous positions include weapons school flight commander, assistant operations officer, and chief of standardization and evaluation. Prior to joining the Rams, Colonel Neubauer served as operations officer for the 4th FS from October 1998-Apr- il 1999. in a name? By Tech. Sgt. Curtis Swift 388th Fighter Wing historian The significance behind a unit's name is not always evident to those outside the squadron itself. To some, a particular name brings back memories of past times and experiences. To others, a name portrays an attitude or philosophy. Expecting parents spend weeks' or" even months deciding on a name for a coming child. The reason for such deliberation is simple. There is apparently much more to a name than originally thought. It is believed by some, that a child's name will profoundly affect their life and their degree of success. How many times have you heard another person's name and thought "I bet they were teased about that name since they were a kid," or " I'd hate to have a name like that poor kid! What were hisher parents thinking?" The fact is a name can have a good or bad first impression on others. This is one of the reasons people in the entertainment industry often change their names to something unique or catchy. In sports, a name, or mascot, gives a focal point for fans and athletes to rally behind. Sports teams pick names that denote power, speed, agility, and stamina. They want to convey the image of a winner! The name or emblem of a fighter squadron gives its personnel something to idento. tify with; to be proud of, to belong I Well, what in the world is a Fuujin? get asked this question all the time. J3elow is a short history of each of the 388thFighter and Wing's Fighter Squadron's background The 34th Fighter Squadron also boasts a long proud heritage first being activated October 15, 1944. The record is significance of the Rams emblem, a white ram on a black background, cannot be traced, but has remained constant since its approval in Novem- ber 1945. The Rams are also known as "The Men in Black." The 34th FS has been based at locations in North Carolina, Ie Shima, Okinawa, George AFB, California, and Yakota AB, Japan, prior to being assigned to the 388 Tactical Fighter Wing at Korat, RTAFB, Thailand. After moving to Hill AFB, Utah, the 34th became the first operational 6 Squadron. OA iiH 'V S llliil I 4 - f WmUmK M .sm'm Ipfft t HI (ill '"fPSSfc; mmmmm immmmmmmm smm&MmmMM 'yyfii-i-- 'WyyyyysyyyyMyyl :::':Z'y:y-- Photo by Airman 1st Class Cindy Huston Lt.Coi.Paul Smith, 34th Fighter Squadron operations officer, and Lt. Col. Kurt Neubauer is study a map of the Utah Test and Training Range. Colonel Neubauer scheduled to take over as commander of the 34th FS in a change of command ceremony May 28. a target, and filters all the way down to the warfighter flying strike missions. "The first phase is at an Air Operations Center where a Joint Forces Air Component Commander and his team process intelligence information that drives their decisionmaking, planning and dissemination of an operational plan called an Air Tasking Order," said Lt. Col. Scott Dowty, ACC Y2K Operational Assessment director. Phase II centers on Wing Operations Centers that receive the Air Tasking Order. Each WOC translates the order into what specifically needs to be done to prepare their people, aircraft and munitions to accomplish their portion of the mission. The final phase is the employment of the aircraft, aircrews and ground support forces that will execute the order and put the bombs on target. "During this portion of the Y2K Flag, we're concentrating mainly on the third elphase with some command and control ements added in," said Colonel Dowty. "In each test, we set the clocks to various critical dates, such as December 3 1 , Janu ary 1, 2000, and April 28 and 29, 2000, for the leap year. As the clock ticks across the midnight hour, we carefully monitor what happens." Once past midnight, pilots check their onboard systems to ensure they operate correctly in the year 2000 environment. "The good news is that as we're looking at the systems, we're just not seeing many problems at all," said Colonel Dowty. "So far, we haven't encountered any problems with any of our munitions. Even our most equipment, the global positioning system receiver, had zero failures." By the end of the first week of evaludate-sensiti- ve ations here, all planned tests were on schedule and going well, according to Lt. Col. Steve Miller, Y2K Flag Detachment commander. "We've had some limiting factors because, obviously, the conflict in Kosovo takes priority. Some assets are hard to schedule because they're needed for the war." However, Colonel Miller has no doubts of completing all the tests needed before the end of the millennium. "What I fully expect is that everything will work as advertised," he said. "We're just here to make sure it does." F-1- Y2IC The42lstBlackWidows Squadron, originally the 421st Night numerFighter Squadron in 1943, includes ous assignments from World War II to present day. The unit has been assigned to 16 different wings and 20 different lo cations through- out the world since their acti- vation in Or- lando, Fl. The unit has also undergone several emblem changes, from 1 the Bugs Bunny Night Fighter to the "Three flying the P-Musketeers" style hat and sword. 61 Their current emblem, the Black Widow Spider, (recently redesigned from was approved on the "tick look-a-like- - From Page A The heritage behind the 42 1 st Fighter The 4th Fighter Squadron hasc a proud land to North Africa, and from Okinawa and Misawa, Japan to Eglin Air Force Base Florida. It was during their assignment at Yonton Air mi From Page A The 34th Rude Rams The 4th Fightin' Fuujins .1 n TESTING Base, Okinawa, that the squadron adopted Fuujin, the Okinawan god of wind, as its emblem, after half of its combat aircraft were destroyed by a freak windstorm. name. and coioriui past with assignments from Northern Ire- new commander om w H R ") Oct. 27, 1977, and characterizes the aggressive determination and awesome capability of the unit. acport offered by various base agencies, cording to Colonel Avella. "We've received an overwhelming show of support from the 388th Fighter Wing as well as the 75th Air Base Wing," said Lt. Col. Scott Dowty, ACC Y2K operational assessment director. "From computers and communication to airfield mandiliagement, everyone at Hill has worked met." gently to ensure all of our needs were "In addition to providing updated weather reports to aircrews and daily air traffic control support, we made provisions for ramp space and use of our hot pads," said Maj. Terri Czenkus, 75th Operations Support Squadron commander. "We're trying to help the team out any way we can to include assisting with their flight planning requirements as necessary." One Hill unit even went as far as deploying to the middle of the Utah desert to provide ground communications capabilities for aircrews throughout the exercise. Tearly 100 members of the 729th Air Control Squadron, augmented by person- nel from the 109th ACS, Air National Guard, set up satellite and radar communications equipment in Wendover, Utah, and conducted their mission in a field environment. The unit's support was not lost on exercise planners given nearly half of the de'Angry Warriors' squadron is currently ployed to Southwest Asia in support of Operation Southern Watch. "We certainly recognize the effort put forth by the 729th ACS and 1 09th ACS," said Colonel Dowty. "The 729th played a key role providing command and control and battle management through the use of communications data links. Although several of their more experienced members were deployed overseas, the 729th helped us demonstrate our core competencies in the year 2000 and beyond." The exercise at Hill will be followed by a similar operational assessment next month at Nellis AFB, Nev. "We've got a long road ahead of us yet," said Dowty. "The exercise at Hill has proven that our confidence in the weapons systems was well placed. |
