Mission
As the Air Force's Tier 1 unit, the 24th STS provides special operations airmen to the Joint Special Operations Command, including Pararescuemen, Combat Controllers, Special Reconnaissance, and Tactical Air Control Party personnel. 24th STS members are also trained to conduct classified and clandestine operations such as direct action, counter-terrorism, counter-insurgency, hostage rescue, and special reconnaissance.[5]
24th STS members conduct some missions on their own, but are mostly known as enablers to the Army's 1st Special Forces Operational Detachment-Delta (a.k.a. Delta Force) and the Navy's Special Warfare Development Group, or DEVGRU (a.k.a. SEAL Team 6).[6]
The Special Tactics Squadron is the oldest of the U.S. military's special forces groups, dating to World War II, before the U.S. military adopted a widespread special operations doctrine.[7]
History
World War II
The squadron traces its lineage to the 24th Air Corps Interceptor Control Squadron, formed in October 1941 at Hamilton Field, California. It was the director unit for the 24th Pursuit Group, which was formed simultaneously at Clark Field, Philippines, as the headquarters for pursuit squadrons of the Philippine Department Air Force.
After completing training, the squadron sailed for the Philippines on the USAT President Garfield on 6 December 1941. After the following day's Japanese attacks on Pearl Harbor and Clark Field, the President Garfield returned to port on 10 December and the squadron returned to Hamilton Field.
Although nominally assigned to the 24th Group from January through October 1942, the squadron served with air defense forces on the Pacific coast until it was disbanded on 31 March 1944, when the Army Air Forces converted its units in the United States from rigid table-of-organization units to more flexible base units. Its personnel and equipment were transferred to the 411th AAF Base Unit (Fighter Wing) at Berkeley, California.
Special operations
The 24th Special Tactics Squadron was called BRAND X from 1977 until Operation Eagle Claw in 1980. Then it was called Det 1 MACROS (Detachment One, Military Airlift Command Operations Staff).[8] In late 1985 (the Achille Lauro hijacking) it was Det 4 NAFCOS (Detachment Four, Numbered Air Force Combat Operations Staff),[9] and in 1987 it became 1724th Combat Control Squadron, and then in the same year the 124th Special Tactics Squadron.[10]
In 1989, the newly renamed the 24th Special Tactics Squadron participated in the United States invasion of Panama.[11][1] In 1993, the 24th STS deployed 11 personnel including the unit commander, Lt. Col. Jim Oeser, as part of JSOC's Task Force Ranger during Operation Restore Hope.[2] Several airmen were decorated for providing lifesaving medical care to wounded soldiers in the 1993 Battle of Mogadishu: Pararescuemen Technical Sergeant Tim Wilkinson received the Air Force Cross and Master Sergeant Scott Fales the Silver Star.[12] Combat Controller (CCT) SSgt. Jeffrey W. Bray received the Silver Star for coordinating helicopter attack runs throughout the night around their positions.[12][13][14]
From 15 to 20 September 2000, the 24th STS and the 23rd Special Tactics Squadron took part in the annual Canadian military exercise, Search and Rescue Exercise (SAREX). This was the first time Special Tactics units took part in SAREX.[15][16]
The squadron was heavily involved in combat operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, where the unit was part of the JSOC groupings Task Force 121, Task Force 6-26 and Task Force 145.[17] In 2003, members of the unit made two combat jumps in the initial phases of the Iraq War alongside the 3rd Ranger Battalion. The first was on 24 March 2003 near the Syrian border in the Iraqi town of Al Qaim, where they secured a small desert landing strip to allow follow-on coalition forces into the area. The second combat jump was two days later near Haditha, Iraq, where they secured the Haditha Dam.[18]
On 8 April 2003 Combat Controller Scott Sather, a member of the 24th STS,[19] became the first airman killed in combat in Operation Iraqi Freedom, near Tikrit, Iraq. He was attached to a small team from the Regimental Reconnaissance Company. The RRD team and Sather were operating alongside Delta Force, under Lieutenant Colonel Pete Blaber, west of Baghdad. They were tasked with deceiving the Iraqi army into believing the main U.S. invasion was coming from the west in order to prevent Saddam Hussein from escaping into Syria.[20] Sather Air Base was named after him.[21]
The 24th STS was a part of JSOC's Task Force 145 which was a provisional grouping specifically charged with hunting down high-value al-Qaeda and Iraqi leaders including Al-Qaeda in Iraq leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who was killed in June 2006.[22]
The squadron lost three members – PJs John Brown and Daniel Zerbe and CCT Andrew Harvell – in 2011 when the Chinook in which they were flying was shot down in Afghanistan.[23] To honor them, 18 members of AFSOC marched 800 miles from Lackland Air Force Base, San Antonio, Texas to Hurlburt Field, Florida.[24]
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United States
United States Air Force
United States Special Operations Command.svg){kind=small}
Joint Special Operations Command
24th Special Operations Wing
724th Special Tactics Group
