Kaufbeuren Air Base (Fliegerhorst Kaufbeuren) is a German Air Force

military airbase An air base (sometimes referred to as a military air base, military airfield, military airport, air station, naval air station, air force station, or air force base) is an aerodrome used as a military base by a military force for the operation ...

. It is currently the home of the Luftwaffe Technical School 1.

History

Originally built in 1935 as a

Luftwaffe The ''Luftwaffe'' () was the aerial-warfare branch of the German ''Wehrmacht'' before and during World War II. Germany's military air arms during World War I, the ''Luftstreitkräfte'' of the Imperial Army and the '' Marine-Fliegerabtei ...

station, the aerodrome was seized by the

United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the land warfare, land military branch, service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight Uniformed services of the United States, U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army o ...

in May 1945 at the end of

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

. The 289th Combat Engineers were ordered in to occupy the site as

military police Military police (MP) are law enforcement agencies connected with, or part of, the military of a state. In wartime operations, the military police may support the main fighting force with force protection, convoy security, screening, rear rec ...

when it was discovered to be the final location of

Nazi Party The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party (german: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or NSDAP), was a far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that created and supported t ...

's top secret FA signals intelligence and

cryptanalytic Cryptanalysis (from the Greek ''kryptós'', "hidden", and ''analýein'', "to analyze") refers to the process of analyzing information systems in order to understand hidden aspects of the systems. Cryptanalysis is used to breach cryptographic s ...

agency. After all intelligence aspects perceived crucial by

TICOM TICOM (Target Intelligence Committee) was a secret Allied project formed in World War II to find and seize German intelligence assets, particularly in the field of cryptology and signals intelligence. It operated alongside other Western Allied ...

, the U.S. intelligence and technology gathering organization, were secured, it was occupied by the 225th Anti-Aircraft Searchlight Battalion. The

USAAF The United States Army Air Forces (USAAF or AAF) was the major land-based aerial warfare service component of the United States Army and ''de facto'' aerial warfare service branch of the United States during and immediately after World War II ...

55th Fighter Group based P-51 Mustangs at the airfield from 22 July 1945 - 28 April 1946. Renamed Kaufbeuren AFB (later, Kaufbeuren AB), the

60th Troop Carrier Wing 060 may refer to: * Motorola 68060 microprocessor * 0-6-0, wheel arrangement for railway locomotives * emergency telephone number in Mexico, "060" * Bermuda, country code "060" (ISO 3166-1 numeric) * 060, the area code for Chimay in the Belgian te ...

was assigned to the base from 1 July 1948 until 1 October 1949. Shortly after moving to Kaufbeuren the 60 TCW and its three squadrons—the 10th, 11th, and 12th Troop Carriers Squadrons—began supporting the

Berlin Airlift The Berlin Blockade (24 June 1948 – 12 May 1949) was one of the first major international crises of the Cold War. During the multinational occupation of post–World War II Germany, the Soviet Union blocked the Western Allies' railway, roa ...

. From 26 June 1948 to 30 September 1949, the C-47 and C-54-equipped squadrons flew from both Kaufbeuren and

Wiesbaden AB Lucius D. Clay Kaserne (german: Flugplatz Wiesbaden-Erbenheim) , commonly known as Clay Kaserne, is an installation of the United States Army in Hesse, Germany. The ''kaserne'' is located within Wiesbaden-Erbenheim. Named for General Lucius ...

, Germany, and contributed to the U.S. total of nearly 1.8 million tons of supplies delivered on 189,963 flights. On 20 January 1949, the wing's headquarters element moved to

RAF Fassberg Fassberg or Faßberg may refer to * Faßberg – a municipality in the district of Celle, in Lower Saxony, Germany * RAF Fassberg – a Royal Air Force air base between 1945 and 1957 in the vicinity of Faßberg * Faßberg Air Base Faßberg Air ...

, Germany, and fell under operational control of the 1st Airlift Task Force. When the Berlin Airlift ended on 26 September 1949, the 60 TCW began moving without its personnel and equipment to Wiesbaden, where it assumed the resources of the inactivated 7150th Air Force Composite Wing. The 60th became operational at Wiesbaden on 1 October 1949. The shift of USAF bases to locations west of the Rhine River meant that permanent active flying organizations were not assigned to Kaufbeuren, and it was used as a communications station under the 7320th Air Force Wing. In 1955, the 7330th Flying Training Wing was established on the base to train German pilots for the reconstituted German Air Force. The facility was handed back to the West German government on 16 December 1957.USAFHRA Document 00462798
/ref> Missile Group 11 (German: Flugkörpergruppen 11, FKGrp 11) was activated in Kaufbeuren Air Base in February 1958, equipped with the

MGM-1 Matador The Martin MGM-1 Matador was the first operational surface-to-surface cruise missile designed and built by the United States. It was developed after World War II, drawing upon their wartime experience with creating the Republic-Ford JB-2, a ...

cruise missile. Used as an active Luftwaffe airbase until the 1990s, it is now a non-flying training facility.

References

External links

Luftwaffe Technical School 1 at Kaufbeuren
{{Subject bar , portal1=Aviation , portal2=Military of Germany , portal4=World War II , commons=y , commons-search=Fliegerhorst Kaufbeuren Bases of the German Air Force History of telecommunications in Germany Luftwaffe bases Installations of the United States Air Force in Germany Signals intelligence of World War II Kaufbeuren Airports in Bavaria