The

United States Air Force The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Armed Forces, and is one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Originally created on 1 August 1907, as a part of the United States Army Signal ...

's 9th Space Warning Squadron (9 SWS) was a

missile In military terminology, a missile is a guided airborne ranged weapon capable of self-propelled flight usually by a jet engine or rocket motor. Missiles are thus also called guided missiles or guided rockets (when a previously unguided rocket i ...

warning unit located at

Robins AFB Robins Air Force Base is a major United States Air Force installation located in Houston County, Georgia, United States. The base is located just east of the city of Warner Robins, south-southeast of Macon and approximately south-southeast ...

, Georgia.

History

The 9th Space Warning Squadron was originally constituted as the 9th Missile Warning Squadron (9 MWS) on 4 January 1985, and activated at

on 1 July 1985. The 9 MWS controlled the Southeast facing AN/FPS-123

PAVE PAWS PAVE PAWS (PAVE Phased Array Warning System) is a complex Cold War early warning radar and computer system developed in 1980 to "detect and characterize a sea-launched ballistic missile attack against the United States". With the first solid-st ...

radar site, providing warning to detect sea-launched and intercontinental ballistic missiles. The site went mission operational on 10 November 1986. Later use of the radar included support for the USAF

space surveillance network The United States Space Surveillance Network (SSN) detects, tracks, catalogs and identifies artificial objects orbiting Earth, e.g. active/inactive satellites, spent rocket bodies, or fragmentation debris. The system is the responsibility of Uni ...

by providing satellite vehicle surveillance, tracking, and radar space object identification. With these added mission areas, the unit was redesignated 9th Space Warning Squadron (9 SWS). As the likelihood of sea-based missile attacks from the

Gulf of Mexico The Gulf of Mexico ( es, Golfo de México) is an oceanic basin, ocean basin and a marginal sea of the Atlantic Ocean, largely surrounded by the North American continent. It is bounded on the northeast, north and northwest by the Gulf Coast of ...

decreased, and the low probability of missile attacks from the South, the

decided to close southern-facing

sites at

and Eldorado AS,

Texas Texas (, ; Spanish language, Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2 ...

. Two radar faces, one each from

and Eldorado AS, were moved to Clear AFS,

Alaska Alaska ( ; russian: Аляска, Alyaska; ale, Alax̂sxax̂; ; ems, Alas'kaaq; Yup'ik: ''Alaskaq''; tli, Anáaski) is a state located in the Western United States on the northwest extremity of North America. A semi-exclave of the U.S., ...

as part of the

BMEWS The RCA 474L Ballistic Missile Early Warning System (BMEWS, "474L System", Project 474L) was a United States Air Force Cold War early warning radar, computer, and communications system, for ballistic missile detection. The network of twelve ra ...

upgrade in 1998.Globalsecurity.org: "AN/FPS-115 PAVE PAWS"
/ref>

Assignments

Major Command

* Air Force Space Command (4 Jan 1985-1995)

Wings/Groups

21st Space Wing The 21st Space Wing (21 SW) was the United States Space Force's ground–based missile warning and space control wing. The 21st Space Wing was assigned to Space Operations Command and headquartered at Peterson Air Force Base, Colorado. The 21st ...

(15 May 1992 – 1995) *

1st Space Wing The 1st Space Wing was a wing of the United States Air Force active from 1983 to 1992 at Peterson Air Force Base, Colorado as part of Air Force Space Command.AN/FPS-123

(1986–1995)

References

External links

Robins AFB home page
Military units and formations in Georgia (U.S. state) Space Warning 0009 {{USAF-stub