Otis Air National Guard Base in Massachusetts actively is lining up a new mission, once its F-15s depart for good. (This is the base that everyone—including BRAC commissioners—thought was to close under BRAC 2005.) (DR, 09/15/05) Leading the list of potential missions is intelligence, per Brig. Gen. Michael Akey, head of the Massachusetts ANG. Akey tells the Boston Globe that ANG members at Otis could easily handle the job of processing intelligence data from unmanned aerial vehicles. He also thinks ANG personnel could take over operation of the PAVE PAWS radar facility at Cape Cod AFS, Mass., currently run primarily by active duty airmen and contractors.
The U.S. sent Air Force F-16s over central Syria in a show of force following the Dec. 13 killing of two U.S. Army Soldiers and one American civilian interpreter by a gunman linked to the Islamic State group.
