Members of the 35
3rd Special Operations Group, Kadena AB, Japan, recently honored the eight US service members killed during Operation Eagle Claw—best known as Desert One—the April 24, 1980, failed attempt to rescue American hostages from the American Embassy in Tehran. (Read our 1999 article here.) Col. Raymond Chapman, group commander, told attendees at a base ceremony, “Looking back today, I see that Operation Eagle Claw may have been a tactical failure, but it was a strategic success.” That failed rescue, said Chapman, helped make special operations the force it is today. Following Desert One, the Pentagon created US Special Operations Command.
The top Air Force commander on on the Japanese island of Okinawa has clamped down alcohol and issued a curfew for junior enlisted Airmen and Guardians at Kadena Air Base for the next month. The order came roughly two weeks after a U.S. Marine was arrested for allegedly robbing and…