According to a Tribune-Star report, airmen of the Indiana Air National Guard’s 181st Intelligence Wing, formerly the 181st Fighter Wing, are well into their new mission, analyzing and disseminating near-real-time video feed from Predator unmanned aerial vehicles. The wing’s executive officer, 1st Lt. Randi Brown, told the newspaper: “It’s like a customer service job. They call us and say we are in this area and we need you to look at this specific zone and tell us what you see from the big picture.” The Distributed Ground Station operation under the 181st Intelligence Group will comprise some 400 Air Guardsmen, many of who retrained from the wing’s former F-16 operations. The intel wing also has airmen in training for its new 113th Air Support Operations Squadron, which Brown told the newspaper would not be operational for another year.
The U.S. military is maintaining a beefed-up presence in the Middle East, including fighters and air defense assets, following the U.S. strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities June 22 and subsequent retaliation by the Iranians against Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar.
