Luke Field/Air Force Base and 56th Fighter Wing Heritage Pamphlet ...

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1 April 1964 First F-104 student sortie flown under USAF/German Air Force
F-104 Starfighter Foreign Military Sales Program.
30 April 1964 First F-5A Freedom Fighter delivered to 4441st Combat Crew
Training Squadron at Williams AFB. Program conducted by
Luke but based at Williams due to commonality of
maintenance/parts between F-5 and Williams T-38 trainer.
11 June 1964 F-84 program ended after producing 6,930 graduates.
15 June 1964 With the end of F-84 training, the 4513d Organizational
Maintenance Squadron deactivated.
15 June 1964 Col James Jabara, the first jet ace, assumed command of the
4540th Combat Crew Training Group
22 July 1965 Project Skoshi Tiger conducted to determine combat
effectiveness of F-5A. Success of test resulted in basing jets in
South Vietnam.
12 December 1967 Luke was operations center for Operation Haylift which saved
500,000 snowbound Indian livestock in northern Arizona.
1 September 1969 First A-7D Corsair delivered to base as part of plan to conduct
fighter training in jet at Luke.
15 October 1969 4510th Combat Crew Training Wing inactivated and
58th Tactical Fighter Training Wing activated as Luke host unit
in move to redesignate training wings as fighter wings with
combat histories. Also, 69th Tactical Fighter Training Squadron
and 418th Tactical Fighter Training Squadron activated as F-104
units, and 425th Tactical Fighter Training Squadron activated as
F-5 unit.
15 December 1969 310th Tactical Fighter Training Squadron, which was historically
aligned with 58th Tactical Fighter Training Wing, activated to
conduct A-7D training.