764th Bombardment Squadron

The 764th Bombardment Squadron is an inactive United States Air Force unit. It was last assigned to the 461st Bombardment Wing. It was last stationed at Amarillo Air Force Base, Texas, and was inactivated on 28 March 1968.

History
Established in mid-1943 as a B-24 Liberator heavy bomber squadron, it trained under the Second Air Force. The unit deployed to the Mediterranean Theater of Operations (MTO) in February 1944, being assigned to the Fifteenth Air Force in Southern Italy.

The squadron engaged in very long range strategic bombardment missions against enemy strategic targets in Italy, France, Germany, Austria, Czechoslovakia, Hungary and the Balkans until April 1945. It bombed aircraft factories, assembly plants, oil refineries, storage areas, marshalling yards, airdromes and other objectives until the German capitulation in May 1945.

Most squadron personnel were demobilized in Italy in May 1945 and it returned to the United States with a skeleton staff. Re-equipped and redesignated a B-29 Superfortress very heavy bomber squadron, it also received new personnel. It began training under the Second Air Force for planned deployment to the Western Pacific Area (WPA), however, the Japanese capitulation in August led to the inactivation of the squadron in October.

Reactivated in 1953 under the Tactical Air Command of the Ninth Air Force as a B-26 Invader light bombardment squadron, it became a B-57B Canberra unit, receiving their first aircraft in January 1955 at Hill AFB, Utah. In the summer of 1955, it moved to Blytheville AFB, Arkansas, the first TAC bomb squadron to be fully equipped with B-57s. After three years of service with the B-57s, the decision was made to phase them out in favor of supersonic aircraft, and in April 1958 its parent 461st BG began to inactivate at Blytheville AFB, the squadron inactivating in June.

Reactivated under Strategic Air Command (SAC) in 1963, it replaced a provisional B-52G Stratofortess squadron at Amarillo AFB, Texas.It performed intercontinental training and deployments, also standing nuclear alert. At the beginning of 1966, the squadron deployed personnel to forward bases in the Western Pacific, where they engaged in combat missions over Indochina as part of Operation Arc Light. The unit was inactivated in 1968 with the closure of Amarillo AFB and a reduction in the B-52 force, their role being taken over by ICBMs.

Lineage

 * Constituted as the 764th Bombardment Squadron (Heavy) on 19 May 1943
 * Activated on 1 Jul 1943
 * Inactivated on 28 Aug 1945


 * Redesignated the 764th Bombardment Squadron (Light) on 11 Dec 1953
 * Activated on 23 Dec 1953


 * Redesignated the 764th Bombardment Squadron (Tactical) on 1 Oct 1955
 * Inactivated on 8 Jan 1958


 * Redesignated the 764th Bombardment Squadron (Heavy), activated on 15 Nov 1962
 * Organized on 1 Feb 1963; receiving aircraft/personnel/equipment as a redesignation of the 718th Bombardment Squadron
 * Inactivated on 28 Mar 1968

Assignments

 * 461st Bombardment Group, 1 Jul 1943-28 Aug 1945; 23 Dec 1953-8 Jan 1958
 * Strategic Air Command, 15 Nov 1962
 * 461st Bombardment Wing, 1 Feb 1963-28 Mar 1968

Stations

 * Wendover Field, Utah July 1, 1943
 * Gowen Field, Idaho, July 29, 1943
 * Kearns Center, Utah September 11, 1943
 * Wendover Field, Utah, September 30, 1943
 * Hammer Field, California, October 30, 1943 – January 1944


 * Torretto Airfield, Italy c. February 20, 1944 – July 1945
 * Sioux Falls AAF, South Dakota, July 22 – August 18, 1945
 * Hill AFB, Utah, December 23, 1953 – April 8, 1956
 * Blytheville AFB, Arkansas, April 8, 1956 – April 1, 1958
 * Amarillo AFB, Texas, February 1, 1963 – March 28, 1968

Aircraft

 * B-24 Liberator, 1943–1945
 * B-26 Invader, 1954–1955
 * B-57 Canberra, 1955–1958
 * B-52 Stratofortress, 1963–1968