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341st Missile Wing Heritage Pamphlet 2018

Malmstrom AFB · 30 pages · text from the file's own layer

This heritage pamphlet from Malmstrom AFB traces the history of the 341st Missile Wing. The unit began as a B-25 bomb group in the China-Burma-India Theater in 1942, then flew B-47s at Abilene AFB before being activated at Malmstrom in July 1961. The pamphlet covers the Minuteman I, II and III deployments, the Cuban Missile Crisis alert, arms-reduction work under START, trophies, wing commanders and a missile field chronology. It also has museum display notes on missiles and the UH-1 helicopter.

341st Missile Wing History
Minuteman I missiles with Minuteman IIs. This replacement program
included the creation of a fourth strategic missile squadron at Malmstrom,
the 564th.
14 Dec 1965: The 564th Missile Squadron was activated at Malmstrom
Air Force Base, Montana. Equipped with the then-new Minutemen II
missile, the unit was declared fully operational on 3 May 1967.
26 Oct 1966: Construction was completed on Minuteman II ICBM
operational launch facilities at the 564th Strategic Missile Squadron,
Malmstrom AFB, Montana.
21 Apr 1967: The 1000th (and last) Minuteman silo was completed at
Malmstrom AFB, Montana. HQ SAC declared the 564th Strategic Missile
Squadron (Minuteman II) at Malmstrom AFB operational in May. Once the
564th SMS achieved operational status the deployment of the programmed
force of 1,000 Minuteman ICBMs was completed.
*For a bit of trivia; the 341st Bombardment Wing also flew the 1,000th B-47
Stratojet in 1960.
22 Apr 1967: The 12th SMS, at Malmstrom AFB, Montana, was the
first squadron to become fully operational with the new Minuteman II
missiles under the weapon system upgrade. The 12th SMS was also the first
squadron in the 341 SMW to undergo silo upgrade.
12 Feb 1969: The last Minuteman I ‘A’ model was removed from its
launch facility near Malmstrom AFB, Montana. That last Minuteman IA
from 490th Missile Squadron was removed as part of the Force
Modernization Program to replace the Minuteman IA an Bs with 50
Minuteman II "F" models.
27 May 1969: The Force Modernization Program was completed at
Malmstrom AFB when Kilo Flight was returned to the 341 SMW. During
this final modification, the 490 SMS’s 42 Minuteman I "A" models and 8
Minuteman I "B" models were replaced by 50 Minuteman II "F" models.
The 490th had the distinction of possessing the last "A" model on strategic
alert until it was removed from its LF as part of the Force Modernization
Program. 500 Minuteman I's and 500 Minuteman II's on alert.
11 Jul 1975: The 550th Minuteman II became operational with the
341st Strategic Missile Wing at Malmstrom AFB, Montana. With
completion of the nine-year force modernization program, the Minuteman
force now consisted of 450 Minuteman II and 550 Minuteman III ICBMs.

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Document, cited by the archive. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is above. 30 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.