Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD)

484th Bomb Wing

In October 1943, General William Brewer Keese supervised the forming of the 484th Bomb Group, which he commanded and took overseas to the Mediterranean Theater of Operations. The 484th Bomb Group, flying B-24s, was declared operational as part of the Fifteenth AF on 29 April 1944.

In the late 1950s through the mid-1960s B-52 bombers of the the 4138th Strategic Wing were stationed at Turner Air Force Base, Georgia. The 4138th Strategic Wing at Turner was inactivated on 01 February 1963.

A B-52D from the 484th Bomb Wing at Turner AFB crashed near Cumberland, MD with two nuclear weapons on 13 January 1964. The B-52F was the first Stratofortress model to participate in combat. The 7th and 320th Bomb Wings bombed suspected Viet Cong enclaves in South Vietnam in June of 1965 under Arc Light. B-52Ds of the 28th and 484th Bomb Wings deployed to Guam in March and April of 1966, replacing the B-52Fs. Over the next few years, 11 more B-52D wings were rotated to combat duty in Southeast Asia. While on duty at Andersen AFB, the B-52Ds were assigned to the 4133rd Bomb Wing (Provisional), which had been established on 01 February 1966.