I see it is described as a training center for air to air combat. Is it also a defensive air base? Are there Marine detachments or other military presence in the Keys? Missiles? How about during the Cuban crisis? Looking at Google view it looks like 10 fighters on the tarmac.
Dennis
There haven’t been defensive SAMs anywhere in the USA since the 1960s. Except supposedly on the roof of the White House.
IIRC during the Cuban Missile crisis a bunch of USAF and Navy deployed there as well as to Homestead AFB just south of Miami.
I’ve PMed a doper who works on the base in some civilian capacity. Perhaps she can add some more.
Defense against who? And why do we need a battalion of Marines there?
I think Navy views the base there as a bit anachronistic. There was some utility in WWII and during the cold war, but today it’s value is limited. There isn’t a real lot going on there that couldn’t be transferred to Pensacola, Corpus or JRB Fort Worth. It was frequently discussed during BRAC, but, needless to say, survived.
Looking at Wiki, it has complex airspace with a lot of over water areas (obviously), which you won’t find outside of Hawaii probably. Also, counter-narcotics activity as well.
Aircraft have a limited ranged and CN stuff will probably burn up fuel as you are not flying at the most efficient speeds I imagine. Having a fueling depot that any pilot can get to as it’s on land, versus a carrier, does have it’s utility.
If we give it to the civilians, they will never give it back … it seems a prime spot for a military base …
Consider Patrick AFB up near Cape Kennedy … it’s only apparent military function is providing a golf course and base exchange for the local retirees … but it’s prime real estate, give it up and we’ll never get it back …
That’s a great point about Patrick. It is similar to the NAS in one way. They both now have a bunch of tenant commands that could be anywhere, but have migrated to Florida. Partially because its cheap and it’s a great place to live. Partially as BRAC protection as they increasingly have more and more commands there.
I was briefly stationed at Patrick back in the 1980s.
At that time, and perhaps even up to today a bunch of the base is given over to the USAF agency that operates the rocket/missile test range east of Canaveral. NASA owns the launchers & space vehicles, but USAF manages everything else around the vehicle once it clears the ground.
A variety of other USAF space stuff ended up there. The folks who managed the nuclear explosion detection satellite network, etc. Umpteen reorgs later I don’t know who/what is still there today. But stuff tends to stay put unless there’s something significant pushing it elsewhere.
Back to the original question. It is also the home of the Joint Interagency Task Force South (JIATF). I won’t waste time describing what they do…you can check it out yourself, but one of their primary associated missions is interdiction. JIATF also has quite a few antennas on the end of Key West closest to Cuba, if you get what I mean…and I think that you do.
The force of 8 (mobile, towed) Hawk batteries at Homestead and Key West, deployed in response to the Cuban Missile Crisis, the only Hawk units deployed for continental air defense, lasted til 1979, well beyond the larger static SAM system elsewhere.
The (fixed) Nike Ajax/Hercules SAM in Army Air Defense Command for US air defense declined by the end of the 60’s compared to the peak of 211 batteries in 1963, though the last ARADCOM National Guard Nike Hercules units lasted till 1974. The last of the USAF (and RCAF) big ramjet Bomarc SAM’s were deactivated in 1972. From ‘Rings of Supersonic Steel’ by Berhow.
The Hawk system of course lasted in US service long beyond that, but not deployed continuously for US air defense.
Found a site with some photos of the area. Looks like JIATF is south of the southernmost point:
http://joelmyers.net/2008/html/Key%20West.html
Dennis
That’s a good trick, unless the Navy’s contribution is boats…
Yeah, the Southernmost Point is a monument (pictured in the link) but it is on the edge of the road for tourists to photograph. So there is a bit of land remaining.
Dennis
The “Southernmost Point” isn’t even the southernmost at that end of the island; you can stand at the monument and see stuff further south. I know, because I was just there doing just that about a month ago.
I work at NASKW. There are Marines here and Army and a Coast Guard Sector. We are the premier training base in the world due to proximity to water and the near perfect flying weather. We have an adversarial squadron here. The previously mentioned JIATFS has all branches of the military here as well as foreign nationals. We have the most green space in the Keys.
Speaking of giving it away the Navy did in fact give to the city of Key West many acres on which the city is now building a park. We have endangered species located on base property and sit in a marine sanctuary. The southernmost point is on Navy property so a monument has been erected outside the gate declaring itself the southernmost point.
The Army has the Underwater Dive School and the Navy often does carrier landing training. Our proximity to Cuba is probably as good a reason as any to keep the base open. NASKW is really five bases in one. We have the air field, the housing annex, the beach annex, officer housing and Coast Guard on one annex and medical/VA has its own area. We are the largest employer in the Keys. We get training squadrons from all over year round.
AFTAC is about the only going concern there at Patrick right now AFAIK … the folks with the seismometer receivers …
Thanks, Buttercup! The one question remaining is would your guys take to the skies if a situation called for military attention, or would a base farther up Florida deploy?
Dennis
Same question that we asked you earlier. Who do you think the threat is in the Caribbean that would require US “military attention?”
Do you think Cuba is going to invade Florida and I missed that in the news?
NAS Key West is there first, because it’s always been there, second, because of the Naval aviation training ranges, and third because of counter-narcotics. It’s not there because of any “military attention” issues.
Per the sorta vague information at the base’s official web page there are no line combat units at NAS Key West.
There is a detachment of F/A-18s there which are part of VFA-106. This unit is responsible for training F-18 pilots, back seaters, and maintenance folks. Not for fighting. There’s also VFC-111 which does aggressor training. They’d not really be directly useful in a shooting situation either.
At least based on DoD practice in my era I conclude:
If there was a need to intercept some individual intruder some other base that already has those duties in that area would get the call.
If something like Reagan’s invasion of Grenada was needed on just a couple days’ notice, other front-line combat units from other bases would be sent.
If we somehow got into sustained daily combat ops with, e.g., Cuba, TPTB might deploy some assets from other bases to use NAS Key West as a handy airport. OTOH, it’s actually too close to the enemy if that’s Cuba. Better to keep our forces based farther back where they are in range of us but we’re mostly or entirely out of range for them. Tall boxers stand way back; short boxers clinch.
I’d sooner believe we’d be using Key West as a staging base for forces from farther away if the target was Puerto Rico, Haiti, or someplace else at a similar distance.
Yeah, I think there is a fundamental disconnect on how the military in the US operates. It’s not like we have units “on alert” to repel an invasion throughout the country.
SECDEF: “Mr. President, bad news. The Canadians have started the long feared invasion. They just landed troops in Erie, Pennsylvania.”
President: “My heavens, what do we have up there?”
SECDEF: “We just checked. There’s a Navy Reserve historical research unit and an Army National Guard truck maintenance unit in Erie.”
President: “Thank God! Have them move out on the double! We’ve got to nip this invasion in the bud!!!”
True.
In my earlier post I timed out on an edit that my comment about intercepting intruders was based on jet-type intruders. The JIATF counter-drug units at NAS KW are doing interceptions of something fairly regularly. But from my reading it’s usually a slow light airplane being intercepted by a fast armed helo. Plus they intercept a lot of boats.
But if you imagine a remake of 9/11 then what matters is who can get eyeballs and missiles and cannon and if necessary rammers into the same airspace as the intruders fastest.
The USAF ANG 125th Fighter Wing is the designated unit for air defense and counter-intruder ops in that area. Home-based at Jacksonville FL they have a 24 hour alert force of F-15s at Homestead AFRB just south of Miami. Unlike the folks at NAS KW, these people are loaded for war all day every day.
So if this time the bad guys took over an airliner from the Caribeean or South America and seemed intent on crashing it into Miami then NASKW airplanes would play only if the Homestead F-15s could not.
At intercept speed it takes about 5 minutes to fly from Homestead to NAS KW. So even if the bad guy’s axis of approach was directly beyond NASKW as seen from Homestead, the quicker reaction time from Homestead’s alert force would get to the intruder faster than NASKW could set up and launch an aircraft. It’s far more likely that the geometry of any intruder would be more favorable to Homestead than that worst case.