BREAKING NEWS

1 January 2025

One of the United States Air Force’s finest units (the Super Sabre Society) has been inactivated today. This organization, in existence since 2006, comprised at it’s peak of approximately 1,500 men who flew the F-100 Super Sabre is being moved from active to stand-by status. At one time there were Wings and Squadrons based in England, Germany, Spain, Italy, Turkey, Libya, Holland, France, Denmark, Japan, South Korea, Okinawa, the Philippines and Vietnam. These pilots, Flight Surgeons and back seat electronic warfare officers (Bears) flew 380,283 combat missions during the Vietnam War, more than any other jet plane in that conflict. They sat alert with nuclear weapons from Korea to Turkey during the Cold War with targets that were often known to be one-way. They attracted millions of spectators with the F-100 C/D’s Thunderbirds for thirteen years. They gave goose bumps to anyone who heard the afterburner lite with the ka-boom of the big J57 engine. They made history by air refueling behind KB-50’s, KC-97’s, and KC-135’s when air refueling was in it’s early stages for single seat fighters. To fly one of these magnificent planes pilots were the best of their pilot training classes and the best of their generation.

Except for two (Collings Foundation and Dean Cutshall’s) these once front-line fighters now rest in museums…no more combat, no more high G’s, no more supersonic air rushing across their skin. The aviators, most having flown west, look at these F-100’s wistfully with memories that flood the mind and tears flood the eyes. We were a great pair and we were a great fraternity…the Super Sabre Society.