A Few Photos from the Barksdale Global Power Museum at Barksdale AFB, Louisiana

30 May 2013

by

Tom Hildreth

Comments accompanying the photos on this page are those of the photographer


It makes sense that the Global Power Museum, formerly the 8th Air Force Museum,
would posses a Flying Fortress, in this case B-17G 42-31340.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The best known escort fighter for the B-17 was the P-51D Mustang, this example represents a 352d Fighter Group ship,
44-14237, named "Moonbeam McSwine", a character featured in the postwar Lil Abner comic strip.

 

Coming into the jet age, the museum displays B-47E Stratojet 53-2273, one of more than two thousand produced.
To me, the Stratojet was the best looking of the jet bombers,and was unique in that it was a six engine aircraft.

 

The B-47 was supplanted by the much larger B-52 in SAC service. The museum's B-52D
56-0623 appears to be the veteran of many missions dropping iron bombs over Vietnam.

 

The Mig-21, seen in this photo, was represented in the media of the day as the nemisis of American Airpower over Vietnam.
Wiser planning by American leadership could have eliminated the enemy fighter fleet on the ground, a technically achievable goal.

 

In the mid-1950s, SAC operated several Strategic Fighter Wings equipped with the Republic F-84F seen here.
The theory was to deploy these aircraft overseas and equip them with tactical nuclear bombs in the face of Warsaw pact forces.

 

In spite of dire economic conditions gripping the United Kingdom following World War II, the RAF managed to equip itself with
three different nuclear-armed jet bomber designs that became known as the "V-bomber fleet." This is a Vulcan B.2, the most
successful of the three, an aircraft type that eventually saw combat late in its career in the Falkland Islands.

 

The SR-71A represents the pinnacle of American military operational aircraft design. There was nothing like it before
or since. Our inability today to purchase much simpler aircraft without undue scandal, cost overruns and delay, does
not speak well of the future of US Mlitary Airpower.

 

The following link will bring you to an informative page
on this museum: Air Power Park

The End

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