Fleet Air Reconnaissance Squadron VQ-2, also known as "Batmen" and later "Sandeman," was an air reconnaissance squadron of the United States Navy, established on 1 September 1955 and based at NAS Whidbey Island, previously at NAVSTA Rota, Spain, flying both Douglas EA-3B Skywarrior and Lockheed EP-3E Aries aircraft until 1991 and then strictly EP-3E aircraft until 2012. The squadron was disestablished on 22 May 2012.
Squadron history
1950s
Roots
Fleet Air Reconnaissance in the European Theater had been conducted since the start of the Cold War by detachments within patrol squadrons (VP) flying modified PB4Y-2 PrivateersDonald from NAS Port Lyautey and conducting missions in the Baltic, Black, Mediterranean, and North Seas. These missions occasionally provoked reactions, sometimes hostile, from behind the Iron Curtain. On 8 April 1950, Soviet Lavochkin La-11 fighters shot down a Lyautey-based PB4Y-2 Privateer (BUNO 59645) over the Baltic Sea, off the coast of Liepāja, Latvia with the loss of all ten aircrew.
Shortly after the start of the Korean War in 1950, a dedicated unit, Naval Air Activities (NAA), Port Lyautey Patrol Unit (NPU) was established with three PB4Y-2 aircraft and personnel transferred from VP-26. As this unit demonstrated its value to the Navy, the Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) and the Bureau of Aeronautics (BuAer) came to realize that a dedicated aircraft was a necessity.
By 1952, the VP community had not had much success with the P4M-1 Mercator that it had deployed to Morocco due to maintenance issues arising from its nineteen airframe total production run. The rest of the VP community found easier maintenance with the Lockheed P2V Neptunes deployed in theater because that airframe had been adopted as the VP standard asset. The maritime patrol commanders removed the Mercators from frontline service at Port Lyautey in favor of the Neptune. Washington subsequently decided to reconfigure all but one P4M-1 as P4M-1Qs and permanently assign them to the Naval Communications Units established at NPU and its sister unit at NAS Sangley Point, Philippines. Having lost an aircraft and lives to hostile Soviet action, the aircrew appreciated the added takeoff and combat speed of the two Allison J33-A-10A turbojet engines mounted in the aft of the Pratt & Whitney R-4360-20A Wasp Major radial's nacelles.
In 1953, with the conversion and deployment of the P4M-1Q, NPU needed an administrative identity as part of the Naval Air Force Atlantic (AIRLANT) structure and Airborne Early Warning Squadron TWO (VW-2) at NAS Patuxent River, Maryland became the command into which NPU was folded as VW-2 DET A. Since VW-2 Det A's mission began to diverge greatly from the parent unit's VW mission, the Navy decided to establish dedicated squadrons for the Fleet Air Reconnaissance mission. One was to be formed from VW-2 Det A and the other would be formed from its sister unit at Sangley Point, VW-1 Det A. By mid-1954, four P4M-1Qs and one Lockheed P2V-2 Neptune were at Port Lyautey. The P2V-2, stripped of ASW equipment, served as a trainer and logistics aircraft.
The unit operated all over the European Theater from a variety of bases. Regular deployment sites were Incirlik AB, Turkey; RAF Mildehnall, United Kingdom; Wiesbaden AB, West Germany; RAF Schleswigland, West Germany; and RAF Hal Far, Malta.
Establishment
VQ-2 was commissioned as Electronic Countermeasures Squadron TWO (ECMRON TWO) on 1 September 1955, to provide the United States with an improved defense posture. The squadron took over VW-2 DET A's spaces and hangar at NAS Port Lyautey. Through the 1950s, VQ-2 would continue to fly missions throughout the European Theater operating from Cyprus, Germany, Libya, Turkey, and the United Kingdom. At commissioning, Commander Morris L. Kalin led a total complement of 24 officers and 78 enlisted men.
The squadron continued using the six P4M-1Qs as mission aircraft. In addition, they obtained three Lockheed P2V-5Fs. The P2V-5Fs were reconfigured onsite from the standard maritime reconnaissance to similar electronic suites as the P-4Ms. Of note, the P2v-5Fs had the same dash speed capability as the P4Ms from two Westinghouse J34-WE-34 turbojets mounted on their own nacelles outboard the Wright R-3350-32W Cyclone Turbo-compound radials. The squadron used the P2V-3 for pilot training and logistics, since it was not configured for electronic reconnaissance (this became a standard squadron practice when possible; using a "bare bones airframe of one of its models for training and logistics"). The four Neptunes would serve alongside the Mercators until 1960.
In September 1956, a new and faster carrier-capable A3D-1Q Skywarrior was delivered to the squadron. The A3D-1Q, nicknamed "The Whale" was a reconfigured A3D-1 with the bomb bay closed and an electronic reconnaissance suite installed similar to those of the P4M-1Q and P2V-5F.HeinemannGunston The Whale was a carrier-capable high-wing, twin-jet aircraft with a crew of four.Winchester 2006, p. 75. The A-3 was also one of the fastest non-afterburner aircraft in the US Armed Forces with a service ceiling significantly higher than the Mercators and Neptunes which gave the aircraft a greater area of coverage. The squadron also received an A3D-1 which it use like the P2V-3. Although the pilots and navigators came to the command after carrier-qualifying, the squadron operated the A-3 from land bases until the next decade unlike her sister squadron VQ-1. With the high tempo of operations and depot-level maintenance for the three models back in the continental United States (CONUS), it is unsurprising that on 1 June 1957, the command had three P4M-1Q, two A3D-1Q, two P2V-5F, one A3D-1, and one P2V-3 reported in its table of organization (TOE).
The Lebanon Crisis in 1958 on 15 July 1958, saw a P4M-1Q and aircrew shift south from Incirlik to fly out of Beirut while the US Marines and US Army were deployed there at the behest of Camille Chamoun, the President of Lebanon. VQ-2 operated out of Beirut Airport through the remainder of the summer and into the fall, departing with the withdrawal of US forces after stabilization in October 1958.
Homeport change As a result of the Pact of Madrid, signed on 23 September 1953 by Spain and the United States, the US pledged to furnish economic and military aid to Spain. The United States, in turn, was to be permitted to construct and to utilize air and naval bases on Spanish territory (Naval Station Rota, Morón Air Base, Torrejón Air Base, and Zaragoza Air Base). By 1959, the base at Rota and its airfield had been completed to satisfy the US Navy's aviation needs. Due to its newer facilities, the Navy decided to move VQ-2 to Rota.
The relocation of the squadron to Rota began in late 1958 into the first days of 1959. The shift of the squadron CO, XO, and department heads (DHs) was completed by 14 January 1959, but it would take another year to transfer all command assets to Rota. All assets at Lyautey had to be surveyed, packed up, and moved.
During this evolution, five seven-seat A3D-2Q aircraft arrived to replace the four-seat A3D-1Qs. These new aircraft had the bulkhead between the cockpit and the bomb bay removed, the bomb bay sealed, and three more seats and equipment added in the former bay. This unarmed version (the tail gun had been removed) brought an increase in capability to the community.
Aircraft/aircrew losses and mishaps
Over the course of the decade, VQ-2 suffered the eleven aircrew fatalities and three aircraft in three mishaps: On 6 January 1958, at the end of a ferry flight from Port Lyautey, via Lajes Air Base, Azores and Kindley AFB, Bermuda to NAS Norfolk, Virginia, P4M-1Q (BUNO 124373) lost an engine on approach. The aircraft crashed at 22 St. and E. Ocean Ave., Norfolk, killing four crew and injuring three civilians."Four Missing In Air Crash", The Anderson Independent, 7 January 1958 Two aircrew were injured and one was uninjured. On 16 October 1958, returning to Incirlik, A3D-1Q (BUNO 130356) crashed near the airfield. All four aircrew aboard were killed.
1960s
Change While keeping the alphanumeric designation VQ-2, ECMRON TWO was renamed Fleet Air Reconnaissance Squadron TWO (FAIRECONRON TWO) on 1 January 1960. Its sister squadron, VQ-1 was similarly renamed. On 14 January 1960, with all equipment and personnel out of Lyautey, VQ-2 officially transferred to Naval Station.
The Navy had recognized that the maintenance costs of the aging, worn P4M-1Q and P2V-5F airframes were increasingly more expensive to maintain, and these planes needed replacement. Washington opted for a larger, more capable aircraft, the Lockheed WV-2Q Warning Star. The "Willie Victors," unarmed like the A3D-2Qs, could carry a crew of twenty-six. On 26 February 1960, the first two WV-2Q arrived. By the end of the first quarter in 1960, 31 March, VQ-2'aircraft inventory were five A3D-2Q, three P2V-5F, two P4M-1Q, and two WV-2Q. The P2V-5F and P4M-1Q aircraft were soon to be phased out as all hands quickly adapted to the A3D-2Q and WV-2Q airframes. Meanwhile, the squadron continued its business of airborne electronic reconnaissance. By the summer of 1960, the Mercators and Neptunes were gone.
On 18 September 1962, the Department of Defense (DoD) initiated its Tri-Service Aircraft Designation System which replaced the 1922 USN Aircraft Designation System. The new unified system for designating all US military aircraft was a Type/Model/Series (T/M/S). With this change, the A3D-2Q became the EA-3B and the WV-2Q became the EC-121M.
In theater operations
In response to the Berlin Crisis of 1961, VQ-2 flew missions in West Germany along the border with Czechoslovakia and East Germany as well as their routine missions into the Baltic. By now these were being carried out primarily by the WV-2Qs with A3D-2Qs filling in as needed. Tensions continued to increase as the Kennedy administration and its NATO allies responded to Soviet moves in Europe.
Following the Cuban Missile Crisis was Cyprus Crisis in 1964 saw an increase in international tensions in the Eastern Mediterranean. This led to an increase in EC-121M and EA-3B presence in the Levant. Afterwards, a series of eastern Mediterranean crises provided ample opportunities for VQ-2 to perform timely reconnaissance. A major factor in the more direct tactical reconnaissance shipboard role was the rapidly growing and modernizing Soviet Navy that established a continuous presence in the Mediterranean, concurrent with the Cyprus Crisis. In response to these crises, VQ-2 started operating EA-3B detachments aboard a Mediterranean-based carriers like her sister squadron, VQ-1 did in the Pacific. In January 1965, the first planes went aboard the USS Saratoga (CVA-60). Detachments aboard provided support to the Mediterranean deployed carriers.
While operating in Vietnam and the Philippines, the political tensions in the Middle East and North Africa were building. In June 1967, armed conflict erupted into the Six-Day War where Israel defeated its enemies. The loss of the during the war at the hands of the IDF reaffirmed the relative safety of using aircraft for fleet reconnaissance. This incident kept the high tempo of operations in the Eastern Mediterranean despite a cessation of strife in Cyprus. The coup in Libya in 1969 combined with the ever increasing presence of the Soviet Navy to counter the presence of the NATO navies in the Mediterranean kept the command operating at a high tempo.
As the decade came to a close, VQ-2 found itself operating all over Europe from various NATO bases, from US Sixth Fleet carriers, as well as in Southeast Asia.
Cuban Missile Crisis