RAMSTEIN ARMED FORCES DAY 1971

In the seventies it was common that the USAFE bases in West Germany held an “open house” regularly; these days were called “armed forces days”. In June 1971 three bases held their armed forces day, Hahn on Thursday, Ramstein on Saturday and Wiesbaden on Sunday. For me the opportunity to visit them all three together with three of my friends. And as at the same time the yearly NATO excercise “Royal Flush” was organised at Ramstein, I give a description of the armed forced day there.

The first Royal Flush competition was held in 1956 at Lahr, which was then a French Air Force Base. Since then a reconnaissance competition has been held each year in the Central Region. In the first eight years the aircraft and their crews assembled at one base, in the six years thereafter the aircraft were operating from their home bases. Royal Flush XV reverted to the single base concept.

The following Royal Flush competitions were held until 1970:

Royal Flush I               1956    held at French AF Base Lahr, West Germany

Royal Flush II              1957    held at RAF Base Laarbruch, West Germany

Royal Flush III             1958    held at USAF Base Spangdahlem, West Germany

Royal Flush IV             1959    held at KLu Base Eindhoven, The Netherlands

Royal Flush V              1960    held at French AF Base Bremgarten, West Germany

Royal Flush VI             1961    held at Belgian AF Base Beauvechain, Belgium

Royal Flush VII            1962    held at USAF Base Ramstein, West Germany

Royal Flush VIII           1963    held at RAF Base Wildenrath, West Germany

Royal Flush IX             1964    final ceremony at USAF Base Alconbury, United Kingdom

Royal Flush X              1965    final ceremony at GermanAF Base Fürstenfeldbruck, Germany

Royal Flush XI             1966    final ceremony at French AF Base Strasbourg, France

Royal Flush XII            1967    final ceremony at KLu Base Twenthe, The Netherlands

Royal Flush XIII           1968    final ceremony at Canadian AF Base Lahr, West Germany

Royal Flush XIV           1969    final ceremony at RAF Base Brüggen, West Germany

Royal Flush XV            1970    held at KLu Base Deelen, The Netherlands

In 1971 this competition was held at Ramstein and started on 4 June. 84 Competition missions were flown in 12 aircraft waves until the competition ended on 10 June. The competition was held between teams of the Second Allied Tactical Air Force (2ATAF), consisting of 42 sq of the Belgian AF with the RF-84F from Bierset and 306 sq of the KLu with RF-104G from Volkel. 4ATAF had four teams: 17 sq of the USAF with RF-4C from Zweibrücken, 32 sq of the USAF with RF-4C from Alconbury, 38 sq of the USAF with RF-4C from Ramstein and 439 sq of the Canadian AF with CF-104 from Bad Sollingen. Guest team was 2/33 sq of the French AF with Mirage IIIR from Strassbourg.

As monitors and chase aircraft some TF-104G of the West German AF and Canberras of the RAF were used.

Before the participating a/c would leave Ramstein, the open day would be held on 12 June. I arrived in the afternoon of the day before and noted some visitors, coming in for the static show. A big surprise was the arrival of two F-5A and an F-5B in USAF dress. The single seaters were on their delivery flight to Greece and the dual was on its way to Iran. Fortunately all three a/c were on the static show the next day.

And as the famous team “Thunderbirds” were on a European tour, they were the highlight of the show with their 6 F-4E Phantoms.

I had some marvelous days with the USAFE!