page_title: Air Forces Panama
section_title: Reorganizations
hierarchical_section_title: Air Forces Panama / History / Reorganizations
caption_attribution_description: English: At Davis Monthan Air Force Base
context_page_description: Air Forces Panama is an inactive United States Air Force headquarters. It was assigned to Tactical Air Command, most recently to Twelfth Air Force. Its headquarters were located at Albrook Air Force Station and Howard Air Force Base in the Panama Canal Zone. The organization was inactivated on 11 February 1992.
  The unit was activated as the USAF Southern Air Division in 1976 to replace the United States Southern Command Air Forces as the USAF component of United States armed forces in the Panama Canal Zone. Southern Command Air Forces was simultaneously disestablished as a Major Command and USAF responsibility for South and Central America was transferred to Tactical Air Command. It was also renamed the 830th Air Division before receiving its final designation. After the transfer of the Panama Canal Zone to Panama, its remaining responsibilities were transferred to the 24th Wing, one of its former components.
  The unit served during a period when USAF presence in Panama was gradually reduced, with some of its functions and organizations transferred to locations in the United States or discontinued.
context_section_description: In January 1987, the unit's command relationships were shuffled and it focused on its mission in Panama, losing its responsibility for managing relationships with Latin American countries as it was reassigned to Twelfth Air Force.  At the same time, its 24th Composite Wing was inactivated and the wing's subordinate units at Howard Air Force Base were assigned directly to the division and Col Harold E. Watson, the 24th Wing's commander became the division commander. .
  Much of the January 1987 reorganization was reversed two years later, when the name of the division changed to the 830th Air Division and the 24th Composite Wing was again activated.  The division also became United States Southern Command Air Forces's forward element with the reorganization, ending the previous arrangement in which the division commander was also the deputy commander of that command.  The 630th Aircraft Control and Warning Squadron, which had been activated in 1988 and assigned to the division to manage the Caribbean Basin Radar Network Southern Regional Operations Center was transferred to the 24th Wing.  Three months later, the division returned to Albrook Air Force Station from Howard after an absence of almost twelve years.
  1990 saw continuing reductions in the division's footprint in Panama as its Directorate of Latin American Affairs moved to Twelfth Air Force at Bergstrom Air Force Base and the Permanent Secretariat of the System of Cooperation Among the American Air Forces joined the Inter-American Air Forces Academy at Homestead.
  In February 1991, the division became Air Forces Panama and once again assumed responsibility for the subordinate units of the 24th Composite Wing, which was inactivated.  The takeover of the 24th Wing's responsibilities resulted in a move of headquarters to the 24th's former location at Howard.  The assignment of the 24th Tactical Air Support Squadron lasted only two weeks, as it was inactivated on 1 March.   The 24th Squadron was the last unit in the regular Air Force to operate the OA-37.
  Air Forces Panama was inactivated in February 1992 when responsibility for its area was assumed by Twelfth Air Force and it was replaced in Panama by the 24th Wing, which was once again activated and its commander, Brigadier General David Oakes became the commander of the wing.
caption: C-27A from Howard AFB
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