page_title: 456th Fighter-Interceptor Squadron
section_title: Cold War Air Defense
hierarchical_section_title: 456th Fighter-Interceptor Squadron / History / Cold War Air Defense
caption_attribution_description: English: 456th Fighter-Interceptor Squadron North American F-86L-45-NA Sabres 28th Air Division, Castle AFB, California, February 1958 Identified Aircraft: 52-4197, 52-4176
context_page_description: The 456th Fighter-Interceptor Squadron is an inactive United States Air Force unit. Its last assignment was with the Air Defense Command San Francisco Air Defense Sector stationed at Oxnard AFB, California. It was inactivated on 18 July 1968.
context_section_description: It was reactivated in 1954 under Air Defense Command as an air defense interceptor squadron, and stationed at George AFB, California for the air defense of Southern California. It was equipped with F-86D Sabres.  In August 1955 the unit was inactivated, and was reactivated again at Castle AFB in October 1955 with F-86D Sabre Interceptors.  In 1957 it began re-equipping with the North American F-86L Sabre, an improved version of the F-86D which incorporated the Semi Automatic Ground Environment, or SAGE computer-controlled direction system for intercepts.  The service of the F-86L was brief, since by the time the last F-86L conversion was delivered, the type was already being phased out in favor of supersonic interceptors.
  The squadron upgraded in June 1958 into supersonic F-102A Delta Daggers.  In September 1959 it received F-106 Delta Darts.
  On 22 October 1962, before President John F. Kennedy told Americans that missiles were in place in Cuba, the squadron dispersed one third of its force, equipped with nuclear tipped missiles to Fresno Air Terminal at the start of the Cuban Missile Crisis. These planes returned to Castle after the crisis.
  The squadron moved to Oxnard AFB on 18 July 1968 and was inactivated the same day, transferring its mission, personnel and equipment to the 437th Fighter-Interceptor Squadron.
caption: 456th FIS North American F-86L Sabres at Castle AFB, California, February 1958
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