52d Expeditionary Flying Training Squadron The 52d Expeditionary Flying Training Squadron ( 52 EFTS ) is part of the Iraq Training and Advisory Mission - Air Force ( ITAM - AF ) and is based at Contingency Operating Base ( COB ) Speicher , Tikrit , Iraq . It operates T - 6A aircraft conducting flight training for members of the Iraqi Air Force . C - 172 and C - 208 aircraft will be moved from Kirkuk Air Base to COB Speicher in spring 2010 to be incorporated in the flying training program . Mission . Train , educate and advise professional Iraqi Airmen in order to build the institutional capacity to conduct credible fixed and rotary wing flight training for the Iraqi Air Force . History . Activated in early 1940 as part of the pre - World War II build up of the United States Army Air Corps after the breakout of war in Europe . Assigned to the GHQ Northeast Air District , equipped with B - 18 Bolos ; later early model B - 17C / D heavy bombers . After the Pearl Harbor Attack . flew antisubmarine patrol missions in the Caribbean from , January – June 1942 . Returned to the United States in June 1942 and was assigned to II Bomber Command . Was an Operational Training ( OTU ) and later Replacement Training Unit ( RTU ) for B - 17 heavy bomber units and replacement personnel until March 1944 with the end of Heavy Bomber training . B - 29 Superfortress operations against Japan . Re - designated on 1 April 1944 as a B - 29 Superfortress Very Heavy bombardment squadron . When training was completed moved to North Field Guam in the Mariana Islands of the Central Pacific Area in January 1945 and assigned to XXI Bomber Command , Twentieth Air Force . It ' s mission was the strategic bombardment of the Japanese Home Islands and the destruction of its war - making capability . Flew " shakedown " missions against Japanese targets on Moen Island , Truk , and other points in the Carolines and Marianas . The squadron began combat missions over Japan on 25 February 1945 with a firebombing mission over Northeast Tokyo . The squadron continued to participate in wide area firebombing attack , but the first ten day blitz resulting in the Army Air Forces running out of incendiary bombs . Until then the squadron flew conventional strategic bombing missions using high explosive bombs . The squadron continued attacking urban areas with incendiary raids until the end of the war in August 1945 , attacking major Japanese cities , causing massive destruction of urbanized areas . Also conducted raids against strategic objectives , bombing aircraft factories , chemical plants , oil refineries , and other targets in Japan . The squadron flew its last combat missions on 14 August when hostilities ended . Afterwards , its B 29s carried relief supplies to Allied prisoner of war camps in Japan and Manchuria Squadron remained in Western Pacific , although largely demobilized in the fall of 1945 . Some aircraft scrapped on Tinian ; others flown to storage depots in the United States . Remained as a paper unit assigned to Twentieth Air Force until inactivated in 1946 . Undergraduate Pilot Training . It conducted undergraduate pilot training from , 1972 – 1977 and 1990 - 1997 . The 52d was reactivated in March 2007 as the first ever US Air Force expeditionary flying training squadron and the first flying training squadron activated in a combat zone . Its mission is to train , educate and advice Iraqi airmen to conduct undergraduate and instructor pilot training for the Iraqi Air Force .