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Released: April 21, 2003

F-117 pilots receive Distinguished Flying Cross for first strike mission

OPERATION IRAQI FREEDOM (ACCNS) -- Two F-117A Nighthawk pilots from the 379th Air Expeditionary Wing at a forward-deployed desert air base in the Middle East were awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross recently for extraordinary achievement while flying in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom.

On the opening day of the air campaign Lt. Col. David Toomey and Maj. Mark Hoehn flew the first strike mission which targeted a senior Iraqi leadership compound in Baghdad where intelligence sources believed Saddam Hussein and other top regime leaders were staying. President George W. Bush approved the target.

The president told the nation in a televised statement that on his orders coalition forces had begun "striking selected targets of military importance to undermine Saddam Hussein's ability to wage war."

The next day Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld told a full pressroom at the Pentagon that the mission was the first strike of the war to liberate Iraq and that the U.S. Central Command exercised flexibility in the strike by taking into account the "realities that you find in the world."

The pilots launched on the strike less than two hours after being notified of the mission, with minimal planning material available. They met up with aerial refueling and electronic warfare aircraft on their way to Baghdad and coordinated the many details of the mission elements they needed in the air to support the attack formation.

Major Hoehn faced another challenge when his aircraft developed a malfunction during the flight and had degraded communications ability. He was able to handle the aircraft through superior airmanship and was still able to achieve complete surprise in the heavily defended target area.

Colonel Toomey also had to overcome a weapons system malfunction as daylight approached in the target area and the two aircraft entered into the heart of an Iraqi Integrated Air Defense System with more than fifty strategic surface-to-air missile systems and more than two hundred anti-aircraft artillery sites defending it.

Despite the malfunctions, both pilots penetrated the defenses and placed enhanced precision munitions exactly on target within one second of the planned time over target.

Their performance in carrying out the mission was "in the finest traditions of our Air Force," said Lt. Gen. T. Michael "Buzz" Moseley, the Combined Forces Air Component Commander, on presenting the medals. They "made us all very proud," he said.

This mission opened the air war by striking at the heart of the Iraqi regime and began a continuous stream of what now numbers more than 42,000 sorties.