Mike Crapo: “GEN H.H. ``Hap'' Arnold, USAF, once said, ``A modern, autonomous, and thoroughly trained Air Force in being at all times…”

“GEN H.H. ``Hap'' Arnold, USAF, once said, ``A modern, autonomous, and thoroughly trained Air Force in being at all times will not alone be sufficient, but without it there can be no national security.'' It is in the name of our national security that today I recognize the U.S. Air Force's 60th anniversary. One hundred years ago, Henry H. ``Hap'' Arnold graduated from the U.S. Military Academy. That same year, in August 1907, the U.S. Army Signal Corps established an aeronautical division to oversee ``military ballooning, air machines and all kindred subjects.'' Arnold went on to become the Chief of the Army Air Corps, and, upon the creation of the U.S. Air Force as a separate branch of the military in 1947, a year after General Arnold's retirement, Congress appointed him to the rank of five star general--the first and only in the history of the Air Force. The U.S. Air Force was created by Congress to ``be organized, trained, and equipped primarily for prompt and sustained offensive and defensive air operations.'' ``[It] shall be responsible for the preparation of the air forces necessary for the effective prosecution of war except as otherwise assigned and, in accordance with integrated joint mobilization plans, for the expansion of the peacetime components of the Air Force to meet the needs of war.'' Today, on the anniversary of the National Security Act of 1947, we celebrate 60 years of an independent Air Force.”