Records kept by the Air Force Historical Research Agency helped lead the Air Force to award a Distinguished Flying Cross posthumously to 1st Lt. Louis Valls earlier this year for his actions piloting a B-26 bomber during World War II, according to a May 20 report in the Maxwell/Gunter Dispatch. Lt. Col. Peter Guerra, a great nephew of Valls, researched AFHRA records while attending Air Command and Staff College at Maxwell AFB, Ala. He found information on a January 1944 mission, the last for Valls, in which he instructed his crew to bail out after his aircraft was severely damaged before reaching its target in Italy; Valls stayed with the aircraft to complete the mission. Guerra coupled his AFHRA data with survivor accounts and a lawmaker endorsement to produce a package that survived the Air Force awards process. (Air University report by Scott Knuteson)
A Defense Department team is on the ground in Ukraine assessing what the country needs to protect itself from air, naval, electronic, and cyber warfare threats as Russian troops gather on multiple fronts, a senior Ukrainian defense official told Air Force Magazine, describing an emphasis on what assistance can be…