RAF Upper Heyford

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Royal Air Force Upper Heyford or more simply RAF Upper Heyford is a former Royal Air Force station located 5 miles (8 km) north-west of Bicester near the village of Upper Heyford, Oxfordshire, England. In the Second World War the airfield was used by RAF Bomber Command. During the Cold War, Upper Heyford was one of the former RAF bases chosen to house the United States Air Force Strategic Air Command (SAC) nuclear-capable bombers on 90-day TDY (Temporary Duty) deployments until 1959, SAC Operation Reflex deployments from 1959 until 1965, from 1966 United States Air Forces in Europe (USAFE) tactical reconnaissance aircraft, and from 1970 General Dynamics F-111 Aardvark strike aircraft. Work on clearing the site began on 1 June 1918 when a detachment of the Canadian Forestry Corps arrived after completing similar work at RAF Hooton Park, near Ellesmere Port. The station was opened in July 1918 by the Royal Air Force. In November the Canadian Air Force was formed at Upper Heyford, by renumbering two RAF squadrons and posting in Canadian pilots and observers, and groundcrew trained at RAF Halton. After the British government cut funding for the squadrons in June 1919, the Canadian government decided that a permanent peacetime air force was not needed and so both squadrons ceased operations. Consequently by mid-1920 the aerodrome had closed, and the land returned to the owners, New College, Oxford, to lease out for agricultural use. In 1923 there were concerns over the French occupation of the Rhineland after Germany had defaulted on the payment of war reparations. Upper Heyford was one of the sites chosen for a new strategic bomber force capable of attacking targets in France.