The Air Resupply And Communications Service (ARCS) is an inactive United States Air Force organization. It was assigned to Andrews Air Force Base, Maryland. Established during the Korean War, the mission of ARCS was providing the Air Force an unconventional warfare capability during the 1950s. It was inactivated in 1954, but elements continued to operate until the reactivation of air commando units by the Kennedy Administration in 1962.
Mission
The mission of ARCS was: Introducing, evacuating and supplying guerrilla-type units in enemy occupied territory. Storing and packaging psychological warfare propaganda materials and storing and packing supplies used by guerrilla-type personnel. Housing, supplying, administering, training and briefing guerilla-type personnel. Composing and reproducing psychological warfare propaganda. Composing and transmitting by radio, psychological warfare propaganda. Providing and maintaining communications circuits and communications security for the transmission and reception of intelligence material and for the analysis of such intelligence material. Perform such other functions as may be assigned.
History
Background
During World War II unconventional warfare was carried out in every major combat theater by the United States. Clandestine operations, ranging from leaflet dropping to parachuting OSS agents inside enemy-controlled territory, to "Air Commando" units in the China-Burma-India Theater played an essential role in securing victory against Nazi Germany and the Japanese Empire. With the demobilization of the armed forces after the war, most of this capability was lost as the Air Force concentrated on the acquisition of jet aircraft and trying to maintain combat ready forces with austere budgets.
With the outbreak of the Cold War it became apparent to US leadership that the Soviet Union under Joseph Stalin could not be appeased, persuaded, or otherwise convinced to respect the territorial rights of its neighbor nations. The United States Air Force (USAF) and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) had been created by the National Security Act of 1947 and activated a short time later.
Strategists in the Pentagon reasoned that the next war would be fought and won (or lost) in the minds of those fighting it. Subsequently, the Psychological Warfare Division was established at the Air Staff in February 1948. By definition psychological warfare in 1948 was synonymous with special operations as defined during World War II. The new Psychological Warfare Division (also known as PW) division immediately set about to develop plans to fight this "new" type of warfare, which came to be known as psychological warfare, or PSYWAR for short.
In 1950 Air Staff/PW created special operations wings devoted to the PSYWAR mission to support United States objectives in the Cold War. All Air Commando-designated units had been inactivated after World War II, however the Korean War underscored the need for a substantial Air Force unconventional warfare capability. Despite the urgency of the war, it took eight months before the Air Resupply and Communications Service (ARCS) was activated by HQ USAF at Andrews AFB, Maryland on 23 February 1951. Assigned to Military Air Transport Service (MATS) the plan called for three flying wings, equipped with a mixture of B-29 Superfortress bombers, twin-engine SA-16 amphibians, C-119 and C-54 transports and H-19 helicopters to be established to perform the psychological warfare and unconventional warfare missions. Although MATS was the official parent command of ARCS, operations were directed from the Pentagon Psychological Warfare Division, Directorate of Plans, HQ, USAF.
MATS established ARCS Wings as follows: The 580th and 582d Air Resupply and Communications Wings were established to support operations throughout the Middle East, as well as Western and Soviet-Controlled Europe, and the Soviet Union. Both were activated at Mountain Home AFB, Idaho. The 580th in 1951 and the 582d a year later. After activation and training, both were deployed overseas; the 580th to Wheelus Air Base, Libya, and the 582s to RAF Molesworth, England. The 581st Air Resupply and Communications Wing was activated at Mountain Home AFB in July 1951 and deployed to Clark Air Base, Philippines shortly afterwards. Its mission was PSYWAR operations in Korea.