Missile Badge
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The Missile Badge is a military decoration of the United States Air Force which was first created in the 1960s. The badge recognizes those commissioned officers and enlisted personnel of the US Air Force who have qualified as ICBM silo personnel and have been trained in the launching of landbased nuclear weapons under the direction of the National Command Authority. Originally known as the Missileman Badge, the Missile Badge later became known as the Missilier Badge or more informally the Pocket Rocket and is still often referred to by this name.
The Missile Badge is awarded as a permanent decoration upon a service member’s graduation from missile operator training (if awarded to an officer) or from maintenance tech school if awarded to an enlisted service member. The badge is worn on the lower left pocket and is the largest of the U.S. Air Force specialty badges. It is also one of the few United States military badges which is not transferable between services, meaning that a qualified Missile crew member, who transfers to another branch of the United States armed forces cannot display the Missile Badge on another service uniform.
The Missile Badge is issued in three degrees being basic, senior and master. The level of degree is determined by a service member’s years of missile duty in the Air Force and also the level of command responsibility held within the Air Force missile units. The Senior Missile Badge is denoted by a star above the decoration with the Master Missile Badge displays a star and wreath.
The operations designator is awarded to both commissioned officers and enlisted personnel who are certified as members of a missile launching team. The Missile Badge without operations designator is awarded to those qualified to perform maintenance on the weapon system, but are not involvoed with the actual launch procedures. Most Air Force members, who have earned the Missile Badge with operations designator, also earn the Combat Readiness Medal after two years of qualified service serving in an active missile solo. In recent years all personnel qualifying for the operations designator receive the Space and Missile Badge as the missile operations function (13SxC)is a subset of the Space Operations career field (13S), and indeed a few years ago the remaining 3 missile wings were renamed space wings.
In 2004, the Air Force Force Space Command Commander, General Lord, announced the introduction of a new space badge. The new combined Space and Missile Operations Badge, informally known as "spwings" (SPace WINGS), "Space Boomerang", or "Space Blade" replaced the Missile Badge for operators. This new badge is rumored to have infuriated the vast majority of current and former space and missile operators by eliminating a historically significant badge of honor. In addition, the new badge is no longer limited to pure space and missile operators/maintainers, but is also awarded to 61XX, 62XX and 63XX who have performed space/ICBM acquisition duties, even if they were non-operational in nature.
After deactivation of the Titan missile system, enlisted personnel were no longer authorized to earn the Missile Badge with operations designator. However, all enlisted personnel assigned to nuclear silo maintenance duty are eligible to wear the standard Missile Badge (without the operations designator) if qualified under the military specialties 411XX or the new 2M0XX field. From 1991-early 2006, the Missile Badge was the standard specialty badge for the above two career fields.
