Air Education and Training Command officials earlier this month merged the training squadrons at Vandenberg AFB, Calif., for missileers and ICBM maintainers. Under the merger, AETC rolled the 392nd Training Squadron, which trained all ICBM missileers, into the 532nd TRS under command-wide streamlining. “The newly merged unit will continue to teach 12 different ICBM and Air Launched Cruise Missile courses,” but with less administrative and support infrastructure, said Col. Michele Edmondson, commander of Vandy’s 381st Training Group, in the base’s July 13 release. “Class structure and teaching requirements will not change,” she stressed. Instead, the new structure will allow ICBM and ALCM trainees “to further capitalize on synergies between the missile maintenance and missile operations career fields, ultimately resulting in more well-rounded maintainers and operators,” added Edmondson. The 392nd TRS stood up in 1994; AETC inactivated the unit on July 2 as part of the merger. (Vandenberg report by SSgt. Erica Picariello)
A provision in the fiscal 2025 defense policy bill will require the Defense Department to include the military occupational specialty of service members who die by suicide in its annual report on suicide deaths, though it remains to be seen how much data the department will actually disclose.