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Exercise Proud Phantom Patch


Squeaker
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Exercise Proud Phantom was a joint exercise in 1980 between Egypt and the the US. I got this patch from someone who was in the 5th Combat Communications Group. I was told that members of the Air Force were given these patches. Does anyone remember this or have any info about the exercise or these patches? Anyone seen this patch before or know where it may have been made.

 

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Johnny Signor

The patch is in the Jerry Polder volumes he put out , 347th TFW Volume 3 page 158, the sticker is for the 5th Comm unit, Polder's book Volume one page 46 has a similar one with the gator's head on it w/earphones

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Thank you Johnny. What does it actually say about this patch and how common are they? I Googled every phrase I could think of to find this patch and came up with nothing. I definitely need to invest in reference materials for all the things I'm getting in to.

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Johnny Signor

Well his book(Volumes) are just an "ID" reference series , no histories about them sorry , but I suggest you try the 347th TFW lineage/history in that era of the mission, it should get you what you need , also try the F-4 E with the 374th as that was what they were flying at the time, try "deployments" , TDY's , good luck , I'm sure someone else of the forum can find you some info too as I know they're good at it !!!!!!!!!!

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Polder's book had it wrong. This is the unit patch for the 78 Fighter Sq of the Egyptian AF at Cairo West. They were/are under the 222 Brigade. They were still wearing this in the 80s when I was there. Maybe they handed them out as a goodwill gesture during the Moody deployment. Anytime we went TDY to a foreign base a lot of swapping went on.

 

Randy

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Johnny Signor

Well , see there ya go , I had it one thing via Jerry's book, and now know it's incorrect , always good to have more than one person working on an emblem !

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Well , see there ya go , I had it one thing via Jerry's book, and now know it's incorrect , always good to have more than one person working on an emblem !

 

To be fair, Jerry's books were done in the "Dark Ages" but were then, and still are great references for USAF patch collectors. Getting those done before the computer age had to be exacting work!

 

Randy

 

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I appreciate the help Randy and Johnny. I found one other image of the patch on the internet, but it was listed as 347th TFW, TDY Egypt. I assume they got their ID from Polder's book as well. I knew that the backing felt funny, I guess if it was made in Egypt (or somewhere close to) that makes sense. It still looks pretty neat, so I'll hang on to it.

 

Even though this was a "training exercise", its still pretty interesting to read about in the old newspaper articles I'm finding online. I've actually found where this operation is specifically mentioned in a book about US/Egypt relations.

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  • 2 years later...

These patches were issued to us just prior to deploying to Egypt for "operation" Proud Phantom summer of 1980. We were awoken at 0700 by SMSGT Beech at the time, he was my squadrons First Sgt. He came barreling through the barracks crashing the lid on top of a garbage can screaming "wake up boys! we're going to Iran!!!" The 347 TFW was being deployed, the 70th AMU white knights ( mine) and the 68th AMU both went across the pond. The 339th stayed Conus. I have no idea what that alligator decal is about, it has nothing to do with the 347 th TFW. We flew F4 D's and E's at the time converting over to the E's. The difference was, the E's had the 20 MM gattling gun housed in the nose of the aircraft where as prior models carried a gun pod on station 5, the centerline rack. We lost 2 aircraft over there, Colonel Rick "Maverick" Davis flew against a Mig 15 that showed up one day, LOTS of brass showed up with that incident too. I still have one of the 5 patches everyone was issued, they also gave us a RDF patch to wear, Rapid Deployment Force....ahhhhh those were the days.

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  • 3 years later...
Jeffrey A. Porter

I remember 2 F-4's crashed while I was at Operation Proud Phantom. I would love to get a Proud Phantom patch like the one displayed above. I was in a Services unit and we were never issued a patch like that, but it would be nice to have as a remembrance. 

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Again, it's actually an Egyptian AF 78 squadron patch. As far as them being handed out, who knows, anything is possible. I wasn't there. I saw it worn by the EAF a few years later on a TDY there. The EAF had a hard time learning how to maintain the complex F-4E. This led to several deployments there and some technical help on the side.

 

Randy

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