New RoKAF Reconnaissance Wing

The Republic of Korea Air Force (RoKAF) decided to upgrade the 39th Tactical Reconnaissance Group (TRG) to Wing status beginning November 2020.

The newly established 39th Reconnaissance Wing (RW) will manage all the recon assets the RoKAF now operates, including the four RQ-4 Global Hawks. According to the press statement, the wing will be stationed at Chungju/Jungwon (K-75) air base, conveniently already the homebase of the 159th Tactical Recon Squadron operating RKF-16Cs. This squadron belonged to both the 19th Fighter Wing and the 39th TRG but is now fully subordinate to the new wing. The unit operating the RQ-4s was rumoured to be the 39th Recon Squadron, but this is now more likely to be another newly numbered squadron.

Also becoming part of the new wing are the four RC-800RA Geumgangs of the 296th TRS. The question is if all the assets of the 296th TRS including the RC-800SIG Baekdu and Falcon 2000S SIGINT will also join the new wing and if so, if all ten aircraft will move to Chungju or remain at Seongnam.

Another aircraft which will operate within the new wing will be a medium-altitude unmanned aircraft system, probably the MUAV program of Korean Air. This programme however ran into some difficulties as it was found out that the anti-icing system was not functioning as projected, resulting in the crash of one prototype and the grounding of the other.

Photos: Scramble Magazine Archive