Pacific Air Forces Panther Pack participate in exercise Cope West
On 13 June 2021, six Wild Weasel F-16CM Block 50 Fighting Falcons from the 13th Fighter Squadron flew to Indonesia. Resorting under the 35th Fighter Wing at Misawa Air Base (Japan), the 13th Fighter Squadron, also known as Panther Pack, will participate in Cope West 2021 (CW21) at Roesmin Nurjadin Air Force Base, Pekanbaru, Riau (Indonesia).
Hosted by the Tentara Nasional Indonesia - Angkatan Udara (TNI-AU, Indonesian Air Force) from 14 June until 25 June 2021, CW21 will see approximately 100 US service members participating in the bilateral field training exercise with service members from the TNI-AU.
The exercise will involve six F-16s from USAF's Pacific Air Command and six F-16s from the TNI-AU. Lt Col Jordan Kahn, who recently took over command of the Panther Pack on 21 May 2021, stated that Cope West is a bilateral exercise set up in which both forces could become more familiar with each other.
CW21 will be the first iteration of the exercise since the COVID-19 pandemic began. The last Cope West, CW19, saw six 14th Fighter Squadron F-16s from Misawa participating at Sam Ratulangi International Airport, near Manado (Indonesia). See the Scramble Magazine news item of 27 June 2019.
The following 13th Fighter Squadron WW coded F-16CMs are now at Roesmin Nurjadin Air Base (Indonesia):
Photos by @SuneKuma01 (Twitter)