Presidential support seamless effort Published Feb. 7, 2014 By Sandra Pishner 446th Airlift Wing Public Affairs MCCHORD FIELD, Wash. -- One of the many missions assigned to the Air Force is presidential support. When the president travels, you can bet the Air Force is behind the scenes making it happen. And we're not talking just about Air Force One, the iconic presidential aircraft. If the president's destination doesn't support the need for fuel, aircraft stairs, cargo loading, or any other requirement, the Air Force will make sure those requirements are met. Presidential travel support is no easy task, despite how transparent the Air Force makes it look. The support provided is made possible by the seamless integration of active duty, Air Force Reserve and Air National Guard forces. "It's interesting from my perspective because it's a level of effort that is fail safe. It's going to go, and it's going to go right, and there is no margin of error with respect to it," said Col. Bruce Bowers, 446th Airlift Wing commander. Bowers spent time in December serving as the director of mobility forces, an air liaison, for the president's trip to South Africa for Nelson Mandela's memorial. "For that to happen, it requires a tremendous effort by the entire team across the Air Force," said Bowers. "You don't get a mulligan. For it to be that kind of 100 percent level of success, the average Airman has to work very hard because things happen. What's amazing to me is that it happens so transparent to the day-to-day operations. There's not a big sign out saying 'hey we're doing something different.' The risk when you have those kinds of things going on is you have the perception that it's easy. Nothing could be further from the truth." From the time Bowers got notice of the mission, to the time the president actually travelled was less than a week. "We went from having nothing in place, nothing available, nothing there to 'Yes sir; we have multiple contingences in place.' The fuel, the stairs, the presidential vehicles, the security personnel - the delivering of the infrastructure kicks in," said Bowers. As the director of mobility forces, Bowers fills the role of liaison for U.S. Transportation Command, a supporting combatant command. In this case, the commands supported were U.S. European Command and U.S. Africa Command. "What is moved and how it's moved is TRANSCOM's responsibility. The supported combatant commander is just worried about getting the stuff there. That's where the liaison comes into play," explains Bowers. "When the list spits out, other than the time it's supposed to get there, there really isn't a schedule of what goes first, etcetera. The liaison helps AFRICOM develop a flow. It has to be sequenced so, for instance, if we're moving in people, we have to make sure first that there is lodging and food for them. And if lodging is something we have to provide, like tents, then that has be sequenced early. "What I see is when that goes off, I know a lot of great Airmen have done heroic things, as they have multiple times, but make it look really easy," Bowers said. "It looks so easy that you kind of dismiss the challenge." That challenge involved about 100 sorties, with maybe 20 to 30 aircraft. Tankers, helicopters, cargo aircraft - all those aircraft played a choreographed role in making sure this no fail mission went off. It's a total force effort, with not only the active Air Force, but the Guard and the Reserve. Whether it's supporting with tankers, with C-17s, or providing aircrew or security forces and aerial porters to support this movement, the whole process is seamless. "We have some crews that flew during this time frame, multiple airplanes from McChord, some support agencies like maintenance, porters, and other support elements that kicked in," said Bowers. "It really validates this concept of total force. Nobody wears a sign that says I'm a Reservist, or I'm a Guardsman, or I'm active duty. Everyone is there to support the president of the United States and support this nation."