Red Flag 25-2

Red Flag 25-2, Nellis AFB, Las Vegas, NV March 10th – 21st 2025

2025 marked my 4th Red Flag Exercise and I seem to be 50/50 on getting the good weather. I went out the first week this year, Monday was nice, then 2 days of clouds and strong winds. Then Thursday rained in the morning and the afternoon started clearing for recoveries, but the wind was still 25-30 mph right in our face for landings.

This Red Flag was much lighter than previous years. No Recon aircraft flew during the day, the E-3 only went up at night and even the evening launches were later than normal. No F-22’s or F-15E units were part of this.

For the Red Team were all based out of Nellis. I noticed less painted Aggressors out of the 64th AGRS now that the 706th is now based out of there. I only saw 3 painted jets, Splinter, Ghost and Artic, but I did end up seeing the Black Wraith still there on a You Tube video. The 65th AGRS brought their wrapped F-35 out on my last day.

The Foreign Units for this flag consisted of Typhoons from the Saudi Air Force, F-16’s from the Turkish Air Force and F-16E/F’s from the UAE Air Force. Turkey was parked on the far side of the ramp and they usually did Dream Departures instead of Flexing over the raceway. 120th FS out of CO & the VMFA-232 out of Miramar helped round out the Blue Air Team. B-52’s out of Minot were the interdiction team with 5 B-52’s on the ramp.

Tanker support was handled by 4 different units, 6th AW from MacDill, 92nd AW from Fairchild AFB’s. 2 ANG units, 106th ARS from AL and the 108th ARS of IL.

The aircraft and units participating in this flag were:

RED TEAM

F-16C 16th WPS Nellis AFB, NV

F-16C 64th AGRS Nellis AFB, NV

F-35A 65th AGRS Nellis AFB, NV

F-16C 706th AGRS Nellis AFB, NV

BLUE TEAM

F-16C/D 132 Sqn, Turkish Air Force

Typhoon F2 80 Sqn, Saudi Air Force

F-16E/F 4 Sqn, UAE Air Force

F-16C/D 120th FS, Buckley Space Force Base, CO

F/A-18C/D VMFA-232, MCAS Miramar, CA