Royal Air Force Bentwaters

Royal Air Force Bentwaters or RAF Bentwaters, now Bentwaters Parks, was a Royal Air Force station in Suffolk, England, located about 80 mi (130 km) northeast of London and 10 mi (16 km) east-northeast of Ipswich, near Woodbridge. The name derived from cottages that stood on the site at the time of runway construction in 1943. The station was jointly operated by the Royal Air Force during World War II and by the United States Air Force under NATO arrangements during the Cold War, and became the site of one of the most well-documented UFO encounters in military history: the Rendlesham Forest incident of December 1980. At the time of the incident, the base allegedly housed tactical nuclear weapons without the knowledge of the British public, a fact reportedly used to apply classification pressure to witnesses.

The 81st Fighter Wing remained at RAF Bentwaters for over 40 years during the Cold War era, operating from 1951 to 1993. Bentwaters and RAF Woodbridge were known by Americans as the "Twin Bases." The facility hosted two notable UFO incidents: the 13–14 August 1956 Lakenheath–Bentwaters nighttime radar and visual sighting, and the alleged December 1980 Rendlesham Forest incident.

Today the site functions as Bentwaters Parks with offices, warehouses, TV/film production facilities, and the Bentwaters Cold War Museum.

History

Second World War

Construction began in 1942 as Royal Air Force Butley for RAF Bomber Command use. On 28 January 1943 the station was renamed Royal Air Force Bentwaters and was opened for operational use in April 1944. That December, control transferred to No. 11 Group RAF Fighter Command.

RAF squadrons stationed at Bentwaters between 1944 and 1945 included:

• No. 64 Squadron RAF (29 December 1944 – 15 August 1945): North American Mustang III
• No. 65 Squadron RAF (15 May – 13 August 1945): Mustang IV
• No. 118 Squadron RAF (15 December 1944 – 11 August 1945): Mustang III
• No. 126 Squadron RAF (30 December 1944 – 5 September 1945): Mustang III/IV
• No. 129 Squadron RAF (11 December 1944 – 26 May 1945): Mustang III, upgraded to Spitfire IXE
• No. 165 Squadron RAF (15 December 1944 – 29 May 1945): Mustang III, then Spitfire IXE
• No. 234 Squadron RAF (1944–45)
• No. 245 Squadron RAF

Support units stationed at Bentwaters included No. 226 Operational Conversion Unit RAF, No. 7 Fighter Command Servicing Unit, and the No. 2707, No. 2791, and No. 2839 Squadrons of the RAF Regiment.

Post-war RAF use (1945–1946)

• No. 56 Squadron RAF (1 April – 16 September 1946): Gloster Meteor F.3
• No. 74 Squadron RAF (2 June – 9 June 1946): Meteor F.3
• No. 124 Squadron RAF (5 October 1945 – 18 February 1946, and 20 March – 1 April 1946): Meteor F.3

USAF use (1951–1993)

Control of Bentwaters was transferred to the United States Air Force on 16 March 1951, with USAFE designation as a primary installation on 7 September 1951. The 7506th Air Support Group was assigned to Bentwaters with the mission of bringing the facility up to NATO standards.

Early USAF units at the base included the 9th Air Rescue Squadron (July 1951 – November 1952), which flew the Boeing SB-29 'Super Dumbo' for air-sea rescue missions, and the 7554th Target Tow Flight (March–December 1952), which flew the Stinson L-5E and Douglas TB-26C for aerial target practice supporting NATO gunnery training.

81st Tactical Fighter Wing

The 81st Fighter-Interceptor Wing became the new host unit at Bentwaters in September 1951. Originally equipped with North American F-86A Sabres, in early 1965 the 81st began operating F-4D Phantoms. This continued through early 1979, when the wing received and began operating the A-10A Thunderbolt II single-seat attack aircraft, affectionately known as the "Warthog."

Forward Operating Locations were established in West Germany at Sembach Air Base (1 September 1978), Leipheim, Alhorn, and Nörvenich, with two additional classified reserve FOLs in northern and southern Germany. A-10s and support resources routinely rotated to these FOLs from RAF Bentwaters for training and Tactical Evaluations. The C-130 rotating to detachments was nicknamed "The Klong."

Post-Cold War

With the end of the Cold War, the USAF presence was phased down:

• The 510th Tactical Fighter Squadron transferred to the 52nd Fighter Wing at Spangdahlem Air Base on 4 January 1993, was inactivated there on 1 February 1994, and was reactivated at Aviano Air Base as a Block 40 F-16C/D squadron on 23 March 1994.
• The 92nd Tactical Fighter Squadron was inactivated 31 March 1993; aircraft were distributed to Air National Guard squadrons.

The last A-10 aircraft departed Bentwaters on 23 March 1993, and the 81st Tactical Fighter Wing was inactivated on 1 July 1993.

The Rendlesham Forest incident

Main article:

Rendlesham Forest incident

Over the nights of December 26–28, 1980, United States Air Force security personnel at RAF Bentwaters and its companion station RAF Woodbridge encountered a series of unexplained aerial phenomena in Rendlesham Forest, a pine plantation between the two bases. On the first night, Staff Sergeant Jim Penniston, Airman John Burroughs, and Airman Ed Cabansag responded to a report of a downed aircraft and reportedly found a triangular-shaped craft resting on the forest floor, described as warm to the touch and bearing unusual symbols on its surface. Penniston sketched the symbols in his notebook at the scene. He later reported, under regression hypnosis, allegedly receiving a binary code message from the craft that, when decoded, stated: we are you from the future. We're having problems with reproduction.

The Halt memo and audio recording

Lieutenant Colonel Charles Halt, deputy base commander at Bentwaters, was a skeptic who became a direct witness on the third night of the incident. He carried a hand-held tape recorder into the forest and made an audio recording as the events unfolded around him, describing objects allegedly firing pencil-thin beams of light down into the nuclear weapons storage area. Halt subsequently wrote an official memorandum — later known as the Halt memo — to the UK Ministry of Defence, which became one of the most notable government documents in UFO research when it was released under Freedom of Information requests.

Defense significance and suppression

Larry Warren, one of the security personnel present during the incident, testified at the National Press Club Disclosure Project conference in 2001 that the events were of extreme defense significance to both the US and UK governments and remained classified despite their extraordinary nature. Photographs taken by Penniston were reportedly never returned to him, with the Air Force claiming they had not come out. The incident has been assessed by some researchers as among the most notable UFO incidents in military history because of the quality of the witnesses, the existence of the Halt audio tape and memo, and the alleged involvement of nuclear weapons.

Time-traveler hypothesis

Michael P. Masters, a biological anthropologist and author of Identified Flying Objects, cites the Penniston binary message — and Penniston's regression-hypnosis claim that the beings said they could only travel 40 to 60,000 years into the past before being unable to return — as evidence that the Bentwaters craft were piloted by humans from the far future rather than extraterrestrials, allegedly visiting the past to harvest genetic material to correct reproductive problems caused by genetic engineering errors in their own timeline.

ET base registry

Elena Danaan's 2020 contact-information compendium A Gift from the Stars lists RAF Bentwaters within its global registry of allegedly active non-human and joint human–ET installations in England, alongside Menwith Hill, Rudloe Manor, and sites in Wiltshire, Bath, Staffordshire, and Suffolk — purportedly indicating in Danaan's informants' framework that the base retained operational significance beyond the 1980 incident for non-human actors in the United Kingdom.

Current uses

Bentwaters Cold War Museum

In 2003, work commenced on the Bentwaters Cold War Museum (BCWM), based in the former USAF hardened command post on the airfield. Restored features include the main "war operations room" and "Battle cabin," the BT telephone exchange room, and decontamination showers and airlock. Exhibition rooms cover the history of RAF Bentwaters from World War II until the base closed. As of May 2022, the museum was undergoing refurbishment.

Private tractor museum

Bill Kemball from Suffolk moved his tractor and equipment collection to a building on-site. As of October 2023, the museum is only available to visit by appointment, but plans are being made to make it more available.

Television and media

The 2005 reality television series Space Cadets was largely shot at RAF Bentwaters. The base was disguised as a Russian spaceport to maintain the illusion that the contestants were preparing for a space mission in Russia.

In 2008 an episode of the History Channel's UFO Hunters titled "Military vs. UFOs" focused on RAF Bentwaters' 1956 and 1980 UFO incidents.

The 2021 James Nunn action movie One Shot, set on an Eastern European prison island, was filmed at Bentwaters.

See also

• Jim Penniston
• John Burroughs
• Charles Halt
• UFO incidents in the United Kingdom
• Lakenheath-Bentwaters incident
• List of former Royal Air Force stations
• List of former United States Air Force installations in the United Kingdom

References

Sources

• Birtles, Philip (2012). UK Airfields of the Cold War. Midland Publishing. ISBN 978-1-85780-346-4. ＋{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link)
• Falconer, J (2012). RAF Airfields of World War 2. UK: Ian Allan Publishing. ISBN 978-1-85780-349-5. ＋{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link)
• Jefford, C.G. (1988). RAF Squadrons, a Comprehensive Record of the Movement and Equipment of all RAF Squadrons and their Antecedents since 1912. Shrewsbury, Shropshire, UK: Airlife Publishing. ISBN 1-84037-141-2. ＋{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link)
• Ravenstein, Charles A. (1984). Air Force Combat Wings Lineage and Honors Histories 1947–1977. Office of Air Force History. ＋{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link)
• Endicott, Judy G. (1995). USAF Active Flying, Space, and Missile Squadrons as of 1 October 1995. Office of Air Force History. ＋{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link)
• Menard, David W. Before Centuries. USAFE Fighters 1948-1959. ＋{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link)
• Martin, Patrick (1994). Tail Code: The Complete History of USAF Tactical Aircraft Tail Code Markings. ＋{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link)
• Rogers, Brian (2005). United States Air Force Unit Designations Since 1978. ＋{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link)

External links

• Media related to Category:Royal Air Force Bentwaters at Wikimedia Commons
• Bentwaters Cold War Museum
• Bentwaters Park

This article incorporates material from the Wikipedia article "RAF Bentwaters", as of 2026-04-27, released under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License.