No stranger to terror

It has come under rocket attacks many times, as strict security is in place at the strategic installation

PESHAWAR: The Badhaber airbase is not immune to terrorism. Many vehicles and buses of Pakistan Air Force have been attacked on way to this base, which was established by the Americans in the 1960s.

Back in the day, it was used for flying the world-famous, high-altitude spy planes U-2 over the then Soviet Union at the peak of the Cold War. The base remained under the control of the US with the last U-2 flight from Pakistan over Soviet Union taking off from the same base in 1962. The plane was shot down with a surface-to-air missile, creating an international crisis.

However, the Americans were expelled from the base after the 1965 Pak-India war when the US placed a weapons embargo on Pakistan and the government retaliated by closing all the bases used by the American CIA.

The base, which houses the Pakistan Air Force’s radar station, is situated on both sides of a main road; thus Inquilab Road divides it in two sections.

Is has come under rocket attacks many times, as strict security is in place at the strategic installation.


Published in The Express Tribune, September 19^th, 2015.