collocated 305th Bombardment Wing. In the film's plot Stewart's character is assigned to fly B-47s as a vice wing commander at MacDill. In 1959 the wing added a fourth bombardment squadron, the 423d Bombardment Squadron as SAC's B-47 force reached its peak of twenty-seven wings. However, the B-47 soon began to be phased out of SAC's strategic arsenal. The wing began phasing down, with the 423d becoming non-operational in 1961 and the 369th in early 1963. The wing began sending aircraft to Davis–Monthan inventory beginning in late 1962 in anticipation of the wing's planned inactivation. However, inactivation plans were cancelled and the wing moved to replace the 4047th Strategic Wing instead. B-52 Stratofortress era As the B-52 Stratofortress replaced the B-47, the 306th Bombardment was redesignated as the 306th Bombardment Wing, Heavy and moved on paper from MacDill to McCoy Air Force Base, Florida on 1 April 1963, where it replaced the 4047th Strategic Wing. 4047th Strategic Wing The 4047th was organized on 1 July 1961 as a tenant of the 321st Bombardment Wing (BW) and assigned to the 823d Air Division at McCoy as part of SAC's plan to disperse its Boeing B-52 Stratofortress heavy bombers over a larger number of bases, thus making it more difficult for the Soviet Union to knock out the entire fleet with a surprise first strike. In September 1961 the 347th Bombardment Squadron, consisting of 15 Boeing B-52 Stratofortresses moved to McCoy from Westover Air Force Base, Massachusetts where it had been one of the three squadrons of the 99th Bombardment Wing. One third of the wing's aircraft were maintained on fifteen-minute alert, fully fueled, armed and ready for combat to reduce vulnerability to a Soviet missile strike. This was increased to half the wing's aircraft in 1962. The 4047th (and later the 306th) continued to maintain an alert commitment until the 306th was inactivated. Later that same month, the 4047th became the host for McCoy AFB when the 321st Bombardment Wing inactivated and transferred the 813th Medical Group to the wing, along with 39th Munitions Maintenance Squadron to oversee the wing's special weapons. The 4047th became fully organized on 1 July 1962 when the 306th Air Refueling Squadron moved to McCoy from MacDill and began converting to Boeing KC-135 Stratotankers. In 1962, the wing's bombers began to be equipped with the GAM-77 Hound Dog and the GAM-72 Quail air-launched cruise missiles, The