Hobby Master 1/72 HH1202 Boeing AH-64D Longbow (Late) 05-7011 1st Attack Recon Bttn Tikrit Iraq 2010

In the early 1970’s the US Army wanted a replacement for the AH-1 Cobra so companies submitted proposals. In July 1973 the list was shortened to Hughes and Bell with each building a prototype in 1975. The Army selected the Hughes helicopter because its landing gear was more stable and the main rotor was more damage tolerant. In 1981 3 pre-production AH-64As were given to the Army for testing and named Apache. The Apache went into production in 1982 and has evolved into one of the deadly machines over the battle field.

On March 17, 2010 U.S. Secretary of Defense announced that on September 1, 2010 the U.S. presence in Iraq would be changed from “Operation Iraqi Freedom” to “Operation New Dawn”. The U.S. would begin a withdrawal of large portions of its force from Iraq and move them to Kuwait. This would begin the hand over of the defense of Iraq to Iraqi troops that had been trained by NATO forces. Along with trucks and CH-47 Chinooks AH-64 Apache Gun-ships would provided aerial protection against any attacks.