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AMC commander to retire in Wednesday ceremony

  • Published
Gen. John W. Handy, commander of U.S. Transportation Command and commander of Air Mobility Command, will retire from the Air Force in a ceremony here Wednesday.

Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld is scheduled to attend and Gen. Richard Myers, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, will preside over the combined change of command and retirement ceremony.

The event marks General Handys retirement after nearly 40 years of active duty service. He is to be awarded both the Defense Distinguished Service Medal and the Air Force Distinguished Service Medal. His wife, Mary Mickey Handy, is to receive the Distinguished Public Service Award and Air Force Exceptional Service Award for outstanding service throughout her husbands career.

General Handy has served concurrently in the USTRANSCOM and AMC commander positions since 2001. Gen. Norton A. Schwartz will replace General Handy as the USTRANSCOM commander. General Handy will also relinquish command of AMC.

Throughout his career, General Handy has held a number of command positions including the 21st Air Force at McGuire Air Force Base, N.J.; the Air Mobility Command's Tanker Airlift Control Center; two airlift wings and a maintenance squadron. He has served as the Director of Operations and Logistics for USTRANSCOM; the Air Force's Director of Programs and Evaluations; and Deputy Chief of Staff for Installations and Logistics, and the Air Force Vice Chief of Staff, Headquarters U.S. Air Force, Washington, D.C.

General Handy is a 1966 graduate of Methodist College and holds a Masters degree in systems management from the University of Southern California. He is a graduate of the Air Command and Staff College, the Air War College, the National War College, and the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. In 1992, he received an honorary Doctorate of Humanities from Methodist College.

Wednesdays ceremony marks the first separation of command responsibilities between U.S. Transportation Command and Air Mobility Command, the Air Force component command to USTRANSCOM.

The USTRANSCOM commander to be, General Schwartz, graduated from the U.S. Air Force Academy in 1973 and holds a masters degree from Central Michigan University. He is also a graduate of the Armed Forces Staff College and the National War College, as well as a Fellow of Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Seminar XXI.

He is a command pilot with more than 4,200 hours flown in a variety of air frames. (Courtesy Air Mobility Command Public Affairs)

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