USAF Strategic Air Command patch (SAC)

Strategic Air Command (SAC) was both a Department of Defense Specified Command and a United States Air Force (USAF) Major Command (MAJCOM) responsible for Cold War command and control of two of the three components of the U.S. military's strategic nuclear strike forces, the so-called "Nuclear Triad," with SAC having control of land-based strategic bomber aircraft and intercontinental ballistic missiles or ICBMs (the other being submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBM)). SAC also operated all strategic reconnaissance aircraft, all strategic airborne command post aircraft, and all USAF aerial refueling aircraft, to include those in the Air Force Reserve (AFRES) and Air National Guard (ANG), with the exception of those KB-50, KC-97, HC-130 and MC-130 aircraft operated by Tactical Air Command (TAC), Military Airlift Command (MAC), and from 1990 onward, the Air Force Special Operations Command (AFSOC), or associated AFRES and ANG aerial refueling aircraft gained by TAC, MAC or AFSOC.

SAC primarily consisted of the Second Air Force (2AF), Eighth Air Force (8AF) and the Fifteenth Air Force (15AF), while SAC headquarters (HQ SAC) included Directorates for Operations & Plans, Intelligence, Command & Control, Maintenance, Training, Communications, and Personnel. At a lower echelon, headquarters divisions included Aircraft Engineering, Missile Concept, and Strategic Communications.

In 1992, as part of an overall post-Cold War reorganization of the U.S. Air Force, SAC was disestablished as both a Specified Command and as a MAJCOM, and its personnel and equipment redistributed among the Air Combat Command (ACC), Air Mobility Command (AMC), Pacific Air Forces (PACAF), United States Air Forces in Europe (USAFE), and Air Education and Training Command (AETC), while SAC's central headquarters complex at Offutt AFB, Nebraska was concurrently transferred to the newly created United States Strategic Command (USSTRATCOM), which was established as a joint Unified Combatant Command to replace SAC's Specified Command role.

In 2009, SAC's previous USAF MAJCOM role was reactivated and redesignated as the Air Force Global Strike Command (AFGSC), with AFGSC eventually acquiring cl