The top noncommissioned officer of the Air Force Global Strike Command and Air Forces Strategic-Air has been removed for unbecoming behavior, the command confirmed Friday. He has been reassigned pending retirement.
Gen. Timothy Ray, the command’s commander, sent an email to personnel letting them know of his decision to relieve Chief Master Sgt. Thomas Mazzone, based on a command-directed investigation into his behavior at his previous duty station. A copy of the report has not yet been made available.
Chief Master Sgt. Melvina Smith, the Eighth Air Command chief, has temporarily moved into Mazzone’s job.
“It is imperative that we create the right culture and climate in our command to become the long range precision strike force that our nation needs,” Ray wrote in the email.
Mazzone joined the Air Force in 1990 and had been at the Global Strike Command since December 2017. His previous assignment was with the 320th Air Expeditionary Wing at Joint Base Andrews, Md.
Global Strike Command is headquartered at Barksdale Air Force Base in Shreveport, La. As the command’s senior enlisted leader, Mazzone was responsible to the commander on matters concerning the readiness, effective utilization, professional growth and welfare of the command’s airmen.
The command’s mission is to develop, equip and provide combat-ready forces for nuclear deterrence and global strike operations supporting the initiatives of U.S. Strategic Command and other geographic combatant commands. It has more than 33,700 personnel. Weapon systems assigned to the command include intercontinental ballistic missiles and bomber aircraft, UH-1N helicopters, E-4B National Airborne Operations Center aircraft and the Nuclear Command, Control and Communications Center.
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