New vice commander to join Team AEDC in July

  • Published
  • By Janaé Daniels
  • AEDC/PA
Arnold Air Force Base, Tenn. --  Air Force officials announced recently that Col. Eugene Mittuch will be the center's new vice commander at the end of July. 

Arnold Engineering Development Center (AEDC) has not had a vice commander since Navy Capt. Bob Roof, who left in August 2007. 

Since 1995 the AEDC vice commander has been a Navy captain, which is equivalent to an Air Force colonel. The Navy was not able to supply a captain after the last vice commander departed in 2007, but was able to provide a commander, which is one rank below captain. 

AEDC leadership determined the center would be better served by moving the position to 704th Test Systems Group as the deputy director. 

AEDC maintained the vice commander requirement and understood filling it with an Air Force colonel could be a lengthy process. While the details of the process and final organizational disposition remain to be finalized, Headquarters Air Force Materiel Command was able to appoint Colonel Mittuch as the new vice commander. 

Colonel Mittuch is currently the Logistics Group Commander and United States Senior National Representative (USSNR), E-3A Component, NATO Airborne Early Warning and Control Force, Geilenkirchen NATO Air Base, Germany. 

He is responsible for logistics support of NATO's fleet of 17 E-3A Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) aircraft and three trainer/cargo aircraft. 

As the USSNR, he is the senior ranking Air Force officer and is responsible for the morale and welfare of 550 Air Force personnel and families. Colonel Mittuch was commissioned in 1985 after completing Officer Training School at Lackland Air Force Base, Texas. 

He has a bachelor of science in biology from the University of Georgia in 1983. He earned a master's of business administration from Louisiana State University in 1988. 

He was a student at the Army Command and General Staff College at Ft. Leavenworth, Kan., and the Naval War College in Newport, R.I. 

He has held a variety of positions in aircraft maintenance in multiple commands at squadron, wing and headquarters levels.