Badges of the United States Air Force
military decoration issued by the United States Air Force
Badges of the United States Air Force are specific uniform insignia authorized by the United States Air Force that signify aeronautical ratings, special skills, career field qualifications, and serve as identification devices for personnel occupying certain assignments.
Most Air Force badges are awarded in three degrees or skill levels. Aeronautical rating badges for pilots, combat systems officers, observers, and air battle managers are awarded at basic, senior, and command levels; while flight nurses and flight surgeons are awarded ratings at the basic, senior, and chief levels. All other aviation badges are awarded at the basic, senior, and master levels. Air Force occupational badges are normally issued in basic, senior, and master level for officers. A star and wreath system, worn above the Air Force badge, denotes which degree or skill level a service member currently holds. Previously, enlisted wear the basic badge after completing technical school, the senior badge after award of the 7-skill level, and the master badge as a master sergeant or above with 5 years in the specialty from award of the 7-skill level. For non-rated commissioned officers, the basic badge is awarded after completion of technical training, the senior badge after 7-years in their respective AFSC, and master at 15-years. Now most career field CFETPs denote the requirements for awarding each level.
Chaplain, aeronautical, space, cyberspace, and missile operations badges, along with the Air Force Commander's Insignia are mandatory for wear on Air Force uniforms.
“Badges of the United States Air Force” enters the record as military decoration issued by the United States Air Force. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Badges, United and States can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 23, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q4840872. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference.
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This entry incorporates text from “Badges of the United States Air Force” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.