It reads: "Strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow . . ." and references a New Testament verse.
It's a mantra, of sorts, for the thousands whose lives are tied to the Oklahoma City base's fate. They're working to keep Tinker relevant and praying Defense Department officials take notice before deciding which installations should be shut down.
A list of bases recommended for closure or other change is expected this week.
In Utah, officials say they have no idea how things will turn out for northern Utah's Hill Air Force Base - one of the state's largest employers with 23,715 workers.
But the status of Tinker - along with that of Georgia's Robins Air Force Base - may hold some significant clues.
The three bases house the Air Force's only remaining air logistics centers, maintenance depots where workers build, repair and improve military hardware, from radios to rockets. Closing any of the three would require those remaining to take on a greater workload.
None appears to be in any such position. And although some missions held at Hill could be moved to facilities at Tinker and Robins, the northern Utah base's main roles appear unlikely to change.
Depots get lean: Starting in the early 1970s, the federal Government Accountability Office began issuing reports on excess capacity in the Defense Department's major maintenance depots. Service branches, however, took few steps toward depot consolidation.
In 1995, the federal Base Realignment and Closure Commission shut down two of the Air Force's five air logistics centers.
"That was the wake-up call - and it's still a wake-up call," says Rick Mayfield, Utah's director of economic development at the time of the cuts. He now runs a group dedicated to protecting Utah's bases.
Immediately following the 1995 shutdowns, Air Force Material Command officials sought ways to consolidate the three remaining depots' missions. In 2002, the Air Force released a formal "master plan" in which depot duties were laid out for the next 20 years.
In the plan, the Air Force envisioned a system in which specific maintenance duties would be performed in only one location, staffed with highly trained crews.
Tinker would be responsible for the force's jet engines, bombers and aerial refuelers. Robins took over most electrical component work and oversaw maintenance on the cargo and surveillance air fleet. Hill was to be the Air Force center for landing gear, long-range missiles and fighter aircraft.
In keeping with its role as the fighter maintenance center, Hill performs all depot work for the F-16 Falcon and A-10 Warthog. Air Force planning documents indicate the northern Utah base should continue those missions until both aircraft are replaced by the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter around 2020.
Still some redundant missions: While Hill has been designated the fighter maintenance center, depot work for the F-15 Eagle remains at Robins.
Lt. Col. Alex Cruz expects the Air Force to let the F-15 live out its final days in Georgia, rather than take on the expense of moving the maintenance program across the country.
"I'm sorry that she is getting old at all," the maintenance officer says nostalgically as he walks under the wing of a fighter first introduced to Air Force aviators in 1974. "What will probably happen is that we will ramp down as the F/A-22 ramps up."
The F/A-22 Raptor, which debuts this year as the Eagle's replacement aircraft, is expected to be maintained at Hill. But that transition alone wouldn't end the logistics centers' redundancy.
Hill continues to perform depot maintenance on some of the Air Force's C-130s, even as most similar aircraft have moved to Robins. All three air logistics centers maintain separate software operations. All three also house battle damage repair teams that perform repairs on aircraft damaged by hostile gunfire.
There also is an active air wing component at each base - Hill's is made up of two Falcon fighter wings, one active and one reserve. Such missions potentially could be moved anyplace where there is a hangar and runway.
But would consolidation of all duplicated missions make one of the three depots unnecessary? Three retired Air Force generals doubt it.
The generals fight on: Nearly a decade ago, Richard Burpee was visiting Texas, hoping to lure skilled workers to Tinker after San Antonio's Kelly Air Force Base was closed.
"A lot of them didn't want to come here at first," the former Tinker commander says of the thousands of workers who faced layoff or relocation. "Now you couldn't pay them to leave."
Burpee, who since retirement has fought to keep the base open on behalf of the Oklahoma City Chamber of Commerce, wears a relaxed expression as he sits in his downtown office and speaks of the process that has resulted in nearly 100 major closures since 1988. The former lieutenant general is unconcerned that worker hungry representatives from Utah or Georgia could soon be making an appearance in his state.
"That ain't gonna happen here," the sandy-haired man says. "It's different than last time. Now, each of the air logistics centers has a separate but distinct function."
Nine hundred miles to the east, Ron Smith shares his former colleague's assessment.
"We spend a hell of a lot more time planning to keep Robins open than to see it closed," says Smith, who served as commander of the Georgia base before retiring in 1998.
Smith also served at Hill, as director of maintenance, from 1988 to 1991. And he did a tour at Tinker. He expects all three to survive.
"We're not talking about three different depot systems," the lanky former major general says. "This is one integrated depot system."
Retired Gen. James Davis, who served as a commissioner in the 1995 realignment round that resulted in the closure of two air logistics centers, agrees with Smith and Burpee.
"It will be a cold day in hell when they close Hill," he says.
Space matters: The Pentagon has collected thousands of pages of data on each base - reviewing everything from the local cost of living to how much each installation spends on lawn maintenance.
But one factor may trump all others: space.
Aviators on approach to Robins' 12,000-foot runway glide over a sprawling green landscape - thousands of untouched acres of forested wetland.
It's pretty land: Good for hunting and fishing. But not for building.
"We have no physical land for expansion," says Robins' planning director, George Falldine. "We couldn't accept a mission that would require any major space."
For instance, as big as Robins' footprint may be, there would be no place to put Tinker's city-sized jet engine repair facility, known as Building 3001.
More than 6,000 people work the day shift in the enormous building - three-quarters of a mile long and big enough to house more than a dozen of the world's largest Wal-Mart stores. Even if the building's operations moved into multiple smaller facilities - a move experts say would drastically reduce efficiency - it would be difficult to find space at Hill.
"Those engines aren't going anywhere," says Mayfield, the former Utah economic director and current Utah Defense Alliance leader.
Similarly, neither of the other two air logistics centers has the capacity to accept Hill's Intercontinental Ballistic Missile maintenance mission. Nearby Utah Test and Training Range is the only place in the United States where such weapons can be destroyed in accordance with arms reduction treaties.
Nor could the other bases find room for the 340 munition storage structures located in the heart of Hill's 6,802-acre base - though it is possible that mission could be moved to another munitions facility.
"I think if you look at the missions and workload of each of the facilities, the conclusions you have to draw is: If you don't do it here, where would you do it?" Mayfield asks.
But while there may not be enough space at any of the centers to accept the others' specific missions, officials at all three logistics centers say they do have the capacity to take on additional work similar to what they currently do.
The Air Force-Navy game: Tinker maintenance crews already work on the engines for the Navy's F-14 Tomcat.
"Why not the F/A-18 as well?" Burpee asks of the Navy's fighter-attack workhorse, known as the Hornet. "And why couldn't Hill do the landing gear for all of the Navy's airplanes?"
Taking on joint work would fill one of the Pentagon's top requirements for realignment. It also happens to be one of the main ways federal auditors have recommended saving money.
There is precedent for such consolidation at Hill. The northern Utah depot already handles 70 percent of the landing gear work for all of the nation's military.
Hill also has experience overhauling Navy jets. In 1993, 36 Hornets were flown to Utah for depot maintenance. The program lasted a year before the Navy decided to end the relationship, citing increased costs.
A General Accounting Office report issued in 1996 revealed the Air Force's costs for repairing the Hornets were, in fact, lower than the Navy's. Consolidation of depot work entirely, the federal auditing agency has since noted, would save much more money.
But if the Air Force could fix the Navy's gear, couldn't the Navy just as well take work away from the Air Force?
Smith doesn't think that will happen. "The Air Force depots are by far larger than others service depots," he says.
Indeed, the Navy's largest air logistics center, Naval Aviation Depot North Island in Southern California, employs about 4,000 workers - about a third of the number employed at the Ogden Air Logistics Center.
A hopeful trinity: A nine-member panel appointed by the president and congressional leaders will have four months to review the Pentagon's realignment list after it is released.
Though commission members - including former Utah Congressman and longtime Hill advocate Jim Hansen - will spread out across the nation to hear the testimony of those affected by the closures, they have little power to change the Defense Department's list.
Military officials say the list will be based on a very simple set of criteria: Eight standards in total, with four designated as having priority over the others.
The priorities include readiness for joint-service war fighting, land availability, capacity to respond to military contingencies and cost of operations.
"You take the criteria the Defense Department put out to evaluate bases and our logistics centers - all of them - meet that criteria," Burpee says.
But any one can't do it alone. And that may be the best indication of their collective survival.
mlaplante@sltrib.com
Hill Air Force Base
A 1995 Inside the Pentagon article called Hill "the Pentagon's first choice for closure" among Air Force depots, and said McClellan and Kelly Air Force Bases were next on the list. Air Force officials denied the report and Hill was spared. The runners up got the ax.
Why it's unlikely to close
Hill's ICBM mission has been called "unmovable" by Air Force officials. Proximity to the Utah Test and Training Range is a plus. And the depot's munitions storage areas would be difficult to move onto another base.
* SIZE: 6,802 acres * ALC WORKERS: 12,100
* MAJOR SYSTEMS: F-16 Falcon, C-130 Hercules, A-10 Thunderbolt, ICBMs, general landing gear maintenance
* ALSO HOME TO: 388th Fighter Wing, 419th Reserve Fighter Wing, Defense Information Systems Agency, Utah Test and Training Range.
Robins Air Force Base, Ga.
Moving Robins' large avionics and airlift maintenance missions would be costly. The Georgia base's employees also enjoy the lowest cost of living.
* SIZE: 8,435 acres
* ALC WORKERS: 12,500
* MAJOR SYSTEMS: F-15 Eagle, C-130 Hercules, C-5 Galaxy, C-17 Globemaster, U-2 Dragon Lady, E-8 Joint STARS, general avionics maintenance
* ALSO HOME TO: Air Force Reserve Command, 19th Air Refueling Group
Tinker Air Force Base, Okla.
Tinker's 7.2-million-square-foot engine overhaul shop is a model in industrial efficiency. It couldn't fit on any of the other Air Logistic Center bases.
* SIZE: 5,000 acres
* ALC WORKERS: 14,000
* MAJOR SYSTEMS: B-1B, B-2 Spirit, B-52 Stratofortress, E-3 Sentry, E-6 Mercury, general engine maintenance.
* ALSO HOME TO: Navy's Strategic Communications
Wing 1, the first Navy wing to base on an Air Force Installation.
