Mansfield, Ohio, air base’s fate reflects a larger battle between active duty, Guard

The four diminutive cargo planes parked on the National Guard air base in this Rust Belt town last year never would have been selected for a recruiting poster. Lacking the grace of a fighter or the girth of a freighter, the newly built twin-prop aircraft were the minivans of combat aviation — unsexy, utilitarian haulers of people and gear. But that didn’t matter to pilots and ground crews here. They loved the planes, as did troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.

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