Lockheed Martin

You've probably heard the announcement that MCAS Beaufort is due to receive three operational and two training F-35B Joint Strike Fighter squadrons, probably sometime around 2014, but Beaufort's connection with the F-35B program actually is a little deeper than that.

In an interesting twist of fate, one of the first F-35B squadrons to stand up anywhere in the country will breathe life into a former MCAS Beaufort squadron that was decommissioned in 2007.

Marine Fighter Attack Squadron 332, a former MCAS Beaufort squadron, will stand up at Marine Corps Air Station Yuma, Ariz., in 2011 in preparation for the 2012 arrival of the F-35B at that base.

You can read Yuma's writeup on the arrival of the jets here.