The new command, the Air Training Command, became responsible for all training from classification center through pilot and technical schools. Expanded training at Kirtland Field included a ground school for glider pilots-called the Glider Replacement Center, which was established in July 1942. The center served as a temporary training area for glider pilots awaiting vacancies at glider schools. Officer pilots were selected for the new school from advanced twin-engine training schools. The navigation instructors were often recent combat veterans; the school combined regular bombardier missions to targets throughout New Mexico with navigational missions. Instruction covered day and night navigation and instrument flying, formation and altitude flying, comprehensive ground schoolwork, engineering, radio, meteorology, weather flying, first aid and oxygen training, as well as a course on the duties of an airplane commander. Because Kirtland Field was the closest large airport, its runways and bombloading pit supported the atomic bomb program during 1944 and 1945. It also became an important staging ground for the ferrying of men and material to various field sites. Because of thunderstorms, the planes dropped from 23,000 to 18,000 feet before circling the Trinity Site during the first atomic bomb detonation.

On 16 July 1945, at Kirtland Field, two B-29 Superfortress observation planes had set out early in the morning with instructions from Oppenheimer to steer a course at least 15 miles west of the atomic detonation point, Trinity Site. Shortly before the bomb testing at the Trinity site, components of Little Boy were driven from Los Alamos to Kirtland Field and then flown to San Francisco. The Manhattan Project personnel in Los Alamos first became aware of the value of the location of the air base during the process of converting the atomic bomb into a practical airborne weapon. Perhaps one of the most important functions Kirtland Field served during World War II was as a transportation center for the needs of scientists developing the atomic bomb in Los Alamos. Members of the USAAF made similar trips from Wendover through Albuquerque to Los Alamos. After various other incarnations-as a convalescent center and aircraft burial ground-Sandia Base became the precursor to Sandia National Laboratories when the Manhattan Project’s Z Division relocated from Los Alamos to continue top-secret work development of atomic weapons.

Instead of finding new places to grow crops, farmers with ruined fields may move to cities in search of work. In May 1943, a Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps (WAAC) contingent was established at Kirtland Field with the arrival of 45 women on base. In 1943, Kirtland Field facilities expanded to support existing bombardier training plus other training missions. Bombardier and pilot training was not the only focus at Kirtland Field between 1942 and 1945. In 1943, the USAAF Flying Training Command merged with the Technical Training Command in an effort to save manpower. This storage and recycling effort was the last of Albuquerque Army Air Field’s wartime contributions. Such was Kirtland Field’s last important role in the U.S. However, it was not its last connection with the Manhattan Project at Los Alamos, which largely would determine the base’s fate in the postwar economy. From Kirtland Field, Manhattan Project scientists were flown back and forth to Wendover Army Air Base for testing in a disguised “Green Hornet” aircraft. A special Manhattan Engineer District, Military Police unit was located at Kirtland Field to guard facilities used to load Los Alamos-assembled ordnance and test shapes on Silverplate aircraft. And film actor Jimmy Stewart was stationed at Kirtland Field briefly, beginning in August 1942, assisting bombardier cadet training by flying bombers on training missions.

The Second Air Force, operating under the Continental Air Forces, concentrated on training for heavy and very heavy bombers during the war. The proximity fuze, a weapon that was later dubbed by the media as the second most important one developed during the war. Japan, thereby ending World War II. With the end of World War II, the base again became Albuquerque Army Air Field and was used by the Reconstruction Finance Corporation-later called the War Assets Administration. On 30 June, the War Department opened the program to any man between 18 and 36 who could meet the physical and mental requirements, including civilians as well as officers and enlisted men. A WAAC open house for the new post was held in August 1943 and several hundred men with their wives and families attended. In August 1943, Kirtland Field became host to a USAAF Provisional B-24 Liberator Pilot Transition School designed to train airplane commanders. In August 2010, Hanjin Group, the parent of KAL, opened a new cargo terminal at Navoiy International Airport in Uzbekistan, which will become a cargo hub with regular Seoul-Navoi-Milan flights.