Every entry in the Defense records system exists because some decision needed a documented basis, and DD Form 2535 is one of those instruments: DD Form 2535, Request for Military Aerial Support, 20160211 draft, created to Request for Military Aerial Support. The reason it carries a DD number rather than a service designation is structural — the Department maintains a single body of forms for matters that arise identically in every service, so that a record created in one component remains intelligible in another.
This is why the arrangement matters to you rather than only to the archivists. not stated governs the form throughout the Department, with not stated as the responsible office, so the record you create is legible outside your own component. Joint assignments, agency details and cross-service transactions all depend on that: the paperwork does not have to be reconstructed each time it crosses a boundary.
The edition in force is not stated, carried by the publisher as not stated, and edition discipline is stricter on a Department form than most people expect, precisely because supersession happens everywhere at once. There is no interval during which one service still works from the previous layout while another has moved on.
The sequence printed on the form is the sequence in which a reviewer will read it, and the two should agree. Header data frames every entry below it; the substantive fields depend on that frame; the certification stands at the end because its whole function is to vouch for what came before. Entries made out of sequence commonly contradict entries made earlier.
Verify the printed edition against not stated first. Field structure shifts between editions, and the office that receives your record is reading the current one. That office may sit outside your service, which removes even the informal accommodation you might expect from a colleague who used the old version last month.
For an ambiguous field, read the form's own instruction, then not stated, which controls.
Download the form
What you can download: PDF. The form runs 4 pages and asks for approximately 126 entries.
If you find an xfdl file here, its presence is historical. The format belongs to IBM Lotus Forms, which the Department adopted Department-wide for electronic forms and fielded on a scale that makes wholesale removal slow. You need the matching viewer to open it; ordinary pdf software cannot read the format and will say so unhelpfully.
All of it downloads without charge. Where care is needed is in the reader you choose. A fillable pdf depends on field properties that desktop applications honour and browser previews frequently ignore, so work locally rather than inside a browser window.
What the form asks for
- Request number.
- 1. Category Requested. a. Press space bar to mark X if flyover.
- 1.a.(1) Date of event (4 digit year, 2 digit month, 2 digit day).
- 1.a.(2) Type aircraft requested. Mark X if Any.
- 1.a.(2) List specific aircraft requested (optional).
- 1.a.(3) Military service requested. Mark X if All.
- 1.a.(3) List specific military service requested (optional).
- 1.b. Mark X if Static Display.
- 1.b.(1) Date of event (4 digit year, 2 digit month, 2 digit day).
- 1.b.(2) Type aircraft requested. Mark X if Any.
- 1.b.(2) List specific aircraft requested (optional).
- 1.b.(3) Military service requested. Mark X if All.
- 1.b.(3) List specific military service requested (optional).
- 1.c. Mark X if Single Aircraft Demonstration.
- 1.c.(1) Date of event (4 digit year, 2 digit month, 2 digit day).
- 1.c.(2) Type aircraft requested. Mark X if Any.
- 1.c.(2) List specific aircraft requested (optional).
- 1.c.(3) Military service requested. Mark X if All.
- 1.c.(3) List specific military service requested (optional).
- 1.d. Mark X if Other Aerial Support (i.e. Parachute, SAR).
- 1.d.(1) Date of event (4 digit year, 2 digit month, 2 digit day).
- 1.d.(2) Type aircraft requested. Mark X if Any.
- 1.d.(2) List specific aircraft requested (optional).
- 1.d.(3) Military service requested. Mark X if All.
The completed form goes to the office named in not stated or in local implementing procedure, and it is worth keeping a copy before it goes. On a Department form the destination is frequently outside your own chain — another service, a defense agency, a joint staff — and recovering a document that has crossed an organizational boundary is a slower business than retrieving one from a file down the hall.
When DD Form 2535 cites another form, the citation is self-sufficient. The DD series is a single sequence administered at Department level, so the number resolves to exactly one document without any need to establish which component issued it — a convenience that exists only because the sequence was never allowed to fork.
It helps to see the DA and DD sequences as what they are: separate registries with separate custodians. One serves a single service under a service proponent, the other serves the Department under not stated or an equivalent office, and neither was ever indexed against the other. A number that appears in both systems points to two unrelated documents, which is why reading the prefix comes before reading the digits.
Editions change for reasons that originate above the form itself. The prescribing directive is reissued and the form follows; the information the Department needs to collect changes and the fields change with it; the statutory notice language is amended and every form carrying that notice is republished. None of these events announces itself to the person who downloaded a copy last year, which is why confirming not stated at the moment of download is the only reliable check available to you.
The role of this page is narrow and worth stating plainly. It makes a published Defense form available and explains its structure. It does not advise, does not interpret policy for your circumstances, and cannot indicate how any office will treat a completed copy — those judgments rest with the authorities that own the process. Direct such questions to not stated, to the administrative office that services you, or to the authority named in not stated.
Questions and answers
- What is DD Form 2535?
- DD Form 2535, Request for Military Aerial Support, 20160211 draft
- Which edition is current?
- Not stated by the publisher
- Who is responsible for this form?
- Not stated
- In which formats can it be downloaded?