Wikipedia’s Rhodesian Air Force article says military construction began on Kentucky Farm in 1951 and that new Air Headquarters and Technical Headquarters were completed there in March 1952. The base article adds that aircraft started moving in February 1952, that the first runway was finished in August and that military operations officially began on 1 April 1952.

The first graduation parade, of No. 1 Short Service Course with 11 graduates, was held on 21 August 1952, and Air Headquarters was established here in October 1952. The name New Sarum, after Old Sarum in Wiltshire, was suggested by Keith Taute, according to Wikipedia. The civil airport followed: Salisbury’s new terminal was commissioned on 1 July 1956 and opened on 5 February 1957, sharing what became a 4,725 m runway.

New Sarum was the heavy end of the Rhodesian Air Force. At the end of the Bush War, according to Wikipedia, No. 3 Squadron flew 13 C-47 Dakotas from here, No. 5 Squadron eight Canberra B.2s and two T.4s, No. 7 Squadron six Alouette IIs and 34 Alouette IIIs, and No. 8 Squadron 11 Agusta-Bell 205s. The base was a self-contained community with housing, workshops and depots.

The war reached the airfield. On 26 March 1971 a fire broke out at the bomb dump while practice bombs were being filled; Wikipedia records five people injured and one, Sergeant Harry Young, killed. In 1979 ZANLA guerrillas attacked Salisbury Airport with mortars; Wikipedia’s airport article says the airport was unscathed.

At independence in 1980 the base passed to the Air Force of Zimbabwe, and under the Names (Alteration) Act of 1983 New Sarum became Manyame Air Force Base. Wikipedia’s base article lists No. 3 Squadron (Falcon) with CASA C-212s and Islanders, No. 7 Squadron (Spider) with Alouette IIIs and Mi-35s, and No. 8 Squadron (Scorpion) with AB412s; the AFZ article adds the Mi-172 to No. 8. The civil airport beside it changed name too: Harare International became Robert Gabriel Mugabe International Airport on 9 November 2017, a renaming Wikipedia describes as controversial, while the air base kept the name Manyame.

The base has a public face too. In 2015–2016 Group Captain Mildred Dengura commanded it, the first woman to command an AFZ base; the Herald noted in February 2025 that Air Commodore Ellen Chiweshe, taking over Jason Ziyapapa Moyo Air Force Base, was only the second. In November 2025 the commander of the AFZ, Air Marshal John Jacob Nzvede, used an event at Manyame to set out the air force charity fund’s clinic projects for 2026 (ZBC). The C-212 and Bell 412 that Zimbabwe sent to the SADC drought-relief exercise in Zambia in September 2025 belong to squadrons based here.

Manyame’s squadrons are the part of the AFZ that most often leaves the country. In September 2025 Zambia hosted the SADC exercise Blue Lugwasho, which used military aircraft from six air forces to fly drought relief to districts in southern Zambia from 9 to 26 September. defenceWeb reported that Zimbabwe sent a CASA C-212 and a Bell 412, types flown by Nos. 3 and 8 Squadrons; Zambia ran the operation from Lusaka as its strategic base, Livingstone as the main operating base and Maamba and Namwala as forward bases.

The scale was modest but real: more than 1,100 bags of maize of 50 kg each had been flown by 11 September, out of 450 tonnes planned for eight districts, according to defenceWeb. Air Commodore Maxwell Sakupwanya of the AFZ told the publication that Zimbabwe was using the exercise to prepare for the next SADC blue air exercise, which it is due to host in 2027. If that goes ahead as announced, the light transports and helicopters at Manyame are the aircraft most likely to carry it.