More troops headed to Iraq in new year
Thursday, December 18, 2003 Posted: 8:01 PM EST (0101 GMT)
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- As many as 3,500 troops from the 82nd Airborne Division's 1st Brigade could go to Iraq after the new year, according to military officials.
The 1st Brigade is the "ready" brigade of the rapid response division, always on-call for emergencies. It is not yet determined if the entire brigade will go to Iraq, according to senior military officials. The 82nd Airborne Division is based at Fort Bragg, North Carolina.
The troops will spend 120 days in Iraq. In addition, 3,500 troops from the division's 3rd Brigade, now in Fallujah, Iraq, have been ordered to stay for an additional 60 days, extending their deployment until the end of March, a full eight months.
Military officials said the deployment orders resulted from "adjustments" and a "gap" in the stated force rotation policy of the Pentagon.
One Army official said part of the reason is that a National Guard unit that had been designated to go in January will not be ready to deploy until March because the troops were ordered to get additional training.
Last month Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld approved a troop rotation plan to send more than 100,000 fresh troops to Iraq early next year, including the call-up of some 40,000 National Guard and Reserve troops for one-year tours of duty in Iraq. |
