Page "2nd Infantry Division (United States)" Paragraph 97

During the late spring of 2004, many of the soldiers of the 2nd Infantry Division's 2d Brigade Combat Team were given notice that they were about to be ordered to further deployment, with duty in Iraq.

Units involved in this call-up included: 1st Battalion, 503rd Infantry Regiment ( Air Assault ); 1st Battalion, 506th Infantry Regiment ( Air Assault ); 2d Battalion, 17th Field Artillery Regiment ; 1st Battalion, 9th Infantry Regiment ( Mechanized ); 44th Engineer Battalion ; 2nd Forward Support Battalion ; Company A, 102nd Military Intelligence Battalion ; Company B, 122nd Signal Battalion, elements of the 2d Battalion, 72nd Armor Regiment, a team from the 509th Personnel Services Battalion, and B Battery 5th Battalion 5th Air Defense Artillery Regiment ( Deployed as a combination of mechanized infantry and light infantry with two platoons of Bradley Fighting Vehicles and 1 platoon of armored HMMWVs ).

The time of the first notice of deployment to the actual " wheels-up " exit of the peninsula was very short.

As such, an extreme amount of training was conducted by the brigade as they switched from a focus of the foreign defense of South Korea to the more offensive operations that were going to be needed in action in Iraq.

Furthermore, time was given for the majority of the soldiers to enjoy ten days of leave.

This was vital: many of the soldiers had been in South Korea for a year or more with only two weeks or less time in the United States during their stay of duty.

More, they were about to depart on a deployment that was scheduled to last at least another year.

Finally, in the beginning of August 2004, the brigade deployed to Iraq.