Fort Carson – Fourteen months after many of them returned from Iraq and were reassigned to Fort Carson, several hundred soldiers with the 2nd Brigade Combat Team stood in front of Maj. Gen. Robert Mixon Jr. on Monday, prepared to return to the battlefield.
“Although it seems like only yesterday, it is time once again to answer the nation’s call,” Mixon said. “Each of you has stepped forward to accept the harshest duties of war. The challenges that lie before you will not be easy.”
The 2nd Brigade Combat Team, which lost 68 soldiers during its first deployment, will send 3,500 troops to relieve soldiers from the 101st Airborne Division near Baghdad. Soldiers will depart over the next three weeks, stopping in Kuwait before heading into battle. At least 60 percent of the troops have served in Iraq before.
The 2nd Brigade Combat Team deployed from Korea in August 2004, and troops returned to Fort Carson in August 2005.
Col. Jeffrey Bannister, commander of the combat team, said that when soldiers deployed last time, they had three weeks’ notice. This time, they prepared for 14 months, received new equipment and held two special training exercises – a two-week stint called Bayonet Strike at the Piñon Canyon training site in southern Colorado and a month-long exercise in 118-degree heat this summer at the National Training Center at Fort Irwin, Calif.
Mixon said that since the soldiers arrived at Fort Carson in August 2005, they have undertaken “one of the most rigorous training plans that I have ever seen, that has put you on the cutting edge of readiness.”
Lt. Clay Hanna, 28, of Virginia Beach, Va., said returning to Iraq will be hard because he will leave behind his wife, Sarah, 25, and children Henry, 21 months, and Cole, 3 weeks.
“I will definitely be sad to go, but I’m honored that I will get to do my job and serve my country,” Hanna said.
In the year since Hanna has been home, he’s heard Henry say “Daddy” and seen him learn to crawl and learn to walk. He’s watched Henry develop an intense passion for soccer.
This tour in Iraq, Hanna said, will be in a different part of the country.
“We were in Ramadi before and I think it will be pretty different – there’s a lot more sectarian violence where we are going, whereas in Anbar there’s a much stronger insurgency, so it will be a little bit different mission,” he said.
The 2nd Brigade Combat Team was previously deployed in Ramadi in Anbar province.
Hanna said he has two missions while he is there.
“I hope to, first and foremost, come back with all my men,” he said. “And second, I hope we can help the Iraqis do what they need to do to have a safe and secure country.”
Erin Emery can be reached at 719-522-1360 or eemery@denverpost.com.
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BACK TO THE BATTLEFIELD
“I hope to, first and foremost, come back with all my men.”
Lt. Clay Hanna, 28, of Virginia Beach, Va. He is leaving behind a wife, Sarah, and two sons, Henry, 21 months, and Cole, 3 weeks.
