About 50 Hawaii Army National Guard soldiers and five Black Hawk helicopters are being given a mission in Iraq as that country’s leaders have yet to agree to allow U.S. troops to remain beyond a Dec. 31 deadline.
Members of Company C, 1st Battalion, 207th Aviation Regiment, are expected to leave Hawaii for six weeks of post-mobilization training at Fort Hood, Texas, within a week of a deployment ceremony Wednesday in Hilo. Most of the soldiers are based in Hilo.
That would mean about two months of duty in Iraq before Dec. 31, the deadline set in 2008 for all U.S. troops to be out of Iraq.
The U.S. is seeking to have a training role and some troop presence in Iraq next year, but without an agreement in place, the drawdown of the 46,000 remaining U.S. forces continues, officials said.
"The issue will then become, what is the kind of training assistance and presence that Iraq feels it needs in order to be able to defend itself and secure itself?" news service Agence France Presse quoted Defense Secretary Leon Panetta as saying.
The extension of U.S. troops eight years after the war began is a sensitive topic within Iraq, and has created uncertainty for the Hawaii National Guard soldiers.
"There are a lot of gears turning in Iraq right now, and nobody really knows what the situation is going to be," said Lt. Col. Chuck Anthony, a Hawaii National Guard spokesman.
If an extension does not materialize, the Guard soldiers and the Black Hawks could be shifted to Afghanistan, where helicopter support is high in demand.
Anthony said the unit isn’t scheduled to receive high-altitude training, which the 25th Infantry Division previously said was a requirement for the 25th Combat Aviation Brigade as it prepares for a January deployment to Afghanistan. He said some aircraft would presumably be needed at lower elevations.
The mobilization is expected to last a year for the citizen soldiers, meaning the possibility of about nine months of duty in a combat zone, officials said.
About 800 Schofield Barracks soldiers found out in late June that their yearlong deployment to Iraq was being extended by a month, with a new pullout date of Jan. 2.
The soldiers are part of the 25th Infantry Division headquarters led by Maj. Gen. Bernard Champoux. Champoux is commander of U.S. Division-Center in Baghdad, but he will control all remaining U.S. forces as the withdrawal from Iraq occurs, officials said.
"This extension allows us to properly complete the vital task of providing mission command to U.S. forces in Iraq at a critical time," Champoux said in a letter to soldiers and their families posted on the 25th Division website. "I fully appreciate the impact of this extension and know what it means to you and your families, particularly during the holiday season."
The Associated Press previously reported that the White House offered to keep up to 10,000 troops in Iraq next year. The State Department is expected to have a large presence in Iraq as well.
About 60 percent of the deploying National Guard soldiers were with Company C in 2007 when it was mobilized and sent to Iraq. The unit flew more than 1,100 missions and logged 4,800 combat hours.
