Official: 3,500 paratroopers' deployment extended through December; Most of Fort Bragg's force 'will be gone' by winter

Paratroopers from the 82nd Airborne 2nd Brigade Combat Team patrol a neighborhood in Baghdad's Adhamiyah District March 23

FORT BRAGG, N.C. — A Fort Bragg-based unit will remain in Iraq for an additional three months as part of deployments that will move most of the Army base’s soldiers overseas later this year, the military announced Monday.

The 3,500 paratroopers in the 82nd Airborne’s 2nd Brigade Combat Team will stay in Iraq for three months beyond their original return date in September, base officials said. The unit left in January as part of the troop buildup in Baghdad and is now scheduled to return in January 2008.

Under previously announced deployments, another 3,500 soldiers in the division’s 1st Brigade Combat Team will leave in June, and the 18th Airborne Corps headquarters will begin a yearlong deployment in October.

“At one certain time, in the latter part of the fall, a large percentage of this post will be gone,” said Tom McCollum, a spokesman for the 18th Airborne Corps.

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