As the fighting in Iraq subsides, approximately 50 Wisconsin Army National Guard units stationed at Fort McCoy continue to wait for their deployment to the Middle East.
According to Wisconsin National Guard spokesperson Lt. Col. Tim Donovan, those units, mostly engineering, military police and transportation companies, will soon go abroad, despite the cessation of combat.
\Although things have certainly changed in southwest Asia, we still do expect that our troops will be deployed to that part of the world,"" Donovan said.
The units must first complete specific training requirements before departing the base, Donovan said.
""The requirements vary unit to unit depending on what that unit's mission is and the status of their training before they get to Fort McCoy,"" he said.
According to Linda Fournier, a civilian spokesperson for Fort McCoy, troops that have fulfilled their required training may pursue specialized training designed for their particular missions in Iraq.
""As an example, we had a unit that had completed all their training and were going to go through our urban assault center,"" she said.
Certain units that have completed extensive training will receive passes to leave the base for the upcoming weekend, Fournier explained.
The soldiers will depart Fort McCoy at 4 p.m. on Friday and return at 4 p.m. on Sunday, Fournier said. They will be required to stay within 50 miles of the base, but many of their families will be meeting them at locations within that area.
Before deploying to the Middle East, Donovan stated, the units must first send their equipment.
""The unit has to prepare its equipment to be loaded onto rail cars and then transported by rail to a sea port, where it's put on ships and then sailed across the ocean,"" he said. ""That takes some time.""
Donovan cited the helicopter companies, among the first Wisconsin units to be called to duty, as an example of troops already in the Middle East who have waited to pursue their missions.
""They're really just getting started now even though they've been gone for almost a month,"" he said. ""They just got their helicopters and they're starting to go to work.""
Donovan predicts they and their fellow units will remain in the Middle East for an extended period of time.
""All of our orders were for what was phased as an initial period [of deployment] of one year, but it could be two years,"" he said. ""However, we have no reason to think it will be any longer than the one year indicated on the mobilization orders.""
