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Soldiers are livid after being told to remove their combat patches in an attempt to be “welcoming” to new recruits. It’s an insane move that goes against the unofficial combat patch creed: “You earn it. You keep it. You wear it.” But that’s apparently the policy now for Fort Carson’s 1st Stryker Brigade Combat Team. Soldiers are told to strip their uniforms bare to the bone, only showing the name, rank, American Flag, U.S. Army tape and the 4th Infantry Division insignia, the Army Times is reporting. According to officials, the move is designed to promote a “unified army culture.”...

Lt. Tyler Tessman awoke in the desert one day this week with two problems. He had to rethink a tough training mission that stacked the odds against his Joint Base Lewis-McChord Stryker platoon. And he had to consider the possibility that his team might be grounded before he could even start on the battle plan. Three of the four Strykers vehicles in his platoon were immobilized — one from too many busted tires, one from a broken axle and one from an assortment of safety issues that made it undrivable.

SEATTLE (AP) -- The U.S. soldier suspected of gunning down at least 16 Afghan civilians was from a Washington state-based Stryker brigade and received his assignment to a village stability program less than six weeks ago.

ZABUL PROVINCE, Afghanistan — More than six years after sending the first Stryker armored vehicles into desert combat, the Army has decided that it’s probably a good idea to start painting them tan so they will blend in with the environments in Afghanistan and Iraq. “Safeguarding soldiers is the primary purpose for this color change,” said U.S. Army Lt. Col. Peter Butts, commander of the 1st Battalion, 401st Army Field Support Brigade, who announced the change in a news release from Camp As Sayliyah, Qatar, earlier this month. “Strykers will blend into surroundings better. They’re less likely to stand out...

WASHINGTON, Aug. 21, 2009 – Military transportation experts used ships and planes to deploy an Army combat unit that arrived in Afghanistan last month, marking a notable milestone for U.S. Transportation Command. The 5th Stryker Brigade Combat Team from Fort Lewis, Wash., began departing from nearby Tacoma by ship in early May; the unit’s equipment arrived in southern Afghanistan’s Kandahar province July 25, about five days earlier than requested by U.S. Central Command, Army Lt. Col. John Kaylor, a transportation expert assigned to Transcom’s headquarters at Scott Air Force Base, Ill., said yesterday. More than 3,800 troops and 900 pieces...

WASHINGTON, Feb. 19, 2009 – The Army’s Stryker armored vehicle will get its first crack at the resurgent Taliban and terrorist strongholds in Afghanistan this summer when the 2nd Infantry Division’s 5th Stryker Brigade Combat Team hits the ground there. Army Gen. David D. McKiernan, commander of NATO’s International Security Assistance Force and U.S. Forces Afghanistan, said at a Pentagon news conference yesterday that he specifically requested the Stryker brigade for its versatility. “I asked for a Stryker capability, with one of the brigade combat teams, so that it could provide the mobility, the situational awareness, the protection,” McKiernan...

Pursuant to President Obama’s decision today, Secretary Gates ordered the deployment of two additional combat units, totaling more than 12,000 troops, to Afghanistan. The 2d Marine Expeditionary Brigade (MEB), from Camp Lejeune, N.C., with approximately 8,000 Marines will deploy to Afghanistan in late Spring 2009. The 5th Stryker Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division from Ft. Lewis, Wash., will deploy approximately 4,000 soldiers to Afghanistan in mid-summer 2009. This Stryker Brigade and the MEB will deploy to increase the capabilities of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF). Approximately 5,000 additional troops to support these combat forces will receive deployment orders at a...

WASHINGTON, May 2, 2008 – Coalition and Iraqi forces killed at least three enemy fighters, captured 55 suspects, and seized weapons in Iraq over the past three days, military officials said. In Iraq today: -- Coalition troops detained four suspected terrorists during raids in Mosul targeting members of the local al-Qaida in Iraq network responsible for attacks against Iraqi and coalition forces. -- Using information gleaned in previous operations, coalition forces detained four suspected terrorists in a separate raid in Mosul. -- Iraqi and coalition forces captured two wanted men and two additional suspects 15 miles northwest of Baghdad. One...

Anti-war protests have returned to the Port of Olympia with the unloading of a military ship bearing Army gear from a Stryker Brigade that recently returned to nearby Fort Lewis from Iraq. According to an initial news release Sunday from Olympia Port Militarization Resistance, the group at first did not plan to try to block cargo from being sent from the port to the Army post ... Late Monday, however, after the arrival of 950-foot roll-on, roll-off cargo vessel, group leaders said a series of votes and discussions resulted in a change in strategy. "As long as the war in...

Emotional ceremony officially welcomes Stryker soldiers home The soldiers of the 3rd Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division got their formal welcome home Thursday at Fort Lewis in an emotional ceremony that saw dozens of their wounded rejoin the ranks, and seven of their heroes decorated for valor – one of them posthumously. “I am as proud of these soldiers in front of you as anything I’ve been associated with in my life,” their commander, Col. Stephen Townsend, told several thousand friends and family members who attended Thursday’s celebration at Gray Army Airfield.“I know you all are just as proud of them.”Nearly...

FORT LEWIS, Wash., Aug. 30, 2007 – Members of the Fort Lewis community paid a somber tribute yesterday to two of their own killed in recent combat operations in Iraq. About 250 friends and family, fellow soldiers and community members gathered in the base’s Evergreen Chapel to honor Cpl. Shawn D. Hensel and Cpl. Willard M. Powell. Both soldiers were members of the 2nd Infantry Division Stryker Brigade Combat Team’s 4th Brigade, both hailed from the Hoosier state and both were buried Aug. 25 near their respective hometowns. Hensel, 20, of Logansport, Ind., was assigned to 2nd Battalion, 23rd Infantry...

CAMP LIBERTY, Iraq — It was 3 o’clock on a January morning when a convoy of Stryker vehicles rolled out of this protected American base near the main Baghdad airport. The discovery of 27 bodies on a part of Haifa Street, a meandering road that also goes through the Green Zone or, as it is now called, International Zone, meant it was time to help the Iraqis take back what has been called one of Baghdad’s meanest and toughest areas, a place, according to news reports, even henchmen of former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein avoided. Sgt. Holly Jensen of the...

Blast kills Jersey Shore GI Friday, August 10, 2007 By SHRUTI L. MATHUR [Manahawkin, NJ] -- When it came to a post-high school career decision, there was nothing Kareem R. Khan wanted to do other than join the Army. Spurred by the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center, Khan, a 2005 graduate of Southern Regional High School, wanted to show that not all Muslims were fanatics and that many, like him, were willing to lay their lives down for their country, America. He enlisted immediately after graduation and was sent to Iraq in July 2006. So when his...

WASHINGTON–The U.S. Senate has voted to let the Army reimburse families of 172nd Stryker Brigade Combat Team soldiers for unusual expenses caused by their recent Iraq service extension. Sen. Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, said Friday he proposed the amendment at the request of the military. Stevens said Army officials were concerned they might not have the legal authority to reimburse families. They had promised to cover the cost of hotels and airline tickets that the families had bought in anticipation of the 172nd soldiers returning to Fort Wainwright. "With the 172nd coming home, those families had made plans for vacations, to...

FT WAINWRIGHT (Army News Service, Aug. 18, 2006) -- When the extension of the 172nd Stryker Brigade Combat Team to Iraq was announced, the Department of the Army responded by deploying a Tiger Team to Fort Wainwright to begin working Soldier and family issues. The Tiger team got down to business Aug. 4 and worked long hours before leaving last weekend. While at Fort Wainwright, the Tiger Team confronted a variety of issues affecting deployed Soldiers and their families. “This is the top priority of the Army’s leadership,” Col. Dennis Dingle, chief of the DA Tiger Team said. “We are...

WASHINGTON, Aug. 15, 2006 – Three hundred one soldiers with an Alaska-based unit extended in Iraq will return to the combat zone to serve with their comrades in arms, Army officials announced yesterday. A total of 378 soldiers with the 172nd Stryker Brigade Combat Team had returned to Alaska in June and July at the end of their scheduled 12-month tour in Iraq. But before the rest of the 4,000-soldier unit could redeploy, officials halted their return to bolster Iraqi and coalition forces in Baghdad. Now, 301 of those soldiers who made it back to Alaska will return to their...

WASHINGTON, Aug 14 (Reuters) - About 300 U.S. soldiers who just weeks ago returned home to Alaska after a year in Iraq are being ordered back to try to help bolster security in Baghdad, the U.S. Army said on Monday. The soldiers are part of the 3,900-strong 172nd Stryker Brigade Combat Team from Fort Wainwright in Alaska. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld on July 27 ordered the unit to remain in Iraq for up to four months past its scheduled departure. The order provoked anger and disappointment among some of the soldiers' families in Alaska. It also made clear that any...

WASHINGTON, August 6, 2006 – The 172nd Stryker Brigade Combat Team handed over operations in Mosul, Iraq, and other surrounding areas in the Ninewa province to the 3rd SBCT, 2nd Infantry Division, in a transfer-of-authority ceremony at Forward Operating Base Marez today. The 172nd SBCT soldiers were deployed in August 2005 and since have conducted more than 15,000 missions, including cordon and searches, combat patrols, counter-mortar and rocket missions, raids, escort missions and humanitarian aid throughout Dohuk, Ninewa and Irbil provinces. “The accomplishments of the 172nd SBCT have been truly remarkable,” said Army Maj. Gen. Thomas Turner, commanding general of...

BAGHDAD — The extension to the 172nd Stryker Brigade Combat Team’s Iraq deployment has sown chaos in the personal lives of many soldiers in the brigade’s cavalry squadron and imposed tremendous logistical burdens on the unit, problems that could have been avoided, soldiers say, if only the Defense Department had given them a little more warning. The 172nd deployed to Iraq in August 2005 and the bulk of the unit was due to return to Fort Wainwright, Alaska, early this month. But the Pentagon announced July 27 that it was extending the 172nd’s deployment for up to 120 days and...

WASHINGTON, August 2, 2006 – The Army is taking significant steps to ensure soldiers and families of the 172nd Stryker Brigade Combat Team are taken care of now that the unit’s deployment to Iraq has been extended four months. U.S. Army, Alaska leaders are working with higher headquarters to ensure support programs, including financial compensation and personnel support, are available to the soldiers, Army and Defense Department officials said. “We are responding rapidly to provide all the appropriate support and services to these outstanding patriotic professionals and their families, who continue to inspire us all with their unwavering commitment to...