About 400 soldiers from 2nd Battalion, 20th Field Artillery Regiment will deploy to South Korea in June, the Defense Department announced Friday.
The nine-month rotation of the multiple launch rocket system battalion was approved by Defense Secretary Ashton Carter, the DoD announcement said.
The 2nd Battalion, 20th Field Artillery, of Fort Hood, Texas, will be the first rotational battalion to deploy. Once in the Republic of Korea, the soldiers will join the 210th Field Artillery Brigade at Camp Casey.
The soldiers will arrive fully manned, trained and equipped; after their nine-month tour, the soldiers will leave their equipment in place for follow-on rotations, according to DoD.
The addition of the MLRS battalion to the 210th Field Artillery Brigade is part of an Army-wide reorganization that will increase the number of MLRS battalions in all field artillery brigades from two to three, according to DoD. The change will increase theater readiness and maneuver capabilities, officials said.
The MLRS is a mobile automatic system that fires surface-to-surface rockets from the M270 and M270A1 weapons platform, according to the Lockheed Martin website. The system, manned by a three-man crew, can fire 12 MLRS rockets in less than one minute, according to the website.
Michelle Tan is the editor of Army Times and Air Force Times. She has covered the military for Military Times since 2005, and has embedded with U.S. troops in Iraq, Afghanistan, Kuwait, Haiti, Gabon and the Horn of Africa.
