OKC Marine Reserve unit to leave for Iraq
OKLAHOMA CITY -- A large contingent of Marines from the Armed Forces Reserve Center will leave for Iraq next week for a seven-month tour of duty.
http://tulsaworld.com/news/article.aspx?articleID=070707_1_A11_spanc67651
By MANNY GAMALLO World Staff Writer
7/7/2007
Marine 1st Sgt. Scott Baker said 131 reservists with the Fox Battery of the 2nd Battalion, 14th Marines, 4th Marine Division will head to the al-Anbar Province in western Iraq.
He said the Marines will leave next week, possibly Monday or Tuesday. They will leave Oklahoma, fly to Riverside, Calif., and from there head to Iraq.
In Iraq, the Marines will be based at the al-Asad Air Base, the second-largest air base in Iraq.
The base is south of Haditha, northwest of Ramadi and Fallujah.
Baker said this is the largest deployment from Oklahoma City since Operation Desert Storm in 1990-91.
He said the Marines from Oklahoma City will be the first in the history of the Marine Corps to use the HIMARS, or High Mobility Artillery Rocket System.
"The Army has been using this system, but this will be the first time for the Marines," Baker said. "We're really excited."
Baker said the rockets can hit a mailbox from 60 miles away.
"It limits collateral damage," he said. "If you wanted to hit just the south side of a building in Fallujah, you can do that without damaging the north side of the building."
He said the Oklahoma City-based Marines trained on the system last summer at Fort Sill, and others received additional training at the Marine base at Twentynine Palms, Calif.
The first rocket fired in Iraq by the Oklahoma Marines will be in honor of Lance Cpl. Trevor Roberts, 21, of Oklahoma City, Baker said.
Roberts, assigned to the Marine Forces Reserve's 2nd Battalion, 14th Marine Regiment, 4th Marine Division at Oklahoma City, was killed March 24 in a roadside bomb attack in the al-Anbar Province.
Most of the Marines who are heading to Iraq next week attended his funeral April 2.
Roberts was the only Marine from the Oklahoma center to be killed in the war in Iraq.
Baker said about 40 Marines from the Oklahoma City reserve center have gone to Iraq, but they went with other units.
The 131 Marines leaving next week will be the largest mass deployment from Oklahoma City.
Baker said most of those going are from Oklahoma City, but others are from elsewhere in Oklahoma, along with a few from Kansas and Texas.
The unit's equipment has been shipped to Iraq.