MILITARY
Fort Bragg facts
Fort Bragg is the home of the Army's airborne and special operations forces.
The Army post can claim a lot of other "home of" distinctions: civil affairs and psychological operations, as well as training for specialties; and joint special operations, the supersecret forces that are playing one of the biggest roles in the war on terrorism.
Staff file photo
Paratroopers jump out of a C-130 over Sicily Drop Zone on Fort Bragg.
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Here are some other Fort Bragg facts:
- Fort Bragg and Camp Mackall, a satellite Special Forces training camp, cover more than 160,000 acres in the Sandhills.
- The Army post has more than 31 million square feet of buildings. Picerne, a private contractor, manages almost 7 million square feet.
- There are 19 miles of railroad line on Fort Bragg.
- There's $218.9 million of construction going on at Fort Bragg.
- Fort Bragg will take over Pope Air Force Base by 2011. Pope again will become an Army airfield.
- The main purpose of Fort Bragg is training soldiers for combat. To that end, there are seven drop zones, where parachutists land, and four impact areas, where artillery shells land.
- More than two thirds of Fort Bragg's 48,000 soldiers live off post in the surrounding civilian communities.
- The military payroll is more than $2 billion annually.
- Fort Bragg brings more than soldiers to southeastern North Carolina. More than 16,000 family members live on post. The Army post is one of the big reasons that North Carolina has more than 105,000 Army retirees and family members.
- Fort Bragg has a federal school system with nine schools and more than 4,000 students.
- Military stores ring up more than $216 million in sales annually. The military grocery, known as a commissary, does more than $103 million in business.
- Federal employees give more than $2 million annually to the Combined Federal Campaign.
- Fort Bragg has an annual estimated economic impact of $7 billion on the surrounding 10 counties.
Pope Air Force Base
The Air Force Reserve's 440th Airlift Wing is setting up shop at Pope Air Force Base with its C-130H Hercules cargo airplanes. The wing headquarters recently moved from Milwaukee, and the airplanes are scheduled to arrive this fall.
That means Pope will have C-130 airplanes that have not been largely grounded or restricted because of age-related maintenance problems, as has been the case in recent years.
The Air Mobility Command's 43rd Airlift Wing is gradually getting rid of its Vietnam-era E model airplanes. Active-duty airmen and reservists will fly airplanes that belong to the Reserve.
The 23rd Fighter Group is on the verge of moving its A-10 Thunderbolt II attack jets to Moody Air Force Base at Valdosta, Ga.
Fort Bragg is getting ready to take over Pope, which will revert to its World War II role as an Army airfield. All of this is part of the 2005 BRAC mandates that must be carried out by 2011.
Meanwhile, Pope's Green Ramp will continue to be Fort Bragg's airport. Paratroopers and cargo will be loaded onto Air Force airplanes for local training and overseas deployments.
Other organizations, such as the Combat Controller School and special tactics squadrons, will remain at Pope.
Troops at war
About half of Fort Bragg's 48,000 assigned soldiers had gone to war in August by midsummer of 2007.
Staff file photo
82nd Airborne Division paratroopers stand in formation at Funk Physical Fitness Center before heading out for a tour in Iraq.
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The number of soldiers on post may hit a low from October through December.
"That's when we will be making this last push out," said Jonathan Chase, who works with exercises and training for the 18th Airborne Corps assistant chief of staff for operations. "About that same time, people are starting to come back."
The 82nd Airborne Division's four brigade combat teams are in Iraq and Afghanistan. About half of the 9,000 soldiers of U.S. Army Special Operations Command might be deployed at any time, and the 18th Airborne Corps headquarters will be returning to Iraq in early 2008.
Meanwhile, the post population increases with Army Reserve soldiers -- especially civil affairs and psychological operations -- mobilizing at Fort Bragg.
"If you want to look at an ebb and flow, we've been in a steady state that is different than the first Iraq war," Chase said. "The first Iraq war, everybody was gone for an extended period of time."
About 30,000 soldiers were gone for about eight months for the Persian Gulf War of 1991 and the buildup.
Since October 2001, Fort Bragg soldiers and Pope Air Force Base airmen have been headed to the Middle East in increasing numbers, for longer tours.
Nowadays, smaller groups of soldiers from Fort Bragg are constantly coming from and going to Iraq and Afghanistan.
Fort Bragg has an artillery brigade, a medical brigade and a military police brigade at home.
"There are always units coming and going," said Col. Billy Buckner, an 18th Airborne Corps spokesman. "At any given time, that number will fluctuate."
Updated: August, 2007