2nd Brigade Combat Team uncases colors after combative deployment

FORT DRUM, N.Y. (WWTI) — It was the end of a scary deployment.

On May 2, the 10th Mountain Division’s 2nd Brigade Combat Team uncased its unit colors at Fort Drum’s Memorial Park.

For nine months, the unit was stationed across eight bases in the U.S. Central Command Area of Responsibility in Syria, Iraq, Kuwait and Jordan. 2BCT’s original mission was to fight off ISIS in the Middle East.

The deployment took a turn when attacks from Iranian-back militia groups began in October 2023. Over nine months, the eight bases withstood over 170 attacks from these militia groups, including bombs from Unmanned Aircraft Systems and ballistic missiles.

The 2nd Brigade Combat Team shot down 93 of these attacks, according to 10th Mountain Division Leadership.

“The kinetic nature of that entire region, we couldn’t have predicted that,” 10th Mountain Division Deputy Commander of Support Brigadier General Matthew Braman said. “We weren’t ready to to say, you know, this this fall you’re going to start getting attacked, that 170 plus times, by one way, drones.”

This experience was unsettling for all soldiers and commanders, 2BCT Commander Colonel Scott Wence noted.

“I came out of a meeting one time right in the middle of the attacks. A young soldier was walking by me and I was talking to her and she said, ‘Are we going to be okay?'” Col. Wence explained. “We had people running to bunkers several times a day, you know? So there’s people that passed out in bunkers and were dealing with it psychologically that I didn’t I wasn’t in the bunker with them. I was trying to knock it down.”

While the majority of 2BCT was deployed overseas, a portion of the unit remained stateside at Fort Drum. These soldiers took control of the day-to-day duties and assured consistency within the community.

Lieutenant Colonel Mark Gillman stood as the unit’s acting Brigade Commander at Fort Drum. LTC Gillman said the experience was oftentimes difficult when he knew his fellow soldiers were in harm’s way.

“I felt like I was on permanent casualty notification duty,” LTC Gillman expressed. “It’s challenging because you want to do something right. You want to be there next to them. You want to help them out. And it was difficult to keep the families informed and calm about everything. You know, they could tell that this was going to be a different deployment really early in October when things started changing.”

Throughout the deployment, 29 Purple Hearts were awarded to soldiers within 2BCT after they endured injuries from these enemy attacks.

However, at the end of the mission, all deployed soldiers returned home safe to Fort Drum. Which Colonel Wence said was the biggest success.

“To see all the stuff we talk about that’s fake and to see the intel and stuff actually happened in real life, made us a stronger unit. Made them all better soldiers,” Colonel Wence stated.

Home at last and ready for the next mission.

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