Tour of Duty: Afghanistan

By Raul Beltran

Four hundred members of the 1st Battalion from Kaneohe Bay were to leave Oahu this morning. They will be joined by another six hundred Marines from the same unit next week.

In Afghanistan, the Kaneohe Marines from the 1st Battalion will replace fellow Marines from the 2nd Battalion, 3rd Marines, who left the Windward Oahu base in June. Elements of the 2nd Battalion are expected to arrive home this weekend.
Since November 2004, all three battalions of the 3rd Marine Regiment have been deployed to Afghanistan. The first was the 3rd Battalion, followed by the 2nd Battalion in June and now the 1st Battalion.

This will be the second combat assignment for the 1st Battalion, 3rd Marine Regiment. In July 2004, 900 members of the battalion left for Okinawa for what was supposed to be a routine seven-month deployment. The unit was redeployed to Iraq that fall for the assault on Fallujah in November 2004.

Forty-three Marines and two sailors assigned to the 1st Battalion were killed in action in Iraq before the unit returned to Kaneohe in April.

The largest loss occurred on Jan. 26 when 26 Marines from the 1st Battalion from Kaneohe Bay and one Navy corpsman based at Pearl Harbor were killed in a helicopter crash. 7,000 Marines and sailors are stationed at the Kaneohe base.
Posted by on January 5, 2006 11:41 AM Permalink

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: B0F9LL4PWN
• ISBN13: 9798284833797
• Release Date: May 2025
• Publisher: Independently Published
• Length: 28 Pages
• Weight: 0.08 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.1" x 5.0" x 8.0"