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Further Reading

1st Battalion, 56th Air Defense Artillery

This battalion is the only Initial Entry Training (IET) unit at Fort Bliss. The mission is to provide the Regular Army and the Army National Guard with soldiers who espouse the seven Army Values, are motivated, disciplined, physically fit, trained in common soldier skills and in their Air Defense Artillery Military Occupational Speciality. The Battalion conducts soldierization training during ADA AIT (i.e., Army Values, physical fitness, task reinforcement, and military customs and traditions). It provides administrative, logistical, billeting, and food service support for trainees and cadre, and executes and supports soldier and family care and community responsibilities.

The 1st Battalion, 56th Air Defense Artillery (ADA) traces its history to 1921 with the Organized Reserves as Battery A, 506th Artillery (anti-aircraft). It was inactive in 1933 and reactivated in the Regular Army. The battalion's illustrious history encompasses ten major campaigns during World War II, resulting in its being awarded an Army Presidential Unit Citation, A Navy Presidential Unit Citation, and the Luxembourg Croix de Guerre. The War department cited the 56th Field Artillery for its battle honors in the performance of duty 21 to 28 November 1944 in the Germany's Hurtgen Forest, while reinforcing the 121st Infantry Regiment. It reads in part, "Foot by foot and against great odds, the regiment and its attached and reinforcing units drove the enemy from Log Bunker and Pillbox, passing concentrations of artillery and mortar estimated at 3500 rounds per day at the height of operations, and finally capturing the strategically important town of Hurtgen in fierce house to house combat."

This fine fighting tradition was brought forth again by the battalion during its participation in ten major campaigns in the Korean War, including the United Nations Defensive and Offensive Campaigns.

Redesigned at Fort Bliss, Texas on 1 September 1971 as the 1st Battalion, 56th Air Defense Artillery, the battalion was integral to the basic training (BT) and the advanced individual training (AIT) of soldiers entering the high to medium altitude air defense weapon system field. Originally formed with three BT companies and two AIT batteries, on 26 September 1990 the battalion finished its BT mission and with the addition of three AIT batteries, and one transition battery, became the only ADA AIT training battalion in the United States Army.