3rd Squadron - 73rd Cavlary
3rd Battalion, 73rd Armor
The Army announced 11 September 1996 the decision to inactivate the 3rd Battalion, 73rd Armor Regiment at Fort Bragg, NC. This unit was the only light tank battalion remaining in the US Army, with the 16-ton Vietnam-era Sheridan tank, which can be airdropped. Due to the retirement of the 30-year-old M551A1 Sheridan tank, the inactivation was expected to take place no later than July 15, 1997. This allowed an orderly inactivation to take place over a 10-month timeline decreasing undue turbulence for soldiers and their families. Some personnel were reassigned beginning in February with the majority of soldiers and families moving through June 1997.
The M551 Sheridan light tank parachute airdropped into combat by the 3/73d Armor BN attached to the 82d Airborne Division for Panama in 1989.
The Sheridan's last battle action was with the 3rd Battalion (Airborne), 73rd Armor of the 82nd Airborne Division during the Gulf War. If the Iraqi Army had gone on the offensive against the 82d Airborne Division, the division's only antitank capability would have been the 3d Battalion, 73d Armor, the antitank companies of the battalions, and the Dragon gunners in the line companies. When the M551A1(TTS) vehicles were finally placed in the battlefield position that they were originally designed to dominate, the long armed Shillelagh missile system killed Iraqi armor.
Early in the evening of 18 September 1994, nearly 3,000 paratroopers of the 82nd Airborne Division were enroute to Haiti to launch Operation RESTORE DEMOCRACY. Aviation elements were already deployed to the nearby island of Great Inauga. Elements of the 3/73 Armor were waiting aboard ships off the coast. When Haitian leaders heard the 82nd Airborne Division was on the way, a peace agreement was reached, and the 82nd was recalled. From 26 September to 25 October, elements of the 3/73d Armor supported peacekeeping operations in Haiti.
The Sheridan-equipped 3-73rd Armor/82nd operated one company of LAV's on loan from USMC inventory, for a year or more, prior to the Battalion inactivating. Because the Army was favorably impressed, the Piranha/LAV series are being considered for a limited, off-the-shelf acquisition.
The decision to inactivate the unit was a tough one; however, current and future anti-armor assets within the 82nd Airborne Division and XVIII Airborne Corps ensured there is a sufficient anti-armor capability. The division has individual man portable, shoulder-fired, anti-tank weapons like the AT-4 and Dragon as well as vehicle-mounted, tube-launched, optically-tracked, wire-guided TOW missiles. The XVIII Airborne Corps also possesses an attack helicopter brigade and can task organize its assets to augment the division's anti-armor capability.
An Immediate Ready Company consisting of Abrams tanks and Bradley armored fighting vehicles from the 3rd Infantry Division at Fort Stewart, Ga., augments the 82nd Airborne Division. The IRC, capable of being deployed by the Air Force's C-17 Globemaster III, lends flexibility, speed and lethality to early entry forces such as the 82nd Airborne Division. Risk further decreased with the fielding of the Javelin weapon system to the division from April 1997 through November 1998, and the fielding of an Enhanced Fiber Optic Guided Missile Company in the future to the XVIII Airborne Corps.
The 3rd-73 was formally part of the Part of 3rd-505 PIR.
