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1st Battalion - 46th Infantry Regiment
"Professionals"

The 1st Battalion, 46th Infantry Regiment, conducts basic combat training in order to develop soldiers who will succeed at advanced individual training and in the U.S. Army. On order, it conducts ROTC Leader's Training Course in support of Cadet Command.

The 46th Infantry was constituted in May 1917 as a part of the General Mobilization for World War I. The 46th was assigned to the 9th Division just at the end of the war. The unit was inactivated in November 1921.

The 46th was reconstituted at Fort Knox as the 46th Armored Infantry, 5th Armored Division, in 1943. The regiment consisted of three battalions: the 46th, 15th, and 47th Armored Infantry Battalions.

The 46th Infantry participated in the Normandy Invasion, the Liberation of France, and reached the vaunted Seigfried Line in September, 1944. The 5th Armored Division liberated the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg and also had the distinction of being the first American unit to reach German soil.

All three battalions of the 46th fought in the three month bloody campaign of the Hurtgen Forest. These were the worst, most difficult, and trying conditions of the European Theater. Casualties were extremely high and in December 1944, the 46th Armored Infantry Battalion lost half its effective strength in a single day, taking a stubbornly defended hill. Three men, including the battalion commander, won the Distinguished Service Cross that day. The sacrifices made in the Hurtgen Forest are symbolized by the two pine trees, colored red, found on the Unit Crest.

Upon completion of the war in Europe, the 46th Infantry returned to the States and was deactivated in October, 1945. The regiment was activated and deactivated several times in the intervening years.

In May, 1967, the 46th Infantry deployed for Vietnam. Two battalions of the 46th (1st and 5th) served honorably rotating between the 23d Infantry Division (Americal), 198th Infantry Brigade and the 196th Infantry Brigade. The battalions have credit for twelve campaigns, stretching from October, 1967 to June, 1972. On 13 May 1969, MAJ Dunagan, A Co, 1st Battalion, 46th Infantry was awarded the Medal of Honor. The 46th was inactivated again in August, 1984.

The basic training battalions of the 1st Brigade were redesignated the 46th Infantry on 30 January 1987.