3-153rd Infantry Battalion

The 153rd troops are part of the 39th enhanced Separate Brigade, assigned to the Fort Carson, Colo.-based 7th ID. The 7th ID was reactivated in 1999.

The 153rd Infantry Regiment was ordered to active duty December 23, 1940 and spent the next 10 days at what is now the University of Central Arkansas. The 153rd then moved to Camp Robinson and completed basic training. Moving to Camp Forrest, TN, the regiment spent six week in maneuvers and returned to Camp Robinson for a few days of leave before shipping out to Camp Murray, WA August 20, 1941. The 1st and 3rd Battalions were then posted to Annette Island and Seward, Nome and Yakutat, Alaska. The 2nd Battalion was stationed on Umnak Island, west of Dutch Harbor and took part in the occupation of Adak Island and the assault on Kiska. The 153rd returned to Camp Shelby, MS March 21, 1944 and was deactivated on June 30th and its soldiers assigned as replacements. Many returned to Camp Robinson as cadre.

Two Arkansas Army National Guard infantry units served in central Saudi Arabia in 1999 to support the U.S. military presence in the Persian Gulf. The mobilization of 266 citizen-soldiers significantly increased the National Guard's participation with allied forces in Southwest Asia since the Persian Gulf War. The two 133-man companies from Arkansas's enhanced 39th Infantry Brigade provided force security at two locations for about seven months. The units were Company B, 3rd Battalion, 153rd Infantry from Fordyce and Company B, 2nd Battalion from Batesville. They replaced an active Army element from the 82nd Airborne Division. The Fordyce unit, from southern Arkansas, was mobilized in late May 1999 and reported to the central part of Saudi Arabia in mid-June for about 120 days of duty. The Batesville unit, from northern Arkansas, reported for duty in mid-September and began its 120 days of security duty in early October 1999. Both units were on active duty for a total of 155 days. Other National Guard infantry companies to continued with that mission in 2000 and beyond.

They are the first two Army Guard ground combat units earmarked for duty with the six-year-old Southern Watch operation charged with keeping Iraqi military aircraft out of the no-fly zone that covers the southern half of that nation. The request for the infantry units was significant, Guard officials pointed out, because it comes on the heals of a 144-soldier Virginia Army Guard infantry company's successful six-month peacekeeping mission at a Sava River bridgehead in Bosnia and Croatia that ended April 1998. That was the first time a National Guard infantry unit had been sent overseas since Indiana Rangers were deployed to Vietnam 30 years earlier.

As part of Task Force Eagle deployed to Bosnia in 2001, First and 3-153rd Infantry performed presence patrols outside Forward Operating Base Morgan and Camp McGovern, and participated in the consolidation of weapon storage sites. The soldiers also guarded the sites. Stabilization Force 9 has the largest contingent of National Guard combat ground forces of any previous SFOR rotation, including the 48th Infantry Brigade, Georgia National Guard; and 1st Battalion, 153rd Infantry Division, Arkansas National Guard.