Army details plan to shrink to pre-WWII levels

WASHINGTON - The Army will shrink to its smallest size since before World War II by cutting soldiers from nearly every installation, most notably in two full-size brigade combat teams with thousands of soldiers each that will become much smaller battalion task forces.

The service provided new details Thursday on how it will eliminate about 40,000 soldiers between now and 2018, falling to an overall size of 450,000 soldiers.

The most significant cuts will occur at Fort Benning, Ga., and Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, Alaska, where the Third Brigade Combat Team, Third Infantry Division, and the Fourth Airborne Brigade Combat Team, 25th Infantry Division, respectively, will be targeted. Each brigade combat team has about 4,000 soldiers, and will be reduced to a battalion of about 1,050, Army officials said.

Fort Benning will drop from 12,655 soldiers to 9,040, and Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson will drop from 4,603 to 1,895, according to briefing slides released by the Army.

Fort Hood in Texas won't have any brigade combat teams eliminated, but will still drop from about 37,475 soldiers now to about 34,125.

"The decision to make these cuts is not easy, and will affect just about every Army installation," said Brig. Gen. Randy George, the Army's director of force management.

An additional 17,000 civilian jobs also will be cut across the Army by fall 2018. The service is still determining from where they will come, George said.

The Second Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 25th Infantry Division, of Schofield Barracks in Hawaii, also will face significant change, converting from a mechanized unit using the Army's Stryker combat vehicle to an infantry unit. Those vehicles will be sent to the Pacific Northwest and incorporated into the Army National Guard's 81st Armor Brigade Combat Team, saving the active service money.

The cuts come as the Defense Department pivots following more than a decade of sustained combat operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.