FORT DIX, N.J. -- Plumes of red and yellow signal smoke wafted over this Army base's training range yesterday as dozens of Maryland National Guardsmen learned how to perfect the coordinated firing of .50-caliber machine guns.
They paused only to cover a convoy of friendly Humvees snaking through the sandy pine forest filled with snipers and roadside bombs.
It is a scene similar to ones played out by hundreds of thousands of service members who have prepared for a war now in its fifth year.
The difference today might be the amount of time they spend at home engaged in mock battles before they deploy to Iraq.
Two years ago, a Maryland National Guard infantry company deploying to Baghdad trained together for more than three months, including two months in Georgia, before joining its entire brigade at the Army's premier desert training facility in California.
Now, the Maryland Headquarters Company for the 58th Infantry Brigade Combat Team expects to spend as little as 45 days at Fort Dix honing its skills before shipping out for a 10-month combat tour. The brigade's battalions will largely train separately. And they'll receive no time at Fort Irwin, Calif., where the Army runs its National Training Center.
Some critics worry about how ready these troops will be with less time to train at home and, for some, less time between deployments. But Col. Sean Casey of the deploying Maryland-based brigade insisted yesterday that his soldiers are receiving the right kind - and sufficient amount - of training they'll need for combat and survival in Iraq.
"Fort Dix can fill all of the training requirements we have and the time here will vary based on what the different requirements of the units are," Casey said, watching as his soldiers, perched in observation towers, used live ammunition to mow down enemy targets.
The commander pointed out that a unit such as the 1st Battalion, 175th Regiment, which arrived late last week after sendoff ceremonies around Maryland, could have its 525 soldiers stay at Fort Dix for up to three months.
The condensed time to mobilize and ship out troops across the military marks a new approach for units arriving this summer in Iraq to replace existing troops and increase the overall force by more than 20,000 as part of a troop buildup announced by President Bush in January. Some soldiers have left basic training and found themselves on the way to Iraq while other units have been cobbled together because of personnel shortages, experts said.
