101st Airborne Division
Active air assault division of the United States Army.
History
The 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault) ("Screaming Eagles") is a light infantry division of the United States Army that specializes in air assault operations. The 101st is designed to plan, coordinate, and execute brigade-sized air assault operations that can be conducted in one period of darkness, at distances up to 500 nautical miles (926 kilometers), to seize key terrain and hold it for up to 14 days. In recent years, the 101st was active in security force assistance and counterinsurgency operations in Iraq, in Afghanistan in 2015–2016, and in Syria, as part of Operation Inherent Resolve in 2018–2021.
Established in 1918, the 101st Division was first constituted as an airborne unit in 1942. During World War II, it gained renown for its role in Operation Overlord (the D-Day landings and airborne landings on 6 June 1944, in Normandy, France); Operation Market Garden; the liberation of the Netherlands; and its action during the Battle of the Bulge around the city of Bastogne, Belgium. During the Vietnam War, the 101st Airborne Division fought in several major campaigns and battles, including the Battle of Hamburger Hill in 1969 and the Battle of Fire Support Base Ripcord in 1970. In mid-1968, the division was reorganized and redesignated as an airmobile division and in 1974, the division was again redesigned as an air assault division. The titles reflect the division's shift from airplanes to helicopters as the primary method of delivering troops into combat.
At the height of the war on terrorism, the 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault) had over 200 aircraft. This shrank to just over 100 aircraft with the inactivation of the 159th Combat Aviation Brigade in 2015. In 2019, media reports suggested the Army was working to restore the 101st's aviation capabilities so it can return to lifting an entire brigade in one air assault.
Text from Wikipedia: 101st Airborne Division, CC BY-SA 4.0, lightly trimmed.
Wars and campaigns
From Wikidata (CC0).
Key dates
- 1918On 23 July 1918, the War Department directed the organization of the 101st Division in the National Army at Camp Shelby, Mississippi, under the supervision of camp commander Brigadier General Roy Hoffman.
- 1943506th Parachute Infantry Regiment (506th PIR) (attached from 15 September 1943 to 1 March 1945; thereafter assigned)
- 1944The first elements of the division returned to Southampton, England on 12 July 1944 in the presence of Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson according to the private papers of Lt.
- 1971In 1971, elements of the division supported Operation Lam Son 719, the South Vietnamese invasion of southern Laos, but only aviation units actually entered Laos.
- 1988On 8 March 1988, two U.S. Army Blackhawk helicopters assigned to the 101st Aviation Brigade collided while on a night training mission at Fort Campbell.
- 2005Renamed Task Force Band of Brothers, the 101st assumed responsibility on 1 November 2005 for four provinces in north central Iraq: Salah ad Din, As Sulymaniyah.
- 2014In 2014, the 101st Airborne Division Headquarters deployed to west Africa to help contain the spread of Ebola, as part of Operation United Assistance.
- 2016On 3 November 2016, it was reported that U.S. Army combat engineers were seen just west of the Great Zab River about halfway between the Kurdish city of Irbil and Mosul.
- 2024In response to the damage inflicted by Hurricane Helene, soldiers of the 2nd Mobile Brigade Combat Team "Strike" and 101st Combat Aviation Brigade began deploying on 5 October 2024, to western North Carolina.
Dates and events quoted from the same Wikipedia article (CC BY-SA 4.0).
Records that place someone with this unit
A unit history doesn't name everyone who served. These records do:
- Morning reports and unit rosters: access (National Personnel Records Center)
- Search Army morning reports, 1912–1946 (National Archives Catalog)
- Unit and organizational records held in St. Louis