The military’s presence in North Carolina is dominated by Fort Bragg, the nation’s largest Army base by population, and Camp Lejeune, the Marine Corps’ main east coast infantry base. The state also has a major Army National Guard brigade of several thousand citizen soldiers.
With no ground fighting, the state’s major units of soldiers and Marines haven’t been tapped for the war with Iran.
But troops and military families here are still being affected, including those with ties to Seymour Johnson Air Force Base, which has jets involved in the conflict flying out of an undisclosed site in the Middle East.
Here are some of the ways the conflict is — and isn’t — touching North Carolina-based troops and military families:
SEYMOUR JOHNSON AIR FORCE BASE: Websites that focus on the defense industry and national security issues reported last month that F-15E Strike Eagle jets from Seymour Johnson had been sent to the Middle East as part of the U.S. military buildup there. That’s based on flight tracking data, airport tower communications, and other sources.
The three jets shot down over Kuwait March 2 in a friendly fire incident were F-15Es, but a spokesman for U.S. Central Command declined to say which base, unit or units they came from, citing operational security.
All six crew members ejected and parachuted safely to the ground, according to a Pentagon news release.
NORTH CAROLINA NATIONAL GUARD: About 800 soldiers of the North Carolina Army National Guard left the state at the end of January for a long-planned, year-long deployment to Kuwait as part of an ongoing U.S. presence there that began in 2012.
Those soldiers are with the Wilmington-based 1st Battalion, 120th Infantry Regiment, which is part of the 30th Mobile Brigade Combat Team.
They are still in Texas, doing final preparations on a normal timeline for these kinds of routine deployments, and it’s unclear yet whether or how their mission might be affected by the fighting.
The North Carolina Air National Guard flies C-17s, the military’s key long-distance transport jet. The unit specializes in medical missions, but can also fly troops and cargo. Its Aeromedical Evacuation Squadron has 40 flight nurses, medical technicians, and flight crews, as well as its aircraft, deployed to Germany and operating under federal control for use however the Pentagon needs them.
The state’s National Guard is among the largest in the nation. It's also one of the most relied-on, by both state and federal governments. Its main Army unit, the 30th, with nearly 4,000 soldiers, is among the best-trained and equipped in the country, which led to Pentagon to send it to Iraq for two full rotations during the war there.
The 30th also is one of the first armored brigades — active duty or National Guard — chosen by the Pentagon to be reconfigured for modern conflicts as part of an Army-wide modernization initiative. It’s now in the process of trading its tanks and other heavy armor for fast-moving smaller vehicles.
Because the Southeast has been hit by so many major storms in recent years, the N.C. Guard has been busy with domestic, state-led duty. Guard units have provided crucial recovery help in the aftermaths of storms like Hurricane Floyd, Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico, and Helene in Western North Carolina, among several others.
FORT BRAGG: The Fort Bragg-based 82nd Airborne Division is an obvious choice if the Trump Administration makes an unexpected decision to send ground troops into the war. The 82nd is often referred to as the nation’s 911 force. It keeps a brigade of 4,000 to 5,000 soldiers ready to deploy and can put hundreds in the air within hours. In a dire situation, it can deliver them via parachute.
A spokesperson for the 18th Airborne Corps, which includes the 82nd, said the Division has had no orders from the Pentagon regarding the war. President Trump told reporters this weekend that there would "have to be a very good reason" to send ground troops into Iran.
If special missions on the ground in Iran require a small elite unit, it could be drawn from Bragg, which is home to Delta Force and standard Special Forces units. Delta was used in the Jan. 3 raid in Venezuela that captured that country’s president, Nicolas Maduro.
These kinds of units are often secretly pre-positioned in countries adjacent to potential targets.
MARINE CORPS BASE CAMP LEJEUNE: About 2,200 Marines from Camp Lejeune and Marine Corps Air Base New River departed on a regularly-scheduled shipboard deployment in August and joined the major buildup of U.S. forces off Venezuela prior to the Maduro raid.
On Monday, the Amphibious Ready Group that the Marines were with, including USS Iwo Jima, was reported to be still in the Caribbean.
Such deployments can be extended but they usually last six to seven months. So in a typical case, the Marines would be coming home about now. But President Trump has said the U.S. isn’t done in the Caribbean yet, and the Cuban government is coming under more U.S. pressure. So far there has been no suggestion the Lejeune force will be part of that. The base also is home to an elite Special Operations unit, the Marine Raiders.
