About 300 soldiers from the Maryland National Guard's 175th Infantry Regiment said goodbye to family and friends Monday morning at the Dundalk Readiness Center, boarding transport for a deployment that will take them thousands of miles away to the Horn of Africa. The First Battalion's departure marks the official start of a mission expected to last the next several months, with troops headed to support counterterrorism and stability operations across East Africa.
The unit is headed to Camp Lemonnier in Djibouti, according to WBAL, which reported that the deployment officially began Monday morning when soldiers departed the Dundalk Readiness Center.
Families were invited to attend the deployment ceremony as soldiers prepared to leave. Families and friends gathered to support the soldiers. The deployed troops will work alongside American allies and are expected to promote regional stability while supporting mission objectives tied to counterterrorism security initiatives in the region.
Joining a Task Force That Spans Seven Nations
Once in Djibouti, the Maryland soldiers will support the Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa, a command that, as of a year earlier, had a strength of about 2,000 personnel from across the U.S. military, according to Stars and Stripes. The task force operates in Sudan, Somalia, Djibouti, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Seychelles and Kenya, the outlet reported.
The Maryland unit isn't the first National Guard formation to rotate through the task force. New York Army National Guard soldiers were preparing for a 10-month deployment to Camp Lemonnier at the start of last year, training at Fort Bliss, Texas, for four weeks beforehand, per Stars and Stripes. That deployment included a farewell ceremony in Buffalo, New York, where 145 soldiers from the 152nd Engineer Support Company were sent off, the outlet noted.
A Base Increasingly in the Spotlight
Camp Lemonnier has drawn fresh attention in recent weeks amid regional security concerns. Stars and Stripes reported that recent Houthi territorial gains on Perim Island have brought the Iran-backed group closer to the installation, and that the base sits within range of the group's ballistic missiles and drones across the Bab el-Mandeb Strait.
The 175th Infantry Regiment has a long history of both overseas missions and domestic emergency response. The unit deployed to Iraq for several months in 2007 and conducted a peacekeeping mission in the Sinai Desert in 2011, according to WBAL. More recently, the regiment was called into service to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic and the January 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol.
Maryland's Earlier Ties to the Continent
The Guard's connection to the African continent predates this deployment by nearly two decades. In 2008, 18 Maryland National Guard doctors, dentists and other medical professionals spent two weeks in Senegal supporting a 14-nation exercise known as Flintlock 09, according to DVIDS. That team treated nearly 1,600 Senegalese patients who visited a makeshift clinic during the exercise, the report stated.
For now, the roughly 300 soldiers who left Dundalk this week face months of work supporting the task force's mission in Djibouti, with no confirmed return date included in official announcements. Their families, many of whom gathered for Monday's farewell, will be watching from Maryland as the deployment unfolds.
