Unit’s deployment cut short as Afghan war winds down

[unhappycamper]

http://www.thenewstribune.com/2014/02/03/3025952/units-deployment-cut-short-as.html



SCHNEIDER: Colonel heads 62nd Medical Brigade

Unit’s deployment cut short as Afghan war winds down
By ADAM ASHTON
Staff writer
February 3, 2014

Midway through her deployment to Afghanistan last year, Col. Theresa Schneider got some good news: The Army wanted her and about 60 other soldiers from her Joint Base Lewis-McChord medical headquarters to return home in time for Christmas.

But there was a catch. Schneider had to close out her command managing the war’s two primary combat hospitals at a much faster pace than she planned. She’d thought she had until March.

“You had six months to do what you thought you had nine months to do,” said Schneider, who leads Lewis-McChord’s 62nd Medical Brigade.

The quickening pace of her work was a sign of the U.S. military’s drawdown from the war. About 34,000 U.S. troops are in the country today, down from a peak of more than 100,000 in 2011.