08 August 2016 (15:44 UTC-07 Tango 01) 18 Mordad 1395/04 Dhu I-Qa’da 1437/06 Bing-Shen 4714

“It’s the first time that an engineer brigade headquarters has had this type of mission within the U.S. Central Command area of responsibility. We have had other engineer brigades in Iraq and Afghanistan other times but they have had different types of missions. This mission will be a pure engineer brigade headquarters mission where we will be overseeing and providing command and control for specific engineer missions throughout the theater…..    Our mission is so diverse and covers such a wide variety of sovereign countries, with each having its own set of rules, it will require us to stay on top of it and we have a process that will ensure we get to where we need to go.”-Colonel Charles M. Schoening, Texas National Guard 176th Engineer Brigade Commander

Over the next nine months, besides expanding the U.S. military presence in the Middle East through the construction of more permanent military installations, one of the historic missions of the 176th will be to track 1-thousand 7-hundred Active Duty, Reserve and National Guard personnel throughout the region.