Members of 1st Squadron, 17th Cavalry Regiment, 82nd Combat Aviation Brigade, arrived in South Korea earlier this month to complete the Kiowa’s final deployment. In nine months, the unit will return to Fort Bragg, North Carolina, and the unit’s OH-58Ds helicopters will be replaced with more modern AH-64D Apaches.
The National Guard’s Apaches will be redistributed to the Army in exchange for UH-60 Black Hawks. The transition is a product of the Army’s Aviation Restructuring Initiative; a controversial five-year plan to retire “legacy systems” like the 50-year-old Kiowa, and to make use of newer technologies while maximizing the number of active aircrafts.
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