Army Reserve unit of 600 called to federal duty

Hundreds more Iowans are being called to fight in the war on terrorism. The 389th Engineer Battalion of the U.S. Army Reserve is being activated out of six units in Iowa — Dubuque, Davenport, Decorah, Iowa City, Middletown and Muscatine. That battalion has 600 soldiers who are to report for duty on March 15th. They’ll head for Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri, then to points unknown as part of Operation Enduring Freedom. With that call-up, military officials say a total of 35-hundred Iowa Reservists and National Guard members will be on federal duty. That surpasses the 32-hundred Iowans in the Guard and Reserve who served in the Gulf War of a dozen years ago.