Grow the Army

Grow the Army is a transformation and restationing initiative of the United States Army announced in 2007 and scheduled to be completed by fiscal year 2013. The initiative is designed to grow the U.S. Army's force by almost 75,000 soldiers, while realigning a large portion of the force in Europe, moving units located there to the continental United States in compliance with the 2005 Base Realignment and Closure Commission suggestions.

The plan was announced in a United States Army press release on December 19, 2007. It calls for a total force growth of 74,200 soldiers, expanding the Active duty army force by 65,000 soldiers, the United States Army Reserve by 1,000 soldiers, and the Army National Guard by 8,200 soldiers. To support the growth, the Army simultaneously announced the restationing of 30,000 Soldiers in combat support and combat service support units throughout the United States as well as various overseas locations.

The army announced that the total active duty force structure would grow by six Infantry Brigade Combat Teams and eight support brigades of various types. This would grow the force from 42 Brigade Combat Teams and 75 modular support brigades in 2007 to 48 Brigade Combat Teams and 83 modular support brigades by 2013. However on April 6, 2009, Defense Secretary Gates announced that the Army will stop the growth of Army brigade combat teams at 45 versus the initially planned 48.

The plan called for US$66,400,000,000 in spending in construction between 2006 and 2013. This construction comprised 743 projects, including 20 new Brigade complexes. One third of the entire Army was scheduled to be realigned during the Grow the Army and BRAC plans.

As part of the 2003–2008 restructuring plan, the Army moved from using division-sized units to brigade-sized units as the basic unit of deployment. As such, the 2007 army consisted of 42 brigades, forty of which were divided evenly amongst ten division-level commands, while two were independent. The six newly activated brigades will be designed as separate independent brigades, without division-level commands.

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