Thursday mornings guest speaker at the Military Affairs Council breakfast was Major General Paul Funk II, Commanding General of the 1st Infantry Division.

Funk went over the current activities of the units assigned to the 1st Infantry Division have been up to.

“The First Brigade is going to go be the theatre reserve at CENCOM, U.S. Central Command,” Funk said.

He explained that they will be going there for about nine months in June and are only taking about 2,500 of their troopers leaving a little more than a battalion at Fort Riley. The ones staying will continue to train Funk said,”and get ready to receive a combined arms battalion that will build in that time.”

The Second Brigade is currently regionally aligned in Africa. Funk explained that they are the brigade the completed the evacuation of the Embassy in South Sudan earlier this month. “They did a world class job, otherwise you would hear all about it.”

The Fourth Brigade will take over as the regionally aligned force in Africa for the Second Brigade in June. “They will be the guys that will be ready should our diplomats be threatened somewhere on the African continent, at least on the east side.”

The Combat Aviation Brigade is currently deployed to Afghanistan and will be back in May and will then begin training before heading somewhere else.

The 75th Fires Brigade is getting ready to go back to Corp at Fort Hood in Texas. Funk mentioned that Fort Riley will be getting a Division Artillery Command. “It’s about a sixty to eighty man headquarters that will form but it comes in about 2016.”

In May of 2015 possibly the Sustainment Brigade will be doing something for SITCOM. “It will probably be part of evacuating our equipment out of Afghanistan.”

Funk finished up by saying that the Garrison is continuing to do a phenomenal job of making,”this place truly feel like the best place to come home to in the Army.”