US Military Base Closures/Realignments Four National Guard centers will be closed including three in Baton Rouge as well as the Naval Support Base in NO. Barksdale AFB and the NO Naval air station will gain units. Fort Polk is not listed here, although it has already been mentioned for realignment, probably gaining another brigade and almost certainly keeping the JRTC in place. The heavy 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment will move to Fort Lewis Washington and a new, light 4th Brigade of the 10th Division (Mountain) will be stationed at Ft. Polk. The Army desperately needs a major urban warfare training center, and the north half of this base is ideally suited. North Fort Polk is a large training base constructed during WWII and has not been extensively modernized like the main post at South Fort Polk. It may be shut down and become a huge urban training area for the Joint Readiness Training Center. This will allow brigade-sized light infantry units to arrive at Alexandria Air Park (Former England AFB) to conduct lengthy urban warfare exercises in a real city ten times larger than the quaint artificial villages used today.
