166th Aviation Brigade (United States)

166th Aviation Brigade (United States)

The 166th Aviation Brigade is an aviation training brigade of the United States Army headquartered at Fort Hood, Texas. It is a subordinate unit of First Army - Division West. An "AC/RC" (Active Component / Reserve Component) formation, the 166th Aviation Brigade is the sole organization responsible for the post-mobilization training of United States Army Reserve & National Guard aviation units. The unit was formerly designated as 3rd Brigade, 75th Division.

Activated near the end of the Cold War, the 166th Aviation Brigade was created specifically to serve as a training unit for aviation assets of other units. As such, it has never seen combat, and has thus never earned any campaign streamers or unit awards. As the only brigade in the First Army responsible for training aviation units, the 166th Aviation Brigade is the principal unit for training Army Reserve and Army National Guard assets preparing to deploy to contingencies around the world, which means it is responsible for 47 percent of all Army Aviation assets.

The 166th Aviation Brigade partners with its First Army - Division West sister brigade, the 479th Field Artillery Brigade for its combat aviation brigade (CAB) mobilizations, but maintains validation authority, or final approval over a CAB's successful completion of mobilization training.