Paratrooper regiment deployed to guard detainees

The Pentagon announced it will be deploying the 3rd battalion, 504th Parachute Infantry Regiment to Iraq to guard over the increasing numbers of "security detainees" held throughout the country. This 700-strong regiment, part of the famous 82nd Airborne based in Fort Bragg, North Carolina, and was designed to be deployed on 18-hours notice to often jump behind enemy lines before a conflict has 'officially' begun.

The 3/504 has seen three deployments since 9-11, two in Iraq and one in Afghanistan (where Geraldo visited them).

In Iraq, in 2003, a different regiment of the 82nd Airborne shot and killed 13 protesters in Fallujah in a controversial incident, and was also alleged later to have "brutalized" four Iraqi reporters for Reuters and NBC.

Look back three more years, and specifically the 3/504 was tainted by violence and abuse. It was deployed to Kosovo in 1999 as a peacekeeping force, where it became embroiled in controversy when Staff Sgt Frank Ronghi was convicted of raping and killing a local girl. Ronghi was given a life sentence without parole. Subsequently, the entire battalion underwent administrative reforms.

In the eyes of some, there will be no regiment "clean" enough in the Army to deploy to guard detainees after Abu Ghraib.