Sucks for them, seems like stuff like this would be really bad for moral. They were all planning to go home on x date then bam your hafta stay 3 more months. Why not just send in fresh toops from the US or all the nice bases we have around the world I wonder.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070411/...VQe3hbFIADW7oF

WASHINGTON - The Pentagon is considering stretching the tour of duty for every active-duty Army unit in Iraq to 15 months instead of 12 as the military struggles to supply enough troops for the conflict.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates could make a decision on the proposal in the coming days, said a defense official speaking on condition of anonymity because the plan has not been approved.

It is the third option to become known in the last several days in what has become a drumbeat of unsettling news for a military strained by two wars over the last five years.

Officials on Monday announced some 13,000 National Guard troops were receiving orders alerting them to prepare for possible deployment to Iraq late this year, which would be the second tour for several thousand of them. Officials said those four infantry combat brigades come from Arkansas, Indiana, Oklahoma and Ohio.

The Guard units would serve as replacement forces in the regular troop rotation for the war, and would not be connected to President Bush's military buildup for security operations in Baghdad, the Pentagon said.

Word has also emerged that Defense Department officials were considering a plan to extend by up to four months the tours of duty for up to 15,000 U.S. troops already in Iraq as a way to maintain the buildup past the summer.

There are currently 145,000 U.S. troops in Iraq, and when the buildup is complete in late May or early June, there would be more than 160,000, officials have said.