Over the past four months, the 1st Bn., 82nd Abn. Div., Devils in Baggy Pants, conducted nearly 3,500 patrols, killed or captured 400 enemy combatants, found nearly 200 roadside bombs and weapons caches and engaged the enemy over 170 times, according to Sounia.

What one lexicographer, Samuel Johnson, said of Milton’s “Paradise Lost,” can be said of this campaign: No one ever wished it longer.