The early end of an Afghanistan deployment for a battalion of Kane'ohe Bay Marines is completing the final cycle of war duty in that country for Hawai'i Marines for the foreseeable future, Marine officials said.

An advance party of 100 Marines and sailors with the 1st Battalion, 3rd Marine Regiment returned to Hawai'i yesterday from a shortened five-month deployment to Afghanistan where they rooted out Taliban and al-Qaida militants near the Pakistan border.

The deployment had been expected to last seven months.

NATO is gradually assuming control of security in Afghanistan, and is expected to take over counterinsurgency operations in the south and east from the United States by the end of the year.

A Pentagon decision to delay deployment of a Germany-based Army combat brigade to Iraq, meanwhile, hints at growing optimism that conditions are improving, but officials cautioned yesterday that it does not signal the start of a sizable military withdrawal. The brigade, consisting of about 3,500 soldiers, was set to deploy this month.

The Army said the move has little impact, as yet, on plans to send four other combat brigades to Iraq in August and September, including the 3rd Brigade at Schofield Barracks.

But officials did not rule out the possibility of decisions in coming months that could keep some of those units at home, and lead to a substantial reduction of U.S. troops in Iraq just before the November congressional elections.

ROLLING OUT RED CARPET

About 200 family and friends greeted the Hawai'i Marines yesterday with signs, lei and hugs after a chartered jet landed at the Marine Corps base at Kane'ohe Bay.

A red carpet ran to a hangar on base where the families and friends waited to welcome home their loved ones. Several of the troops saw their newborn children for the first time when they walked off the plane, including one captain who kneeled to hold his 8-week-old firstborn.

"It was a very overwhelming experience and it was great to see an early group of our boys come home," said spokesman 2nd Lt. Binford Strickland.

The returning Marines from the 1st Battalion, 3rd Marine Regiment are an advance party for about 800 more Marines from the battalion who will be returning from Afghanistan within the next few weeks.

The Marines deployed in January, following tours of about seven months by the 3rd and then 2nd battalions at Kane'ohe Bay.

Officials said yesterday that the Army's 10th Mountain Division, which assumed command of Combined Joint Task Force 76 in late February, took over for the Hawai'i Marines in eastern Afghanistan.

The United States is expected to keep about 16,000 soldiers in Afghanistan, down from about 19,000, but they will be under NATO command.

The 1st Battalion, 3rd Regiment Marines were engaged in numerous firefights in March in the Shuryak Valley of Kunar Province and in the often hostile area between Camp Blessing in Nangalam and Camp Wright in Asadabad.

During the search of a house in Salar Ban, the Marines discovered 1,000 pounds of explosives and came under rocket-propelled grenade and small-arms fire in what was described as one of the most ferocious firefights the troops had been in since the Battle of Fallujah in Iraq in 2004.

UNDER FIRE IN KORENGAL

The Hawai'i Marines also took part in Operation Mountain Lion, which began on April 11. An estimated 2,500 Afghan and U.S. forces moved into the Korengal valley for the operation to root out insurgents.

Marine 1st Lt. Kevin Frost, in a report, said every company from the 1st Battalion, 3rd Regiment had been in firefights.

"It's a credit to our abilities as coalition forces that they've shot at us but haven't come close to winning any engagements," Frost said.

Three Marines and a Navy corpsman from the battalion died as a result of injuries received in Afghanistan. Lance Cpl. Billy D. Brixey Jr., 21, died Jan. 27 from injuries received when a roadside bomb hit his convoy.

Pfc. Matthew L. Bertolino, 20, was a passenger in a vehicle that overturned Feb. 9 during a patrol near Jalalabad. Lance Cpl. Nicholas R. Anderson, 21, was killed March 13 in a nonhostile vehicle accident.

Petty Officer 3rd Class John T. Fralish, 30, was killed Feb. 6 during combat operations.

Reach William Cole at wcole@honoluluadvertiser.com.