Colonel James B. Hickey graduated from the Virginia Military Institute and was commissioned into the Regular Army in 1982. His first assignment was with the 3d Squadron, 7th Cavalry in Schweinfurt, Germany, where he served as a cavalry platoon leader, troop executive officer and squadron adjutant from 1982 to 1985. He attended the Infantry Officer’s Advance Course and then returned to Germany, where he took command of L Troop, 3d Squadron, 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment in Bad Hersfeld in 1986. After command, his next assignments were part of his secondary career field, Foreign Area Officer (Russian Linguist), and included the Defense Language Institute in Monterey, California, The Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies (Master of International Public Policy) and the U.S. Army’s Russian Institute in Garmisch, Germany.Upon completing the Command and General Staff Officer’s College in 1984, he returned to the 11th ACR, where he served as the Operations Officer for the 1st Squadron. His other assignments at the National Training Center were Operations Group’s Chief of Plans (Lizard 03P), Observer Controller and Operations Officer for the Scorpion Mechanized Infantry Team and the Deputy Regimental Commander for the 11th ACR. He then served as the Regimental Executive Officer of the 3d Armored Cavalry Regiment in 1998 before taking command of 2d Squadron, 3d ACR. After command, he was assigned as the Brigade Senior Observer Controller (Mustang 07) at the Combat Maneuver Training Center in Hohenfels, Germany, in 2001. He attended Georgetown University as a U.S. Army Senior Service College Fellow. He was assigned to the 4th Infantry Division on 16 April 2003 and joined the Division Tactical Headquarters forward in Iraq on 23 April 2003.On 1 June 2003 he was promoted to colonel; he assumed command of the 1st Brigade Combat Team in Tikrit, Iraq, on 13 June. After nine months of continuous combat operations in the upper Tigres River Valley, 1st Brigade Combat Team redeployed to Fort Hood, Texas, in March 2004.