The 3rd Battalion, 187th Infantry Regiment, also known as the Iron Rakkasans, is a battalion of the US Army 187th Infantry Regiment. The battalion was activated on 25 February 1943, and first saw action in the Pacific Theater of the Second World War, during the battle to regain US control of the Philippines. Troops from the battalion then served in the four-year occupation of Japan, where they earned their nickname "Rakkasans" (meaning "falling down umbrellas"), before stationing in Fort Campbell, Kentucky. The battalion served in the Korean War from 1950 as the 187th Airborne Regimental Combat Team and participated in 12 major missions during the Vietnam War, emerging from that conflict as the US’s most highly decorated airborne battalion. In the 1990s the battalion served in Iraq as part