Schofield Barracks will gain about 3,700 additional soldiers by 2011 — raising questions about housing and schools — as part of an Army plan to bring home 50,000 troops from Germany and Korea, according to the Pentagon and news reports.

The restructuring, the Army's largest since World War II, includes a transition to a modular force that the military said will increase combat power by 30 percent and increase the Army's pool of fighting forces by 50 percent.

The new modularity is being synchronized with the "Global Presence and Basing Strategy" to re-orient U.S. forces overseas as needs change.

Although the Associated Press reported that Schofield's 25th Infantry Division (Light) would get 3,700 soldiers, base officials yesterday spoke only of 1,000 more troops expected for a $1.5 billion Stryker Brigade.

They were unable to confirm the larger number, but said additional announcements for troop placements are still expected.

"Schofield Barracks remains one of the Army's premier training, readiness and deployment platforms, and will experience substantial net growth when all is said and done," said Brig. Gen. Francis Wiercinski, assistant division commander for support. "We are transforming our Army while at war in order to create methods to deploy units that are self-sustaining in combat and smaller in size, so they are more agile."

The troop announcement, which would include 1,000 soldiers that state officials had planned for, but 2,700 that had not been previously announced, comes on top of the possible basing of an aircraft-carrier strike group in Hawai'i and arrival of eight C-17 Air Force cargo planes starting in January.