A group of Schofield Barracks soldiers who returned Thursday from what are increasingly rare deployments to the Middle East — at least for Hawaii — provided sustainment, distribution and personnel for logistics support to U.S. and coalition forces in Iraq, Afghanistan, Jordan, Qatar and Kuwait.

The 63 soldiers with the 524th Combat Sustainment Support Battalion, who deployed to Camp Buehring, Kuwait, in December, oversaw a 2,000-soldier force that drove 2.3 million miles of ground transport missions, sailed Army watercraft nearly 45,000 nautical miles, issued 15 million gallons of fuel, distributed more than 100 million rounds of ammunition and repaired 3,800 containers.

The Hawaii soldiers flew to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia and Guam before arriving home Thursday afternoon at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam on an Omni Air International 767 charter.

For Sgt. 1st Class Hector Lugo, 36, a married father of children ages 4 and 3, it was his seventh combat zone deployment.

“We did great, wonderful things out there, but it’s always good to come back home to your family after a mission well done and just continue on with our careers,” said Lugo, who worked in warehouse operations and is from Miami.

As far as plans with the family, Lugo said he has a simple one. “Just one: spend time (with them) and have my kids wake me up at zero six in the morning.”

Lt. Col. Toby Logsdon, 524th commander, said he managed 13 different unit transitions under his command, and active-duty, National Guard and Reserve soldiers while keeping troops supplied in five countries.

“I was blessed with some of the most tremendous, hardworking people,” he said. In July the country reached a record 129 degrees. “We’re used to high winds like we have today (at Hickam) — only with small rocks and dust in it,” Logsdon said.

Camp Buehring, which sits in the Kuwaiti desert, is a hub for ongoing U.S. regional operations, including maintaining sizable helicopter and infantry capabilities as contingency forces.

More than 1,700 soldiers with the National Guard’s 40th Combat Aviation Brigade took over responsibilities for all aviation operations within the U.S. Army Central’s area of responsibility in a Dec. 20 ceremony at Camp Buehring.

The 3rd Armored Brigade Combat Team’s 4,000 soldiers assumed responsibility for the area July 5 as part of Operation Spartan Shield, which was started in 2011.

Logsdon said the nine-month mission that his battalion headquarters performed in Kuwait is unique to its capabilities.

“I’m set up so that companies within my battalion at Schofield can unplug and fall in with another formation,” he said. “I fell in with Guard, Reserve forces while I was in Kuwait (and) active-duty forces from all over the continental United States.”

At the same time, a lot of what was done in Kuwait “would be very similar to what we can do here in the Pacific in support of going into an area, establishing a foothold, helping run an airfield and bringing in more people, more equipment, more supplies and building up our capabilities,” he said.

Logsdon said he pushed soldiers up into Iraq for projects such as taking well and water purification equipment to make clean water for soldiers to drink and bathe in.

Col. Mario Diaz, deputy commander for support for the 25th Infantry Division, said the Tropic Lightning capabilities “are focused in the Pacific, (but) as required, the Army will ask for niche capabilities if they are needed in certain areas — and we’re prepared to do that. But I think for the most part, the Army has said, 25th ID, stay focused on the Pacific. We’re doing that.”

Another sure sign the 524th soldiers were home was the “OpSec” (operational security) briefing they received at Hickam with reminders not to divulge personal information — as well as the admonition to be careful playing “Pokemon Go” on base, which has seen cases of attempted trespassing by civilians in the hunt for the game’s mythical creatures.