U.S. District Judge David Ezra said yesterday that he has a "profound respect" for the cultural history of Hawai'i, but he reiterated what he has said before: There are precious few things more important than the lives of men and women in the armed forces.

Weighing the public interest on both sides of a two-year-old environmental legal dispute, Ezra ruled that the Army can resume limited Stryker brigade training in preparation for a late 2007 Iraq deployment.

"In sum, a delay of (the Schofield unit's) readiness for deployment would reduce the number of (total Stryker brigades) available and reduce the overall effectiveness of the Army's forces, leading to less training of soldiers and unnecessary loss of American soldiers' lives," Ezra wrote in his ruling.

The Army had asked to be able to resume training and implement six of 28 projects for the more than $1.5 billion Stryker brigade, one of the biggest Army projects ever in Hawai'i.

Not being able to do so would have meant the relocation, possibly in January, of 3,900 soldiers and hundreds of Stryker armored vehicles to the Mainland to complete training.

Such a logistical move would have separated spouses from soldiers and further called into question the long-term viability of the Stryker brigade in Hawai'i. A halt to the project was costing the government $1 million a month, U.S. Sen. Daniel K. Inouye, D-Hawai'i, had said.

Bill Paty, the civilian aide to the secretary of the Army for the Pacific, said the Stryker ruling is good news.

"That's good to know, because there's a lot riding on this thing — they are trying to get training rolling again," he said.

Plaintiffs who belong to three Hawaiian groups that brought suit against the Army in 2004 over environmental law breaches said they are disappointed.

"He (Ezra) has given the Army pretty much what they wanted," said William Aila Jr., one of the plaintiffs. "I think we're certainly going to want to discuss appealing."

Vicky Holt Takamine, another plaintiff, said Ezra thought he was balancing out interests.

"But I don't see it that way," she said. "I think for us as Native Hawaiians, we've given up 25 percent of our 'aina to the Army."

U.S. Army, Pacific, said in a short statement that it appreciates the court's consideration and will "immediately resume deployment preparation of the Stryker brigade."

U.S. Attorney Ed Kubo, meanwhile, said Ezra's "detailed findings balanced the vital training needs of the Army with the need to preserve our environment and cultural resources, which might be affected by (Stryker) training and construction."

Per an October ruling by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco, the Army still must complete an examination of alternative locations outside Hawai'i for the Stryker brigade, a process that could take up to two years.

The court overturned a previous ruling by Ezra and found that the Army had violated national environmental law by not considering other locations for the fast-strike brigade.

An injunction was entered Oct. 27 by the appeals court, and the Army has not been able to do any training with its 169 Stryker eight-wheeled vehicles since then.

Approximately 160 more of the 19-ton vehicles are expected to arrive on O'ahu through April, court papers state. The San Francisco court sent the injunction back to Ezra to determine which projects, if any, could proceed without cultural and environmental harm.

The Army had asked for six Stryker projects to go forward that are "critical" for the Iraq deployment.

Those include completion of Qualification Training Range 1, a motor park and maintenance area, an urban assault course, a tactical vehicle wash, a multiple deployment facility, and modifications to an existing training range at Pohakuloa Training Area on the Big Island.

The Hawaiian groups had said that based on past military use, some Stryker training could be resumed. For example, training at Kahuku Training Area and Schofield Barracks' East Range was acceptable with some erosion-control measures.

Ezra granted all six Army requests, and cut back on some of the environmental measures the plaintiffs had requested.

The Hawaiian groups had said training at Qualification Training Range 1 at Schofield could be done with restrictions or mitigation, such as not using 50-caliber and 40 mm grenades.

But objections were raised to building a range and using a 105 mm Stryker mobile gun system at Pohakuloa Training Area because of harm to cultural resources, the groups said.

The groups also opposed construction and operation of a Schofield motor pool and use of unmanned aerial vehicles, which they said can crash, burn and ignite wildfires.

Training began with the Stryker brigade in October 2005 and is expected to be finished at the end of June 2007, court papers said. Final certification will be conducted during a couple of months of training at the National Training Center in California in the September and October 2007 timeframe before the deployment to Iraq.

Reach William Cole at wcole@honoluluadvertiser.com.