The 66,000 Marines who have not yet deployed to Iraq — more than one-third of the active-duty force — are now on deck for combat, according to a policy issued yesterday by the Corps' top commander.

The directive means more Kane'ohe Bay Marines, either singly or in units, could be heading to the Middle East, a Corps official in Hawai'i told The Advertiser. More than 1,200 Hawai'i Marines are now serving in western Iraq.

The Corps will immediately begin reviewing personnel assignments with the intent of sending all Marines into Iraq, Commandant Gen. James Conway told commanders in a message called "Every Marine Into the Fight."

Under Conway's plan, Marines without Iraq experience could be reassigned to deploying units. Conway also urged commanders to support Marine requests to go into combat.

"When they join our Corps, Marines expect to train, deploy and fight," he said in the message. "That's who we are. That's what we do. And we must allow every Marine that opportunity."

Chuck Little, a spokesman for Marine Forces Pacific at Camp Smith, said Conway's directive was received yesterday morning.

"They've just announced this initiative, so planning for who's going to go, and who, when and where, is going to take some time," Little said.

The 2nd Battalion, 3rd Marine Regiment out of Kane'ohe Bay has about 1,000 Marines in the volatile Haditha area, northwest of Baghdad. Several hundred more Marines are part of a CH-53D Sea Stallion helicopter unit in western Iraq.

In March, 1,000 Marines with the 1st Battalion, 3rd Marines out of Kane'ohe Bay are expected to replace the 2/3 Marines. The helicopter squadron will be replaced by a similar Hawai'i unit.

In planning for months also has been the spring deployment to Iraq of elements of the 1st Battalion, 12th Marines, an artillery unit. Infantry battalions from Hawai'i previously had been on a cycle of repeat deployments to Iraq and Af-ghanistan, but now serve only in Iraq.

Whether support units from Kane'ohe Bay could be tapped for Iraq duty was unclear yesterday, but additional "individual augmentees" to fill out vacancies in other deploying units are expected. About 6,500 Marines in total are based on O'ahu.

According to Defense Department data, there were about 218,000 total active-duty Marine deployments to Afghani-stan or Iraq as of Sept. 30. Of those deployments, fewer than half have deployed only once, and about 56,000 deployed twice or more.

"As our corps postures for the long war, and in order to help meet the challenges of frequent deployments, I want our corps' leadership to initiate policies to ensure all Marines, first-termers and career Marines alike, are provided the ability to deploy to a combat zone," Conway said.

Conway told Marines in Ramadi in late December that about 37 percent of the corps, or about 66,000 out of about 175,000 permanent troops, had not yet been to Iraq, an issue he said could hurt justification for plans to increase the overall size of the Marine Corps. Another 5,000 troops are being funded temporarily, inflating the current end strength to 180,000 Marines.

The Bush administration has called for increasing the corps strength to 202,000 Marines in five years.

"If we're going to grow the force on the one hand, we've got to be able to justify it to the bean counters ... how we have 66,000 Marines that haven't been to Iraq or Afghanistan," he said.

About half of those who have not yet deployed are potentially slated for future Iraq deployments, meaning this new policy would target the remaining 33,000.

Conway says many Marines want to go into combat but are denied. This new policy would relieve Marines who are on their third and fourth deployments. Those Marines' deployments have since been extended as part of President Bush's plan to increase the number of troops in Iraq.