(Radio Iowa) – Production at the Iowa Army Ammunition Plant near Burlington has ramped up due to the war in Ukraine and the facility may be key in getting munitions to Israel as well. The plant manufactures artillery shells and production has recently doubled. According to The Des Moines Register, Iowa Army Ammunition Plant in Middleton is scheduled to get more than a billion dollars in upgrades over the next two years as the U-S military aims by 2025 to have 100-thousand artillery shells manufactured each month at the southeast Iowa plant and another in Pennsylvania. An Army spokesman told The Register more people will be hired to work at the plant as construction and production progress.

The facility opened in 1941 to make ammunition for World War II and closed in 1945 when the war ended. It reopened in 1950 to begin making ammunition for the Korean War. The massive Iowa Army Ammunition Plant campus cover more than 19-thousand acres. Nearly all the employees are civilians. An Army colonel is commander of the facility and about two dozen soldiers are assigned to the plant.