One Utah

From author Ron Glasser on HuffPo, accusing the Bush administration of discouraging the awarding of medals earned in combat:

Each month we lose on average a battalion of soldiers, half of those killed or severely wounded. There is an astonishing amount of courage, bravery and commitment in Iraq and Afghanistan that has gone unrecognized and unappreciated as a way of keeping the real facts of this war out of the public consciousness. If you give a medal for bravery you have to tell why.

The whole article is worth reading. Four years into Vietnam, more than a hundred Medals of Honor had been awarded. In Iraq so far, there have been two Medals of Honor. Some Medal of Honor commendations have been downgraded to the Silver Star. Just for the record, here’s a brief account of the two Iraq war heroes who have been awarded the nation’s highest decoration for valor.

The first Medal of Honor in Iraq was awarded posthumously to SFC Paul R. Smith who stopped a company-size enemy attack at Baghdad Airport on April 4, 2003. Smith threw two grenades and fired rocket launchers at the enemy before manning a .50-caliber machine gun on an M-113 armored personnel carrier to protect his troops. While engaging an enemy attacking from three sides, Smith fired more than 300 rounds from the machine gun before being killed.

Marine Cpl. Jason L. Dunham, a 22-year-old machine gunner, was manning a checkpoint near Karabilah, near the Syrian border in Iraq, on April 14, 2004, when an Iraqi man grabbed his throat. As the two scuffled, the Iraqi dropped a grenade with the pin removed, and Dunham quickly jumped on it, using his Kevlar helmet and body to smother the blast. Dunham died eight days later. After a campaign mounted by friends and relatives and Senator Charles Schumer (D-NY), President Bush awarded Dunham the Medal two years later.

The denial of medals for valor is for the same reason that President Bush refuses to attend military funerals and bans press coverage of dead soldiers coming back from Iraq.

UPDATE: Newsweek had an interview back in February with Joseph Kinney, a veteran who testified before Congress on the Iraq medal shortage. Kinney’s explanation: the Bush administration is “terrified of doing anything that would make this look like a real war.”

This entry was posted Monday, July 23rd, 2007 at 1:58 pm and is filed under Disaster, George W. Bush, Iraq, Military, National Politics, War. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.