Investigation of “lost medal of honor”
McClatchy reports that DoD’s Directorate for Investigations of Senior Officials is investigating the lost Medal of Honor paperwork for Army Captain Will Swenson, prompted by California Republican Duncan Hunter.
The inspector general’s “investigation is looking at the approval process for Capt. Swenson’s award, specifically how the chain of command mishandled his nomination,” said Joe Kasper, a spokesman for Hunter.
Bridget Serchak, a spokeswoman for the inspector general’s office, declined to comment on the matter, saying she could not discuss any ongoing case.
The consequences of the investigation are unclear. Typically, the inspector general’s office refers cases in which allegations of regulation violations are substantiated to the secretary of defense or the service secretaries for further action. Cases in which evidence of crimes is found are sent to the Defense Criminal Investigative Service for further investigation, often in conjunction with the Department of Justice.
Of course, the reason that the military community thinks that the paperwork was “lost” is because Swenson was critical of the rules of engagement in his after-action review of the battle which claimed the lives of US troops as a result. In his book, Into the Fire, Dakota Myer was also critical of the ROE because the team was unable to bring to bear indirect fire and tactical air support in order to withdraw troops when they were ambushed in the battle of Ganjgal in the Kunar Province of Afghanistan. Those supporting fires were denied to the team because people who were not under fire were worried about civilian casualties, while the troops who were under fire were trapped in a box canyon.
Swenson is scheduled to receive the award on October 15th at the White House.
Category: Real Soldiers
Fried butt. They are screwed. The American public knows that generals are a dime a dozen and are rarely paid attention to, absent a scandal involving them. But when a MOH recipient speaks, people listen.
I really hope that if someone in the chain of command decided on their own or with outside influence to kill his award, they pinpoint when and by whom the award was killed, they get their ass handed to them, or better yet, they have to make a personal apology to Cpt Swenson.
People like that never apologize, Andy, no matter how egregious their conduct.
Sadly, I’m guessing that nothing tangible will be found.
If Swenson’s MOH recommendation was intentionally held up – and it’s still an if at this point, since there’s a small chance that the “admin foul-up” claim is legit – I’d guess that nothing was ever put on paper regarding the issue.
I’d further guess that whoever put the kibosh on it (if anyone did) didn’t directly do so in plain language. Rather, my guess is that whoever might have done so made his desires known indirectly (such as “I really don’t like people who aren’t ‘team players’ ” or “Boy, that guy doesn’t know how to keep his mouth shut and work thru channels”) and never directly said “lose Swenson’s packet”.
Absent some strong and tangible written or verbal evidence, I don’t see any way to substantiate allegations of wrongdoing here. And I just don’t think the investigators will be able find anything tangible enough.
Can we get them to ‘investigate’ Bellavia’s nomination too?
They probably ‘lost’ his paperwork in the same pile…
Nothing will ever happen to anyone.
Wasn’t this the incident where some staff pukes (officer types) refused to provide air/artillery support? If so then it explains how the award was “lost”, covering their asses. I always hated staff pukes.
I have to agree with you, ohio!
While reading the book I wanted to reach through my Kindle and throat punch the Battle Captain.
@2, better yet, they apologize to him and all of the families of those killed and hand them the lost rank insignia they are demoted from before leaving for whatever penalties. Then, mandatory visit to each above on the anniversary forever. This is if there is direct evidence of dereliction of duty.
Another war, another time when I was a paper pusher in J01 CINCPAC and had the privilege of processing a couple of MOH recommendations. I remember they received special handling with a record of custody and processing. So my guess is the delay is going to be at a lower level rather than HQ.
ohio: as I understand it, yes.
— break —
Club Manager: I’d guess the same. I cannot believe someone intermediate GO-level commander would have taken that risk. Folks at that level learn very quickly to consider the political risks and impacts of their decisions.
@11, I always figured a MoH packet would be handled a little differently than say a stack off AAMs and ARCOMs coming into a S1 shop, so that makes the fact that it was “lost” and not down graded to a lower award (as was the case with SSG Bellavia) or flat out rejected just a little hinky.
@4 Hondo
Sadly, I fear you have the right of it. It is possible that this was just some paperwork SNAFU.
All things considered though, it seems far more likely that someone made it “known,” in that untraceable, one-on-one, verbal, knife-in-the-back kind of way, that you allude to.
Maybe it was lost in the fire in St. Louis! The convenient answer!
OldSoldier54: that’s my guess as well.
Unfortunately, if that’s the case, whoever did it has the proverbial “plausible deniability” – and will almost certainly get away with essentially no consequences.
about damn time they made this right. my older brother and father were in afganistan and iraq well after i was back state side and told horror stories about the ROE changes. any commander that wasnt critical of the ROE should have been shot on the spot. my personal favorite came from my brother’s 09 deployment, apparently it came down that because of how many “children” were being killed, american forces were not allowed to return fire at anyone who engages them that is under the age of 15. of course this made sense, a 15 year cant kill you as dead as a 16 year old.