In the valley of Ganjgal Gar
Our buddy, ROS has a long piece at Victory Girls Blog on Captain Will Swenson who was awarded the Medal of Honor today in the White House. You should go read it.
Captain Swenson has asked to return to active duty, according to a Breitbart link sent to us by SGT K.
Meanwhile, Mary sends us a link to McClatchy, which for some reason doubts accounts that led to the award of the Medal of Honor for Dakota Myer, who was alongside WIll Swenson for that battle.
Sworn statements by Meyer and others who participated in the battle indicate that he didn’t save the lives of 13 U.S. service members, leave his vehicle to scoop up 24 Afghans on his first two rescue runs or lead the final push to retrieve the four dead Americans. Moreover, it’s unclear from the documents whether Meyer disobeyed orders when he entered the Ganjgal Valley on Sept. 8, 2009.
The statements also offer no proof that the 23-year-old Kentucky native “personally killed at least eight Taliban insurgents,” as the account on the Marine Corps website says. The driver of Meyer’s vehicle attested to seeing “a single enemy go down.”
McClatchy was unable to find anyone who would to say that Myer didn’t deserve the medal, and they probably won’t find anyone here either. Not from me anyway.
Hours before this McClatchy report was published, the Marine Corps inserted a disclaimer into its official online account of Meyer’s heroic actions. The Web page now reads that the summary “was compiled in collaboration” with Meyer and Marine Corps Public Affairs.
A prominent historian of military medals, Doug Sterner, expressed disbelief at the idea that the Marine Corps would publicize an account of a complex battle based solely on the recipient’s recollections.
“Give me a break,” Sterner said. “A recipient is responsible for writing his narrative? I have never heard of such a thing.”
In my opinion, there’s no one at McClatchy qualified to pass judgement on any award that the military awards, right down to my Army Achievement Medal, so whatever it is they’re trying to do, they’d better back right the f*ck off.
So I agree with Doug Sterner;
Sterner said errors in citations had always haunted recipients and that many Medal of Honor winners had been cited for things they didn’t do. He added that the mounting pressure to find a living recipient has made mistakes in details almost inevitable.
“Did this man deserve the Medal of Honor? If the answer to that is yes, then the details of the citation become secondary,” Sterner said. “But we do need to keep the record as accurately as we possibly can.”
Category: Real Soldiers
McClatchy: F*** off!
Or to put this in the kind of language you prefer: “Some have suggested that McClatchy have made things up, just to sound like they knew something about anything. We could not find any evidence to the contrary and have not received any response to our verbal questions of the matter from McClatchy.”
Honestly… the USMC has been very protective of it’s image (brand) since at least World War II. The image of the flag raising over Iwo Jima was hailed by some Marine generals as ensuring “a Marine Corps for another 500 years”. During the Korean war and to this day 90% of the public believe that the fighting at the Chosin Reservoir and subsequent breakout was done by the Marines with little to no assistance from the other services. A point of fact the actions of the US Army’s Task Force Faith (Regimental Combat Team 31) bore the majority of the fighting isolated and with no support on the eastern shores of the Reservoir. That Army RCT was annihilated fighting a slow, painful withdrawl in winter against an enemy force at least 4 times larger than itself. To this day the USMC holds to the claim that the Task Force retreated before the enemy, in cowardice and had little participation or impact on the battle. In truth… that lone RCT held the Eastern shore and prevented the enemy from quickly enveloping the beleaguered Marines. Look at other conflicts… Vietnam. The Marines still to this day hold and the public believes (thanks to Hollywood) that the Marines were the sole American forces fighting in the Battle of Hue. Reality? Three Marine battalions fought the first day and night (Jan. 30 – Feb. 1) of the nearly month long battle when 2-12 CAV and 1-7 CAV conducted air assaults to Hue. Unfortunately, the history of those brave cav troopers is all but forgotten when people think of the Battle of Hue today. What about the Battle of Fallujah? News accounts almost entirely refer to “Marines” as the sole US combatants. Granted there were 6,500 Marines but there were also 1,500 US Soldiers fighting along side of them. Even today most news accounts refer to “Marines” when in actuality it is US Army personnel because the Marines have managed their brand so well. And it is this brand management, which equates to recruiting and dollars for budgets and keeping that “Marine Corps for another… Read more »
The look on his face when Obama stood up there and mentioned the ROE’s his administration implemented resulting in more deaths.
One of these days somebody is going to call president Obama on his shit.
FC: CPT Swenson already has: http://waronterrornews.typepad.com/home/2012/02/negligent-leadership-killed-sfc-kenneth-westbrook.html
@4. That’s a helluva read there.
Remember AR 601-210 standards from back in the day, pretty much every entrance qualification or disqualification was ‘unless awarded the Medal of Honor”. Guessing he’ll get back in, even though I believe Commissioned Officers re-entrance is covered somewhere else. Good luck and best wishes to Captain Will Swenson, whatever he decides to do.
Yeah, Cav, clearly, as of 2012, CPT Swenson was still quite PO’d over the ROE and the events of Gangal, 2009. I believe he still is.
As I recall, so was Dakota Meyer.
@7 – Yes he was. Into the Fire made my blood boil and my heart break. It was the most emotional book I read until The Outpost, another cluster by ‘leadership’ that also resulted in two Medal of Honor recipients plus many other awards. Kind of a pattern there.
I wish people would stop saying “awarded” and “winner” — it’s received and recipient — there was certainly no contest for it. Just a pet peave!
@9: Most of us can’t spell recipant……repicent…….rec……….we can spell award.
The only thing McClatchy is good for is printing previous Joe Galloway anti-war opinion pieces, rolling them up and use for a cat box liner.
Many an award is awarded without any awareness by the winner that he was ever in a contest or competition. What’s more,in those situations in which some action or outcome does result in a prize being awarded, it strains credulity to presume that because an award was awarded, that whatever the winner did to win the award was motivated by the hope, aim, or desire to win the award. It is only in the mind of the perceiver that one equates prize or award with contest or competition in all situations in which an award or prize is awarded. Put another way, I know that some people get all wound up when one refers to a Medal of Honor winner. I’m just not one who does.
The term “awarded” applied to any decoration doesn’t bother me. All military personal decorations are awarded by an individual’s chain of command as recognition for service, special act, or heroism (heroism is arguably a particular type of special act, but it’s usually considered a separate category of award).
The term “winner” does bother me. A person is awarded (or if you prefer, receives) a decoration on their own merits, not in any kind of competition. In my book, saying that anyone “won” any medal cheapens all of them.
Personal decorations are a recognition of service determined to merit special recognition, not the result of a competition. The same is true of campaign and service medals/ribbons.
From what I understand, a McClatchy reporter who survived the battle has been doing his best to undermine Dakota Myers Medal of Honor. Why I do not know. From what I have read, I do know it was a hell of a fight, it was confusing as hell, the ROE almost got everyone killed and it seems a miracle that anyone survived. Look at the number of valor medals that were awarded. 2 Medal’s of Honor, 2 Navy Cross’s and various Silver and Bronze Star’s. We should celebrate our hero’s, not attempt to run them down.
Is it common to rely on the account of the recipient as part of the evidence in awarding the MOH or other medals of valor?
I had always thought that it was other peoples eye view account of the actual “incident” that was relied upon.
@ 9. You are wrong. It is an award presented to the recipient.
@14–might it have something to do with the McClatchy newsie being a douchetool?
jonp: it’s my understanding – and I could well be wrong – that the proposed recipient’s account (e.g., debriefing results, after action reviews, etc . . . ) can be considered, but must be corroborated by eyewitness statements attesting to the heroic act in question. No corroborating witnesses and any award for valor is supposed to be an absolute no-go. That’s probably prevented a fair number of valor decorations in past wars – no surviving witnesses to the heroism.
It’s also my understanding that for the MoH, a minimum of two witness statements corroborating the heroic act are required. I believe that requirement (two surviving witness accounts that attest to the act) has resulted in more than one possible MoH being downgraded to a DSC/NC/AFC in the past.
@ #9: Not going to stop saying that someone who receives an award is awarded the award. Don’t need to stop saying that other thing.
Managed to squeak through a military career without ever being in a situation where any big awards would result. I consider myself lucky in that regard. It does not mean I was not prepared to do whatever was necessary to complete any assigned mission. In other words, it is not always what we actually did, but what we were prepared to do.
All that said, I have received a few awards for this and that. Nothing outstanding, but awards none the less. Not once did I feel in competition for anything. Saying that I was awarded something does not imply that I was. I did earn them, and was recognized as having earned them by being awarded same.
If there is any competition involved in receiving an award, it is with a standard against which one’s actions are measured. Can’t change that, and would not try. Saying that I was awarded something just says that I measured up well to that standard.
jonp, they do not take the recipient’s word for it. It comes from sworn statements and interviews with other people that where there. That is why Meyer’s killing of the taliban dude with a rock was in his book but not his citation, nobody witnessed the event.
Both Meyer and Swenson are clearly deserving-is there some reason that we haven’t had a living recipient for Iraq yet? Since the PR aspect of all this has been touched upon, it seems to me to have been a serious mistake by the Bush administration not to have ensured that a deserving living recipient from that conflict was given the award, so that there would have been a public face of the heroism of those who fought there.
Mr.Sterner said ” the recipient writing his own narrative? Never heard of such a thing” If memory serves our very own “Secretariat of State” did such a thing. One the many charges in Unfit for Command that he had no explanation for.
My guess this is a lame attempt to muddy Sgt Meyer’s reputation as he may run for political office?
Sometimes I wonder if I hate journalists too much.
It’s nice to be reminded that I don’t.
GunzRunner: don’t think that’s it. Any complex situation viewed by multiple participants will yield varying accounts of what happened. Hell, if you ever run into a complex situation where everyone says exactly the same thing happened – well, IMO then you should be suspicious as hell. It’s been my experience that there’s always some difference in some aspect of witness accounts.
Both Meyer and Swenson were determined worthy of receiving the MoH by their respective services. Both performed heroically. Both services are known for “blowing their own horn” at times – albeit perhaps the USMC does so a bit more aggressively.
As for the McClachy reports emphasizing possible disconnects – well, that’s kinda what journalists do. They dig for dirt, and when they find apparent discrepancies in official accounts and reality, they begin to expect the worst. In many cases it’s nothing of significance. On rare occasions, it’s paydirt.
Would you rather no one EVER questioned an “official story”? If that were the case, the outcome here would likely have been very different. In that case I’m guessing Swenson would never have gotten his MoH. As I recall, the McClachy stories were what prompted people to ask why Swenson had never been recognized in any way for his conduct that day.
@#23. You may have found the reason for the McLatchy snit fit.
@#24. I was beginning to have that same thought, it’s nice to be reminded why I don’t.
Hondo, forgive the Marine Corps for blowing our horn a little louder, we are but a small, specialized service that doesn’t always get the attention we feel we deserve and the squeaky wheel does get the grease : )
Seriously, I was surprised that Sgt. Meyer was nominated and awarded the MOH. I figured a Navy Cross would be it. Our only other recipient was Jason Dunham from Iraq and his was posthumous. The Marine Corps is fucking stingy with awards, sometimes to our detriment I believe.
Also Hondo, I believe you are right in regards to continued press inquiries keeping Swenson’s MOH nomination moving forward. He was so critical of the chain of command after the battle that I read that is why he waited so long for his paperwork to be approved. I think at one point, it even got lost. I still do not see what the end state is by prying at Sgt Meyers award. He earned the goddamn thing, everyone who was there, including Captain Swenson said so. Leave it alone.
Dakota Meyer and CPT Swenson each earned their MoH.
Both are critical of the ROE in place that day.
Both are (rightfully) angry that the ROE caused the unnecessary deaths of Brothers on the field of battle.
I am somewhat surprised EITHER received the MoH they earned.
As “Spade” says: the basis of my hatred of “journalists” is evidenced in McRottenCrotchy’s attack. They have a tendency to remind us on a regular basis why that should not be a mere dislike, but unbridled hatred: AP’s publication of pictures of a dying Marine, misportrayal of the March on Washington Sunday, portrayal of every crazed gunman as a Veteran, even when there is no basis for it or the Military tossed him for criminal behavior or he never made it out of Basic or he is more aptly associated with the LAPD than the USNR.
Terminology of the event: I agree with Hondo in #13. The only thing I could (possibly) add to that is that the Military refers to what is authorized for wear on Class A’s as “Awards and Decorations.” Awards refers to the medals.
ISO of the MGySgt, the USMC is known to be quite stingy with Medals, which is also noted in the article cited earlier on SFC Westbrook. I don’t know about the Navy, but the general reality is that: the Air Force hands them out like candy, the Marines guard them like gold, and the Army is schizophrenic, dependent on the unit. I’ve personally seen a SGT get an AAM for shining a spotlight at an Army Ball, and a Private get denied an AAM after running 90 hrs out of 96, without a safety incident and achieving standards expected of an E6 with a success rate 10% than any expected.
As to the lack of MoH’s out of the Iraq War. The first MoH since Somalia was awarded to a Soldier who gave his life in Iraq.
Politics should NOT play into awards, period. (It does, but it shouldn’t.)
The Criteria for award of the MoH has increased exponentially since the Civil War. This is justifiable to some extent. The “lesser” awards did not come until much later, and hence Civil War Soldiers received awards for “lesser” deeds.
The Criteria under the Bush Administration did seem to be unjustifiably high. Nevertheless, the kind of deeds required for the MoH are less likely when we face a fleeing or inferior force than when we face a superior force of a standing Army.
A few years ago, the question was not why Iraq had seen less, but if Afghanistan would ever see one awarded. Nevertheless, it wasn’t until 2006 or so that Troops (other than the invasion force) witnessed the massing of enemy forces in any considerable size. I suspect that there were likely deeds during the invasion that would have warranted a MoH, in places like Mazar-e-Sharif, but more is expected of Special Forces, and hence when they achieve it, less is made of it.
I further suspect that more living recipients have earned but not been awarded MoH’s from Iraq. SSG David Bellavia was put in for one, and I suspect his entrance on the political stage had something to do with him not getting it. His recommendation narrative compares favorably to those awarded in WWII.
Nevertheless, politics does play a part, and no I don’t expect that the Admin that was voted in based on retreat from Iraq in 18 months, and more Troops only being more targets, and numerous other propaganda pieces against the war will approve things that highlight the Valor and Honor of Our Troops there.
MGySgtRet: understood. Not taking a swipe, just stating what I perceive. I kinda wish DA would “grow a pair” and do the same sometimes.
I also agree regarding awards. From my perspective, you guys/gals in the USMC (and to a lesser degree, the Navy) get screwed bigtime on decorations. Both services are IMO way too strict, and the USMC is notorious on that count – particularly regarding decorations for combat valor.
— break —
TN: I agree with your assessment of the USAF and Army regarding decorations. The Army is IMO indeed schizoid at the unit level on what constitutes justification for any particular personal decoration. That’s an area where IMO a bit of clear central guidance is long overdue – preferably guidance from DoD or the Joint Staff to all 4 services so that we might achieve something resembling consistency. Probably too much to ever hope for, but one can hope.
A minor nitpick: per the glossary of AR 600-8-22, the term “decoration” is defined as a “Distinctively designed mark of honor denoting heroism or meritorious/outstanding service/achievement for individuals and units.” It then goes on to define Army decorations explicitly: 13 Army individual decorations (AAM, ARCOM, AM, MSM, PH, BSM, SM, DFC, LOM, SS, DSM, DSC, and MoH, exclusive of DoD or sister-service decorations) and four Army unit decorations (ASUA, MUA, VUA, and PUC – again, excluding sister-service or Joint unit awards). Both the medal and the ribbon for any of those would be considered a “decoration”.
The term “award” is defined much more broadly and includes both individual and unit decorations plus campaign, expeditionary, and service medals; non-medal ribbons for training or service; badges; unit streamers; as well as other accolades, citations, etc . . . . It literally means pretty much anything that can be construed as an “attaboy”.
In regard to journalists, those in that occupation now do not have even one-tenth of the integrity of in-the-field civilian war reporters who were embedded with the troops in the Pacific and Europe during World War II.
They seem to now be more oriented toward being tabloid reporters than journalists.
I don’t know what agenda is being pursued by McClatchy-Tribune, or why, but there seems to be one underway to target Dakota Meyer. Maybe he pissed off the reporter over there by yelling at him to ‘get down’. Hard to say, but there does seem to be an agenda of sorts going on there.
However, plenty of research has shown that eyewitnesses are frequently unreliable in what they report unless questioned about something shortly after it happens. While one area may be quiet, another may be hotter than popcorn in a popper. I’m inclined to take Dakota Meyers’ story at face value and leave it at that until or unless some hard evidence is found to disprove it.
Ex-PH2: the earliest McClatchy reports I can find raising the issue were from mid-Dec 2011. I think that’s well before any mention of a possible political future for Meyer, so I don’t think that’s behind this.
I’m also inclined to take Meyer’s account at face value – as his account. However, I also believe I’ve read accounts where he says so much was going on that day that he has some trouble sequencing/remembering some of the details. That would be completely understandable and normal for such an extremely stressful and chaotic situation, too.
FWIW: I also don’t see the Dec 2011 McClatchy article as taking aim at Meyers, but more taking issue with HQ USMC for doing a rush job on vetting and approving his MoH, and perhaps for “gilding the lily” in official published accounts of his heroism. Link below is for the earliest story I could find quickly, but I believe it’s the original story from McClatchy. YMMV.
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2011/12/14/133134/medal-of-honor-inflated-story.html
My assessment is simple!
Dakota was awarded the MoH, anyone having an issue with that will have to do battle with the MoH Society … Good luck with that.
The recipients are protected by their own, as they should be. This is THE most exclusive society in this great Nation and if anyone wish any harm to any of the members, I and all good men should damn them.
End of assessment.
MCPO: even the McClatchy article didn’t question Meyer’s heroism or whether he deserved to receive the MOH. In fact, their (McClatchy’s) article explicitly indicated their belief that available evidence showed he DID deserve the award. However, they did take the USMC to task for rushing the process and (perhaps) unnecessarily exaggerating what Meyer did while doing so.
Not my intent to debate the issue, or to say that Meyer doesn’t deserve his MoH. The man by all accounts fully deserves the MoH. But if corners were cut due to inter-service politics or other reasons, well, IMO maybe someone should have some ‘splainin’ to do.
Because if you can’t trust the process that awards a MoH to be executed fairly and objectively, then it could easily become just another bauble to be handed out to whomever is today’s favorite. And I have a BIG problem with that.
If I remember correctly from reading his book there were some in his chain of command and NCO support channel that were not too fond of him. If there were major discrepancies in the story wouldn’t they have come forward by now?
Hondo. I agree.
In reading the account by McCrotchRot cited by Hondo in #32, I find gross inconsistencies as accounted by the author who by his own admission was not in a position to see the actions of Sgt Meyer. Quite glaringly, Mr Landay can not decide if Sgt Meyer was manning a Mk-19 40mm grenade launcher, or an M2 .50cal machine gun. Those who have manned either, will quickly recognize that it is not something changed out in middle of a patrol, much less the middle of a battle. Did the driver of Meyer’s vehicle see everyone killed by Meyer? Hell no. Anyone that has sat inside an uparmored HumVee will know that you can’t see shit from inside. Would a SSgt describe his communications with a gunner as “I ordered …” even if the reality was that he authorized the action at the request/suggestion of a Cpl? Absolutely, unless of course he was trying to hang that Cpl out to dry for shooting without authorization. If a Truck Commander/NCO has ANY faith in his gunner, and he damned well better, when the gunner says he has enemy in his sights, will give the order “Fire.” How much more so, when rounds are already pinging off the armor! Is Mr Landay upset with the USMC because he got shot at, or is he engaging in the same kind of journalist’ service based rivalry that was evidenced in Ed Darrack’s attack on the US Navy SeALs, in support of the Corps? I don’t know and don’t care. As previously stated, two witnesses to the same firefight will not have the same account. They see different parts of it, and different points make a greater impact based on the part they can see. But if, after studying the events that he had not witnessed, Landay can’t figure out if Sgt Meyer was firing an M2 or an M40, then I will discount the rest of the CIVILIAN’s account of discrepancies. How many lives did Landay save that day? Not counting his own hide, if it was less than those he admits Meyer saved, even… Read more »
Most of the tangents have been covered so far.
#37 “Is Mr Landay upset with the USMC because he got shot at, or is he engaging in the same kind of journalist’ service based rivalry that was evidenced in Ed Darrack’s attack on the US Navy SeALs, in support of the Corps? I don’t know and don’t care” actually I think the the USMC has made a pretty good or at least more objective assessment/explanation of that operation then Luttrell.
Hondo I agree with you. This has never been a fight about whether Meyer earned the MOH that day but about the USMC’s rush to have a living recipient of their own. Their motivation supposedly stemming from the denial of Peralta.