Ed_Haynes

Yes, a campaign in Iraq much like others: long, bloody, nasty, terror-filled. The oral history among Indian Army soldiers (most of the troops there) made it worse than France, or Gallipoli,. or Kut. Interesting. Reports from relatives who served in Iraq cut recruiting in the Punjab by 20% in the inter-war years.

I give up ..............

Look at any standard reference on medals (e.g., McDaniel and Schmitt or the Mondovor website). The ribbon was widely used officialy and unfoficially.

Source . . . ?????

No, the ribbon has nothing to do with the guards. For the Order of Glory and the medal for Victory over Germany (and, before that, in Tsarist days, for St. George).

From all that I have read regarding the Ottoman officer class, it would not surprise me that they had special medals made up for themselves in Germany or Austria-Hungary. I suspect they had their shirts laundered and pressed there as well.

Hi Chris, I do not have the royal version of the Wisam Nigam al-'Askariia / Military Star, but: The Military Star of Fuad I was originally intended for award to Egyptian and foreign officers for mention in dispatches or distinguished service in the field or before the enemy, with courage and a spirit of self-sacrifice. In broad terms, the Military Star can be seen as having been patterned after the British Distinguished Service Order. It was, of course, redesigned with the fall of the monarchy. With the redesign and restructuring which came with the 1952 revolution, the award came to be awarded to any officer for exceptional service with courage and a spirit of self-sacrifice. Whenever possible, the award is to be personally presented by the president of the republic. The star can be awarded posthumously or to foreigners. Established: By King Ahmad Fuad I in Royal Order of 6 December 1919, revised and redesigned on 9 July 1953 and amended by Law No. 12 of 1972. Obverse: A five-pointed gilt star, enameled white. The center is enameled blue with crossed swords in gilt, surrounded by a red circlet with a gilt wreath. Above all a gilt crown. Suspended from a straight bar suspender. After 1953, the 45-mm star has been of bronze with blue-enameled points, with the center swords replaced with the Egyptian eagle (after 1971, hawk), and the suspension crown removed. Each point has two crossed swords. The suspension is a ornate enameled bar in the form of a pair of "Pharonic" falcon's wings, with a disk in the center bearing a pair of crossed swords. Reverse: Until 1953, a gold Arabic inscription on purple enamel. Afer 1953, Arabic name on white enamel. Ribbon: 37 mm, moir?, five equal 6 mm stripes of blue, yellow, black, yellow, blue, with thin (1 mm) yellow edges. This is the republican version:

TUNISIA -- M?daille militaire / Military Medal Established: 8 December 1955 and modified by Law No. 58-129 of 9 Djoumada I 1378 (21 November 1958). Ribbon: Pale green with a wide red stripe in the center and thin red stripes toward each edge.

Among my interests are the awards of the Arab world. One problem in studying these, of course, is a lack of information. This is one reason I had put up some preliminary information on-line. While it got BADLY trashed by US and sympathetic international "patriots" in the aftermath of 11 September, I have rebuilt some of it, but have not been updating it. I share the remnant link with forum friends here: http://faculty.winthrop.edu/haynese/medals/arab_medals.html I'll put up a few samples as eye-candy.

Sorry, but I'm old-fashioned. I prefer the real Ottoman-issued star, rather than the post-War German jewelers' fantasies. But I'm odd. Everyone says so.

Enough for now - can post more if requested.

BAHAWALPUR -- Independence Medal 1947

JAIPUR -- Medal for Silver Jubilee of Manahara Man Singh II, 1947 For the silver jubilee of Lieutenant-General H.H. Saramad-i-Rajaha-i- Hindustan Raj Rajendra Shri Maharajadhiraja Maharaja Sawai Shri Sir Man Singh II Bahadur, Maharaja of Jaipur, GCSI, GCIE (b. 21 August 1911, r. 7 September 1922-24 June 1970, d. 24 June 1970). McClenaghan, p. 164, no. 163.

MYSORE -- Public Service Medal McClenaghan, #197, p. 202.

JAMMU AND KASHMIR -- Chitral Medal, 1895 Awarded to J&K States' Forces for the defence and relief. This one named: "49 HAVELDAR MAHAN SINGH 4TH KASHMIR RIFL" McClenaghan, #169, pp. 172-73.

PATIALA -- Nishan-i-Phul (Family Order), 3rd class, commander Numbered 19 on the reverse. McClenaghan, # 205, pp. 212-15.

PATIALA -- Long Sevice Medal (Military), Bhupendra Singh McClenaghan, p. 227, no. 216.

BIKANER -- Order of the Sadul Star of Bikaner -- Grand Commander (class I) sash badge This badge is slightly different from other badges reported for this same order and may be a collar badge or grand master's badge, though none has been previously reported.

Just to spice things up a bit,. I'll post here a few SAMPLES of awards from the semi-independence Indian "Princely" States before 1947. For more, see: http://sagongs.ipbhost.com/index.php?showforum=30 (Sorry, but you'll need to sign up to see these -- helps to keep the information brigands and web-crawling spiders out.) The "sacred text" on these awards is: Tony McClenaghan, Indian Princely Medals: A Record of the Orders, Decorations and Medals of the Indian Princely States (New Delhi" Lancer Publishers. [1996]; ISBN 1-897829-19-1), pp. iii + 282 This is a masterful piece of work, representing decades of work when enough "old-timers" were alive who remembered how things were before Integaration in 1947. While the quality of production leaves a good bit to be desired (especially in how the illustrations are rendered), this is a must-have volume for anyone with any interest in this arcane field, although it is now rather hard to find. McClenaghan resisted the temptation of any researcher to wait until the last bits of evidence come together and published his work in an effort to elicit expansions, corrections, and new information. The last privately-circulated updates I have seen are almost as lengthy as the original book. Some states, in particular Bharatpur and Indore, have had massive quantities of new information and specimens come forward. It is good news indeed that active negotiations are underway for a new, expanded, prettier, and more easily available edition. Cross your fingers! (I would have posted a scan of the cover, but the size limit seems to have gone haywire.)

The relations between and among these four new US medals (the two for the so-called "GWOT") and the two for Iraq and Afghanistan are, at best, complex. It seem clear that whoever came up with them never envisioned multi-tour (multi-generational?) deployments (i.e., they'd never read the military history of these areas). And I am not even touching issues of phaleristic "design" here!

Wisconsin? See: http://www.omsa.org/photopost/showgallery.php?cat=830 The OMSA database has coverage of many/most of these state medals. The Gulf War II medal shown is a generic unofficial commercial medal which many states picked up so their "forces" could have just one more medal for liberating Kuwait. See: http://www.omsa.org/photopost/showphoto.ph...to=1911&cat=657 Ed

Of course it is 1st class. Duh! Posting from memory of the initial scan (always a bad idea on Friday afternoon).

So . . . badly wounded in WWII, hence the OPW (2nd class?) commemorative issue? I still think of the OOR as a labor/party award. Am I wrong here? The only other one I have seen is in that group-that-may-not-be-a-group -- http://gmic.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=2456 An interesting story lurks here.

A nice group indeed. I have never had a clear sense of the sorts of folk who got the OOR, and have always assumed it went mainly to party types. It is fairly commonly seen in wear by "foreign friends", but I agree with you that rarely do we see normal Soviets wearing it. Any chance of deciphering stamps and so on to get a sense of who he was? When you find the time to scan the documents, we can unleash Rick's Eagle-Eye and all will be revealed?

I know that ribbons were awarded with the Labor Orders (yellow with red edges and one, two, or three red stripes, depending on class). I have handled, but do not have in my custody, some nice cased sets. They are unnumbered, so their joy is limited. I believe I have seen photos of recipients wearing several labor orders, so the usual patterns seem to hold here.