Drone pilot Medals buried....

[Chris Boonzaier]

http://foreignpolicy.com/2016/01/07/pentagons-drone-pilots-get-a-nod-but-no-medals/?utm_content=bufferec120&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer

 

 

For the past decade, drone pilots have played a central role in U.S. efforts to target extremists and track their shadowy leaders across the Middle East and Africa. Now the Pentagon wants to acknowledge their contributions. But don’t expect them to get a medal for it.

After years of contentious debate, the Defense Department has finally decided it won’t issue new medals to drone pilots or cyber technicians who wage war from air-conditioned pods nestled near American strip malls. Instead, the Pentagon plans to give what amounts to pins to attach to non-combat medals awarded for earlier action.

Defense officials have struggled for years over how to recognize the contributions of troops who operate thousands of miles from the front lines, but still impact the battlefield. In this new age of war by remote control, the rules are still being written, but old ways of deciding who is a combatant — and who isn’t — die hard.

In a document announcing the new award, the Defense Department explained that “as the impact of remote operations on combat continues to increase, the necessity of ensuring those actions are distinctly recognized grows.” As a result, an “R” device — to signify service done remotely, outside the war zone — has been designed to be attached to “non-combat performance awards to specifically recognize remote but direct impact on combat operations,” according to the document.

At the same time, a second new “C” award — for combat — is being rolled out to attach to earlier medals, but it will only be given to troops who have otherwise participated in combat.

The debate over giving new awards to drone pilots and cyber troops came to a head in 2013, when then-Defense Secretary Leon Panetta created a Distinguished Warfare Medal for “extraordinary achievement” that did not require the recipient to have been downrange for combat.

Angry veterans groups quickly objected that the new award would rank higher than the Bronze Star, which requires “heroic or meritorious achievement or service” to win.

Following the outcry, Panetta’s successor, then-Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, scuttled the plan two months later while announcing a general review of all medals and citations awarded by the Pentagon.

The result of that study was released Thursday, and includes a huge new Pentagon initiative to review over 1,000 medals the military has awarded during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Under the plan, the armed services will reexamine awards for Distinguished Service, Navy, and Air Force Crosses, and Silver Stars for possible upgrade to the Medal of Honor.

[Chris Liontas]

Feel kind of sorry for these guys.  They are doing a great service to in theater ops/CIA stuff, but it just isn't the same as the guys that go down range.  They will never get the credit that say the fixed wing Air Force jet jockey get, even though the drone guys have had really successful support operations as well.

 

  As for this medal being equal to the bronze star argument; unless the bronze star has a "V", it is simply an Army/Navy/Air Farce achievement medal.  I cant tell you how many Maintenance/supply officers I saw in the Chair Force with the bronze star for pushing paper in Al Karj during DS1.  I'd grown up with stories from guys from Vietnam about how they got their bronze star, and it was not the same.

[peter monahan]

Presumably the same criteria and logic would apply to anyone who, say, prepped attack aircraft for action in the Middle East from a base in Italy or Katar: he did the hours/work/service but wasn't ever in a combat zone.  At the risk of opening a whole can of worms, I think I detect a little bit of the modern notion that 'everybody runs the race and everybody gets a prize'.  In another thread on a different forum there was reference to a 'new'  WWII campaign star, for the men who did the Murmansk runs.

The Arctic Star may be a legitimate way to recognize exceptionally hazardous service but it also opens the door, at least in theory, to an endless stream of 'worthy of recognition additions to the gallery of honours and awards;  D-Day bars to the rance and germany Star or a Chindits bar to the Burma Star or, in the US context, clasps for specific island campaigns.  While I perfectly understand the need and desire to recognize service, I'm not sure why it is thought necessary to encapsulate a man or woman's entire career in a series of ribbons and metal devices.  Presumably  If I wear a 'Nam era Bronze star, people who need or want to know will figure out, or ask, whether I got it for being 'shot over' or for running a great depot.   

[Hugh]

The following is an excerpt from today's Washington Post article about medal policy in the US Armed Forces.  It seems as though they are trying to put too much fine-grain definition.  It's not clear to me how you would distinguish between award of a "C" device and the traditional "V" device.  

The idea of introducing still more new medals seems bizarre.  Most US servicemen already look like a Christmas tree.  

Hugh

"One of the more unexpected wrinkles following the awards review, however, is the proposed creation of a “C” device to denote meritorious service in combat. Defense officials said Tuesday it will go to service members who earn awards below the Bronze Star. Service members who earn an award with a “C” device will display it on their ribbons while in uniform.

Carter also is expected to tweak the policy for service members receiving an award with a “V” device, in light of there being a discrepancy in the services. For example, in the Army the “V” specifically connotes that the award was approved for a service member’s specific valorous action. In the Navy and Marine Corps, awards with a “V” have gone to troops who performed heroically on a single day, or meritoriously in combat over an extended period of time.

Defense officials said it would be possible to earn some ribbons with both a “C” and “V” device — with the “C” denoting meritorious service in combat and the “V” denoting a specific act or acts of valor."

 

Edited January 8, 2016 by Hugh

[Ulsterman]

Well, aside from the medals review, which seems to me to be a rehash of earlier, very complete valor awards reviews, I think the new R and C devices are a good thing. The whole Bronze Star only for combat is also good and I hope they retroactively strip awards of the BS given stateside for anything.  Now if we can just get rid of those silly " I did it" ribbons- like the NCO course/basic completion ribbons or perhaps the most laughable, the sea service / overseas service ribbons, it will be a better world. 

[Hugh]

13 hours ago, Ulsterman said:

Well, aside from the medals review, which seems to me to be a rehash of earlier, very complete valor awards reviews, I think the new R and C devices are a good thing. The whole Bronze Star only for combat is also good and I hope they retroactively strip awards of the BS given stateside for anything.  Now if we can just get rid of those silly " I did it" ribbons- like the NCO course/basic completion ribbons or perhaps the most laughable, the sea service / overseas service ribbons, it will be a better world. 

Amen!  Too many meaningless awards.  A sea service award for the Navy?  What the hell did they think they were joining, the Girl Scouts?  Doing your duty well should entitle you to a hearty handshake and eventually, the next promotion.  I've got five rows of ribbons and the only one I'm proud of is the Combat Action Ribbon (but in fairness, that was only doing my duty).  Three or four rows of ribbons, maybe less,  for a 20 year veteran in time of war sounds about right to me.  (That should start a "vigorous exchange of ideas".)   

[Ulsterman]

I agree. Gone are the days when a senior Navy NCO in peacetime could expect to retire with a mere two or three rows of awards. 

[Hugh]

Just to keep this dialogue stirred up, here's a piece by Tom Ricks / Ryan Blum from Foreign Policy.  If I read it correctly, it states that every member of one unit achieved an individual award at some level after completing a deployment.  Every member!  That's what the campaign medal is for, not a Bronze Star.  The system is, indeed, badly broken.  When I served with some highly decorated officers in the '60's, some of them only wore the top row of ribbons on the premise that everything else was trivial.

https://foreignpolicy.com/2016/01/21/the-other-stolen-valor/

E MAGAZINE

 

 

 

VOICE

The other stolen valor

• BY THOMAS E. RICKS
• JANUARY 21, 2016
•  
• 

 

By Ryan Blum
Best Defense Council of the Former Enlisted

Decorations, badges, and medals are the distinct manner in which military societies recognize a service member’s accomplishments. While there are specific differences between the categories, I will refer to them all as “awards” for the sake of simplicity, unless otherwise stated.

A service member (SM) displays his or her awards on the military dress uniform, exhibiting achievements in a precisely arranged order, acting as a worn résumé.

These awards depending on service branch, showcase a SM’s military occupational specialty, unit, marksmanship skills, military schools attended, geographical location history, years of service, months in combat, or whether or not the SM has been wounded.

Other awards are based on accomplishments, such as receiving an Army Achievement Medal for attaining the highest physical fitness score in the platoon, or — like the National Defense Service Medal commends — simply enlisting in the first place.

However, many Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, and Marines tell you that the awards that warrant the most deference are those bestowed for heroism and courage in combat, what the Army characterizes as “valor awards.” Combat, in service to the country, is the essence of the Armed Services, and combat awards are preeminent.

Unfortunately, to many veterans who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, the system of issuing these awards is broken, and all too often based on cronyism and rank.

A quick look regarding awards on most military forum websites, and you’ll find the disgust of one medal in particular: the Bronze Star. The once glimmering award, originally created to raise the morale of ground troops fighting in the Second World War, is now considered by the rank-and-file as lackluster.

In a memorandum to President Franklin D. Roosevelt, General George C. Marshall wrote about his support of the award:

“The fact that the ground troops, Infantry in particular, lead miserable lives of extreme discomfort and are the ones who must close in personal combat with the enemy, makes the maintenance of their morale of great importance… the Infantry Riflemen who are now suffering the heaviest losses, air or ground, in the Army, and enduring the greatest hardships.”

The combat arms branches, especially the junior enlisted, lament that the Bronze Star (BSM) has now become a shameless resume-building award for senior NCOs and staff officers, many of whom never experienced combat while in theater.

The Army alone awarded over 170,000 Bronze Star Medals in Operations Iraqi and Enduring Freedom, only 4,500 of which had the accompanying “V” device, which denotes exceptional valor.

Colloquially named, “blanket awards,” many unit commanders awarded their troops’ end-of-tour awards based solely on military grade.

“At the end of our 12-month Afghan tour, E-4s and below received an Army Achievement Medal — a peacetime award,” wrote former Army Specialist Brandon Smith to me on Facebook.

“E-5s and E-6s all received Army Commendation Medals, and E-7s and above received blanket Bronze Stars. It didn’t matter what they actually did during the tour, whether they patrolled everyday, or sat in an air-conditioned office.”

Obviously, it’s important to recognize the efforts of support and staff personnel, and while the requirements for the bronze star were later broadened to include “meritorious service while in a combat zone,” there is an award specifically for that: The Meritorious Service Medal (MSM). However, the MSM was awarded less than a quarter of the rate of the BSM.

Recently, according to documents obtained by USA Today, Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter approved sweeping recommendations from a two-year study that was initiated by his predecessor to review the way in which the Department of Defense awards medals for combat.

Included amongst the 37 recommendations is tightening the criteria for awarding the Bronze Star, and attempting to limit the number of awardees who “face few risks of actual combat.” In addition, the recommendation calls for a uniform definition for meritorious service that would limit combat awards to those exposed to hostile action.

Also included in the recommendations was a review of the over 1,100 Service Crosses and Silver Stars awarded since Sept. 11, 2001 for potential upgrade to the Medal of Honor, the military’s highest award for valor. Furthermore, the review recommends that goals and guidelines be established to ensure that the process for Medal of Honor and other awards are completed in a timely way. Currently, several awards were approved years after the recipient left the service, including several after they passed away.

Edited January 22, 2016 by Hugh

[Ulsterman]

Brandon recounts in his book getting an ARCOM with V device - along with his entire company- for a minutes long firefight in Iraq against insurgents in a Mosque- allegedly. Smith was never completely sure that anyone was actually firing back and the incident might well have been a " jumpy shot"  catalyzing a mass unit reaction. The implication was he got a medal merely for firing at what might have been an empty building. 

Edited January 25, 2016 by Ulsterman

[Hugh]

I've taken the liberty of posting this image from San Giorgio's forthcoming auction (I hope they won't mind) to illustrate.  Here's a master sergeant with 4-1/2 years of overseas service in WW II and Korea and a Presidential unit citation.  His top medal appears to be the Good Conduct medal.  Now he may have been sorting socks 100 miles behind the lines, but he didn't get a Bronze Star for it.  

 

[Ulsterman]

Yup. Cool huh?