Czech Republic Soldier Memorial Display - KIA in Afghanistan

[Rocket]

One of my hobbies is constructing military veteran displays to showcase a veteran's service. I've done them for American WWI soldiers all the way up to the present day. This was my first crack at constructing a display for a foreign soldier.

 

On July 8, 2014 a Taliban suicide bomber on a bicycle detonated his explosives next to a crowd of Afghan civilians and a convoy of NATO soldiers in the village of Charikar. The Afghan civilians were talking to soldiers from the 4th Czech Rapid Deployment Brigade. The Czech soldiers were investigating rocket attacks against Bagram airfield two days earlier from the nearby village of Qalandar Khil. Sadly, a total of 10 civilians (all children), 2 Afghan police officers, and 4 Czech soldiers were instantly killed in the blast. A 5th Czech soldier (Jaroslav Lieskovan) died from his wounds a week later back in Prague, Czech Republic.

 

My son was deployed during this time with the 101st Airborne Division and became good friends with many of the Czech soldiers and other NATO coalition forces. I thought it only fitting to construct a memorial display for one of the Czech Soldiers so it could be displayed with pride in my son's house as a reminder of their sacrifice.

 

Jaroslav Lieskovan was the most senior of the 5 Czech soldiers killed that day. He had served over 15 years with the Czech Army and had numerous deployments under his belt. It took me over a year to track down the correct medals, patches and ribbon bars. Fortunately, a couple of fellow militaria collectors in the Czech Republic were of great assistance in helping me acquire some of the items for the display. 

 

John

 

 

 

[nickstrenk]

In my opinion ,the 1st is For Heroism.A very rare and impossible to get award.Are  the certificates to medals for showing,too?

[Rocket]

2 hours ago, nickstrenk said:

In my opinion ,the 1st is For Heroism.A very rare and impossible to get award.Are  the certificates to medals for showing,too?

You are correct. The 1st medal is the Medal of Heroism (Medaile Za hrdinstvi). All of the medals are original except for the Medal of Heroism. I was forced to use a quality replica since it is impossible to acquire an authentic original one. All 5 of the Czech soldiers who were killed in action received the Medal of Heroism.