Awards of Valor

“I wore a Tunic”
I wore a tunic, a lousy khaki tunic,
And you wore your civvy clothes.
We fought and bled at Loos
While you were home on the booze
The booze that no one here knows.
Oh you were with the wenches
While we were in the trenches
facing an angry foe
Oh you were a-slacking
While we were attacking
The Jerry on the Menin Road
(A World War One song found at http://www.oucs.ox.ac.uk/ltg/projects/jtap/ )

We had trained together through Basic and went together as a unit to Vietnam in ’66. Until some of us died, we felt ourselves fortunate to have that extended relationship. We ate, bled and cussed together. We fought the enemy, the ants and our fears together. We endured the rains, the orders and loneliness together. We took care of each other. We didn’t think about courage, valor or “gallantry in action.” We didn’t think about ribbons. We did our duty together. We went home alone.

The only person who may challenge the validity of an award of valor for combat action is the person to whom it has been presented. Only in the integrity and soul of the recipient is the truth. Some may choose to wear a ribbon upon return home while others may put the ribbon in a box on a shelf in a closet. Some may do an interview with a local newspaper while others may remain silent until the 25th, 50th or other anniversary event or funeral brings them to tears.

In the award of medals, some combat unit commanders are guided by the view attributed to Napoleon Bonaparte, “A soldier will fight long and hard for a bit of colored ribbon.” Others may see political value for themselves in the awards they authorize. Some merely pay the respect due an extraordinary act of human character amidst the most vile of human endeavors. Some have adjutants capable of writing well crafted accounts of actions. Other commanders simply expect a higher level of performance of duty without specific recognition.

In the course of exposure to hostile fire we were scared. In anticipation of hostile fire we were more scared. We acted bravely when not seen. We were there in the jungle, on the water, in the sky above, in the mud, and in the blood of our friends. We bled or were blown back twenty feet in the air and got a ribbon with a certificate that read “for wounds received in action.” We were there “in action.” Many, many others were not.

Medals and ribbons are, in one sense, a part of the theatre costuming of the armed forces. But more, medals of valor are important recognitions of necessary and exemplary conduct in war. In the community of servicemen and women and veterans, as they should in the civilian world, the ribbons command a degree of respect. The military makes admirable attempts to retain the integrity of the awards. However, the recognition by award of a medal of valor suffers from the same potential for human misjudgments as anywhere else in life. To see one person wearing, for example, multiple awards of valor, yet not one Purple Heart, would cause another combat veteran to pause. Could someone perform multiple valorous acts as exemplified by the awards without receiving a scratch? That is not the way combat generally plays out. Does one unit really have so many heroes as to justify the award of a large number of valor medals while another, one equally exposed to combat, awards relatively few? Then again, there have been thousands of valorous acts in war that never receive any recognition. What was unseen and unreported one day may have been substantially more worthy of an award of valor than later action that was recognized.

Stephen Crane’s protagonist, Henry Fleming, in The Red Badge of Courage, showed the potential cowardice of any man or woman in the face of war. Fleming in his first true battle ran away in fear. Yet, he returned to perform courageously on the field of battle. His acts of courage were recognized and praised by his commanders who were unaware of the earlier cowardice, though no medals were presented. Whether or not Fleming would have worn the ribbons of valor, knowing that he had earlier ran away, he was justifiably proud of the balance of his actions during his time in combat. “He felt a quiet manhood, nonassertive but of sturdy and strong blood. He knew that he would no more quail before his guides wherever they should point. He had been to touch the great death, and found that, after all, it was but the great death. He was a man.”

The bottom line is that no one should judge the courage of a combat veteran by the ribbons that the veteran wears or does not have on the uniform. No one should challenge the validity of a combat award except in the most exceptional circumstance of malfeasance. To challenge, particularly for political purposes, unjustifiably insults the integrity of the recipient of the medal and calls to question all others awarded the medal. No one can know the unique circumstances, the balance of exposure to death and the personal conduct in combat that another has experienced and felt. The extremes of war and personal courage or cowardice may be experienced in a single combat encounter. Neither another combat veteran nor an untested observer has the moral capacity or authority to call to question another’s pride in their combat experience as exemplified by their retention of an award of valor.

“I have some wounds upon me, and they smart to hear themselves remembered.” Caius Marcius (“Coriolanus” by Shakespeare )