Medals of Honor to modern veterans more often but wait is longer

Obama awards more Medals of Honor to modern veterans — but it takes longer, too
Washington Post
By Dan Lamothe
July 19 2014

When President Obama drapes the Medal of Honor around the neck of Army Staff Sgt. Ryan J. Pitts on Monday, it will symbolize all of the heroism and sacrifice that occurred in a ferocious battle in Afghanistan. But it will represent something else, too: a dramatic rise in the amount of time it takes for troops to be honored with the nation’s highest award for combat valor.

Pitts, of Nashua, N.H., will receive the award six years and eight days after holding off an enemy assault on his platoon’s hillside observation post in Afghanistan’s Nuristan province. He did so even though he was wounded badly enough that a fellow soldier had to put a tourniquet on his leg to control the bleeding, Army officials say.

The amount of time between his actions and his ceremony at the White House will be the second longest for any service member awarded the Medal of Honor for actions after the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001. It is surpassed only by Army Sgt. Kyle White, who received the medal May 13, more than 61 / 2 years after he braved enemy fire numerous times in a Nov. 7, 2007, battle in Nuristan after he was briefly knocked unconscious by a rocket-propelled grenade blast.

Army officials are still smarting from the way the Medal of Honor case for Capt. William D. Swenson was botched. The infantry officer received the award Oct. 15 for braving enemy fire repeatedly in eastern Afghanistan’s Ganjgal Valley on Sept. 8, 2009, to pull a fellow soldier who had sustained a gunshot from a kill zone, and then search for four service members who had been killed.

Swenson received the Medal of Honor more than four years after the battle — and only after his digital nomination packet went missing in Afghanistan. He was first recommended for the award by a battalion commander in December 2009, but it was subsequently recommended for a downgrade by Army Gen. David H. Petraeus, according to the findings of a Defense Department inspector general investigation. The package never received additional processing.

Swenson’s case was submitted for review again in July 2011, as the military prepared to award a Medal of Honor to another service member in the battle, Marine Sgt. Dakota Meyer. Swenson refused to accept his award until the Army investigated what happened, and he received a public apology from Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel last year.
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