D
Dan Ratcliffe
Guest
I think what often gets missed is that to earn, regardless of how small the wound, you must be under fire. Asking about an award isn't a big deal, more than once my Marines asked me if they had earned one award or another, it was important to them. Suggesting that they some how don't deserve the Combat Action Ribbon, because they asked if they were going to recieve it, just seems silly.
The size of the wound just doesn't make a difference. The first Marine killed in Beirut died when 3 slivers of an APAM entered his forehead in the space between his helmet rim and his glasses. Awarding medals is a damn complicated process, and can take forever to occur. If I am a corpsman and I mention that you could get a Purple Heart for your wound, there is nothing to it if you ask some one else to confirm it, or go looking for it. 18 months after being told I was going to recieve a Navy Achievement Medal, and after the gentleman who put me in for it asked if I ever recieved it, I went looking for it. Seems it was sent to the wrong unit, dropped in a file cabinet drawer to disappear. I guess I didn't deserve it.
On my DD214, it clearly states I earned the Combat Action Ribbon during the first Gulf War. A search of the database will show that no one in my entire unit, who also recieved the award, has the award. Hopefully I won't run for office someday and have 20 years of service washed down the toilet by some SOB who didn't like me.
Again, in order to recieve a Purple Heart you must be exposed to enemy fire. That in itself makes you fairly deserving. If I get my Purple Heart from a bayonet during hand-to-hand combat, and you get one because they happen to lob a mortar round at the supply depot you worked at, does that mean that later I get to tell you you didn't deserve it? Nope.
Any man who has served has more right than any one to call in to question the conduct of it's nation's soldiers during a war. I was a Marine from 1974 to 1994, the NCO's and Officers I served with knew of artocities. How they chose to justify them or prosecute them is up to them, the ones who served. They do not dishonor me by bringing it up, even if they don't do it politely. Some day, history will look back at the "Road of Death" leading out of Kuwait from the first Gulf war and suggest that wasn't necessary. Maybe it wasn't. I know that it was so brutal that Colin Powell himself put a stop to the slaughter.
As a Marine I am not dishonored by reporting of a crime or atrocity; I am dishonored by the atrocity or criminal act. As for the whole hurting of the morale issue, if that's all it takes to hurt your morale, go to work at Burger King. I can tell you from personal experience the whole damn time you are preparing yourself for a patrol you wonder if what you are doing is the right thing, right up until you step off. I call it thinking and our guys are capable of it with out falling to pieces.
The folks who are attacking the service of both Senator Kerry and President Bush are relying on your ignorance of the nature of service in order win points. I have read the service records of both men, and lacking that ignorance find both served honorably.
I am completely ashamed of those men, who for political purpose, seek to ruin the careers of men who served honorably.
The size of the wound just doesn't make a difference. The first Marine killed in Beirut died when 3 slivers of an APAM entered his forehead in the space between his helmet rim and his glasses. Awarding medals is a damn complicated process, and can take forever to occur. If I am a corpsman and I mention that you could get a Purple Heart for your wound, there is nothing to it if you ask some one else to confirm it, or go looking for it. 18 months after being told I was going to recieve a Navy Achievement Medal, and after the gentleman who put me in for it asked if I ever recieved it, I went looking for it. Seems it was sent to the wrong unit, dropped in a file cabinet drawer to disappear. I guess I didn't deserve it.
On my DD214, it clearly states I earned the Combat Action Ribbon during the first Gulf War. A search of the database will show that no one in my entire unit, who also recieved the award, has the award. Hopefully I won't run for office someday and have 20 years of service washed down the toilet by some SOB who didn't like me.
Again, in order to recieve a Purple Heart you must be exposed to enemy fire. That in itself makes you fairly deserving. If I get my Purple Heart from a bayonet during hand-to-hand combat, and you get one because they happen to lob a mortar round at the supply depot you worked at, does that mean that later I get to tell you you didn't deserve it? Nope.
Any man who has served has more right than any one to call in to question the conduct of it's nation's soldiers during a war. I was a Marine from 1974 to 1994, the NCO's and Officers I served with knew of artocities. How they chose to justify them or prosecute them is up to them, the ones who served. They do not dishonor me by bringing it up, even if they don't do it politely. Some day, history will look back at the "Road of Death" leading out of Kuwait from the first Gulf war and suggest that wasn't necessary. Maybe it wasn't. I know that it was so brutal that Colin Powell himself put a stop to the slaughter.
As a Marine I am not dishonored by reporting of a crime or atrocity; I am dishonored by the atrocity or criminal act. As for the whole hurting of the morale issue, if that's all it takes to hurt your morale, go to work at Burger King. I can tell you from personal experience the whole damn time you are preparing yourself for a patrol you wonder if what you are doing is the right thing, right up until you step off. I call it thinking and our guys are capable of it with out falling to pieces.
The folks who are attacking the service of both Senator Kerry and President Bush are relying on your ignorance of the nature of service in order win points. I have read the service records of both men, and lacking that ignorance find both served honorably.
I am completely ashamed of those men, who for political purpose, seek to ruin the careers of men who served honorably.
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