About What Makes a Real Hero? I had the great honor of travelling with some mighty fine men in combat—from all ranks. We had out fair share of; phonies, wannabes and self-aggrandizers, but on the whole they were American fighting men worthy of the linage of; Special Forces, 173rd Airborne, 75th Rangers and Marine Force Recon. A very close friend of mine was riding on a slick with half his recon team and the chopper took ground fire and crashed in the jungle. One of the door gunners was trapped up to his thighs in the wreckage and the fire from the crash was slowly cooking him alive through the metal frame. He was begging the four survivors to help him. Despite their best efforts they could not budge the wreckage and my friend told the young soldier they found a large broken branch and were bringing it. He stepped behind the begging soldier and shot him in the head with his 9mm pistol. Forty-years later, my friend was still suffering from what he did, even though his other option was to put distance between the survivors and the crash and call for an extraction letting the young soldier roast alive. I knew the SP/4 door gunner—having seen him on occasion bringing in supplies and over at the aviation billets. He was a handsome kid, always smiling. So, I can understand my friend’s guilt and 41-years after the incident he committed suicide from a plethora of intense combat events. A year after that event, I was commanding a fire support base as a captain (a LTC position) that held a firing battery, one infantry company and a platoon of Navy Seabees. We came under a Sapper attack, killing 9 (number debated) of them, but one of them had reached our large ammunition bunkers and placed a delayed action charge in the bunker housing artillery projectiles, fuses, flares, small arms ammo and smoke/grenades. There were sandbag dividers inside the bunker and when the charge went off it trapped two of my soldiers inside the bunker setting off the hand flares and smoke grenades. On arrival, I was informed two men were trapped and they did not know if they were alive or not. I grabbed an army blanket and soaked it in a nearby fire barrel and entered the bunker. The fire produced a thick smoke rolling out of the bunker exits but there was still breathable air being sucked in about three feet off the sand floor. I quickly found the first unconscious soldier and dragged him out of the bunker—that was easy. I was operating off adrenalin and a commander’s responsibility for his men. It was going BACK INTO THAT BUNKER for the second soldier that took a lot of courage because I then knew what to expect inside. I found the second soldier after a very hectic search. He had awakened from the explosion and was coughing and I heard him in the thickening smoke and heat. I pulled him out of the bunker as the small arms ammo started cooking off and I was sure we would be killed from the noise alone. A year and a half later, I was attending the Officer’s Advanced Course and was called into the Commandant’s office and informed I was being awarded the Soldier’s Medal for valor. I was asked if I wanted a parade and turned them down. None of the soldier’s who would be forced to parade for me were from any unit I had served with and it wasn’t fair to them. The Commandant understood and handed me the award packet and shook my hand. I have been asked numerous times why I entered that bunker when we didn’t even know if the soldiers were alive and my answer has always been the same: I knew I could not live with myself if I had done nothing. It was the same decision my friend made shooting the SP/4 trapped in the chopper wreckage—he knew he could not live with himself if he did nothing. The difference was, I was fortunate enough to have saved two lives and was as forced to take a life. Yet, to me he did the greater deed that took courage—one of mercy. So when I hear individuals getting the Medal of Honor for shooting an enemy soldier dragging away his buddy! Or making a cellphone call after they had screwed up—worse yet for treading water for “three hours” in the South China sea holding his wounded teammate (as a Navy SEAL!)—I’m not very impressed. Those events are things I would expect from them as a minimum—not something that is “above and beyond the call of duty.” When we lower the standard for valor to meet political needs—it hurts us all as combat veterans.
Posted on: Mon, 06 Oct 2014 10:50:35 +0000
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