This ain't Hell, but you can see it from here

Category: Real Soldiers

  • Colonel Ola Lee Mize passes

    Ola Lee Mize

    Last night we received the sad news that Colonel Ola Lee Mize passed on at the tender age of 82. Colonel Mize was treasured in the Special Forces community as well as the rest of the military as a soldier’s soldier. He earned the medal of Honor. He earned the Medal of Honor in Korea as a buck sergeant and Marne Man, legend has it that he tried to refuse the award until the men he served with were honored for their part in the events as well. He was nominated for a second award during the Vietnam War, but it was denied by Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara because, the secretary said, he was an officer and already had one award of the medal. His citation reads;

    M/Sgt. Mize, a member of Company K, distinguished himself by conspicuous gallantry and outstanding courage above and beyond the call of duty in action against the enemy. Company K was committed to the defense of “Outpost Harry”, a strategically valuable position, when the enemy launched a heavy attack. Learning that a comrade on a friendly listening post had been wounded he moved through the intense barrage, accompanied by a medical aid man, and rescued the wounded soldier. On returning to the main position he established an effective defense system and inflicted heavy casualties against attacks from determined enemy assault forces which had penetrated into trenches within the outpost area. During his fearless actions he was blown down by artillery and grenade blasts 3 times but each time he dauntlessly returned to his position, tenaciously fighting and successfully repelling hostile attacks. When enemy onslaughts ceased he took his few men and moved from bunker to bunker, firing through apertures and throwing grenades at the foe, neutralizing their positions. When an enemy soldier stepped out behind a comrade, prepared to fire, M/Sgt. Mize killed him, saving the life of his fellow soldier. After rejoining the platoon, moving from man to man, distributing ammunition, and shouting words of encouragement he observed a friendly machinegun position overrun. He immediately fought his way to the position, killing 10 of the enemy and dispersing the remainder. Fighting back to the command post, and finding several friendly wounded there, he took a position to protect them. Later, securing a radio, he directed friendly artillery fire upon the attacking enemy’s routes of approach. At dawn he helped regroup for a counterattack which successfully drove the enemy from the outpost. M/Sgt. Mize’s valorous conduct and unflinching courage reflect lasting glory upon himself and uphold the noble traditions of the military service.

    But a greater tribute is how Colonel Mize lived in the hearts of fellow soldiers;

    “He was a soldier’s leader,” [Rick] Vaughan said. “If you had to pick a leader to go to war with, Lee Mize was the one you would want to pick. You would absolutely want to go with him because you knew he would take care of you, make sure you were prepared and had all the skill and knowledge you need to get there and get back safe.

    “We just lost a living piece of history. He just can’t be replaced.”

  • Widow loses bid for Medal of Honor for her husband

    MCPO Ret. In TN and Bobo send us a link in regards to a judge that denied a widow the opportunity to continue her fight to gt her husband’s Distinguished Service Cross (DSC) upgraded to the Medal Of Honor because of a technicality. Lt. Garlin Murl Conner was second only to Audie Murphy, a fellow Marne Man (3rd Infantry Division) in the number of awards that he earned during World War II and many folks agree that he should have earned the Medal of Honor.

    From the Associated Press;

    The board first rejected Conner’s application in 1997 on its merits and turned away an appeal in June 2000, saying at the time no new evidence warranted a hearing or a new decoration despite more than a dozen letters of support for Conner.

    In the years that followed, lawmakers in Kentucky, Tennessee and three other states passed resolutions backing the effort to see Conner receive the Medal of Honor. After Chilton found three eyewitness accounts to Conner’s deeds in 2006, Pauline Conner resubmitted the case to the board in 2008 — two years after the statute of limitations expired.

    A bipartisan group of current and former members of Congress has backed Conner’s application in the past, including retired Sen. Bob Dole, a Kansas Republican and World War II veteran; retired Sen. Wendell Ford, a Democrat from Kentucky; current Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky; and Whitfield, who represents Conner’s home town near the Tennessee line. Noted World War II historian Steven Ambrose, who died in 2002, wrote in November 2000 to support Conner’s application, saying his actions were “far above the call of duty.”

    The review board remained unmoved by Conner’s submission.

    The review board now claims that the application was beyond the “statute of limitations” to qualify for their consideration. This is despite the fact that many of the Medals of Honor that the President is about to award later this month, the events for which the troops are being awarded the medals occurred in the same time period as LT Conner’s.

    Lt Connor died in 1998 and his widow has carried on the uphill fight until her efforts were blocked by U.S. District Judge Thomas B. Russell on Tuesday;

    Russell concluded that Pauline Conner waited too long to present new evidence to the U.S. Army Board of Correction of Military Records, which rejected her bid to alter her husband’s service record.

    Russell praised Conner’s “extraordinary courage and patriotic service” but said there was nothing he could do for the family.

    “Dismissing this claim as required by technical limitations in no way diminishes Lt. Conner’s exemplary service and sacrifice,” Russell wrote.

  • LCpl. William Kyle Carpenter to receive the Medal of Honor

    William Kyle Carpenter

    Stars & Stripes reports that Marine Lance Cpl. William Kyle Carpenter will be awarded the Medal of Honor for taking the brunt of a grenade blast which saved his buddy, Lance Cpl. Nicholas Eufrazio;

    Carpenter was nominated for the nation’s highest award for valor following reports that he covered a grenade to save the life of his friend, Lance Cpl. Nicholas Eufrazio, during an insurgent attack in the Marjah district of Helmand province as the two Marines were standing guard on a rooftop on Nov. 21, 2010. Carpenter and Eufrazio survived the blast, but suffered severe wounds. Carpenter lost an eye and most of his teeth and shattered his jaw; his arm was also broken in several places.

    Damage from shrapnel to the frontal lobe of Eufrazio’s brain left him unable to speak for two years.

    […]

    After a long recovery and more than 30 surgeries, Carpenter ran the Marine Corps Marathon last year and posted a time of 4:28:42, according to the ‘Operation Kyle’ Facebook page, which was created by Carpenter’s supporters.

  • Marine Maj. Kurt Chew-Een Lee passes

    AverageNCO, while trolling the obituaries like he does, ran across this one about Maj. Kurt Chew-Een Lee, the first Asian-American Marine officer who passed at the tender age of 88 in his Washington, DC home on Monday;

    He received the Navy Cross, the Marines’ second-highest honor, for bravery during a fierce assault by Communist Chinese forces aiding the North Koreans on the night of Nov. 2-3, 1950.

    To spur his men to fight, he took off in the darkness on a one-man raid and exposed himself to fire to pinpoint enemy positions for attack. Shouting in Mandarin to sow confusion, he hurled grenades and shot at Chinese troops, who fled. Wounded in the knee, he was shot the next day by a sniper and treated at an Army field hospital.

    Unwilling to be sent to Japan for treatment, Maj. Lee took a Jeep without approval and drove with another wounded Marine to rejoin their platoon in Baker Company of the 1st Battalion, 7th Marine Regiment. He was assigned to help relieve a Marine division that was encircled by overwhelming enemy numbers while trying to defend their only escape road in the bloody Battle of Chosin Reservoir in December 1950.

    You should read the whole story, and there’s more at Wiki. He went on to deploy to Vietnam, too.

  • Peralta discussion continues

    Last weekend we wrote about the Washington Post article in which two witnesses to Sergeant Rafael Peralta’s death and the heroic act which preceded it, claimed that the act never happened. The Washington Times today reports that Sergeant Peralta’s mother claims that the Washington Post reporter, Ernesto Londoño, tried to get her to play the race card in their interview;

    Peralta’s mother Rosa said in a letter this week that a reporter for The Washington Post seemed intent on trying to get her to say her son was denied the Medal of Honor because he was Hispanic.

    Other witnesses are standing by their original account of the events in that small room;

    “If you’re trying to smear the legacy of a Marine who’s a hero, who saved my life, then you’re barking up the wrong … tree,” said Nicholas Jones, one of the Marines in the room when insurgents tossed the grenade toward the troops. Peralta received the Navy Cross for his actions, but his supporters — including California Republican Rep. Duncan Hunter, who himself served as a Marine office in Fallujah during the Iraq war — say he deserves the Medal of Honor.

    In the Washington Post article, their witnesses claim that those in the room conspired to concoct the heroic story about Peralta’s final act;

    Among those are the video shot by the combat photographer showing the aftermath of the fight and Peralta’s body, with wounds consistent with the original story and contrary to what the dissenting Marines now claim. The video also covers the time period when the story would have been concocted, but there’s no evidence of any such discussion, Mr. Hunter said.

    Mr. Hunter also pointed to pictures of Peralta’s body armor which ended up with a fragment of the grenade fuse embedded in it, which he said was consistent with the initial story.

    My problem is that Peralta was awarded the Navy Cross for things that are currently in dispute. He has a ship named after him because of that final act. So why are they having this discussion – based on the official statements made by “experts” who weren’t there.

  • Old Guard delivers 700 pounds of food to charity

    Old Guard RuckRun-

    Our buddy, Nicky, sends us a link to an article in Arlington Now about some troops from the Old Guard at Fort Myers, VA who delivered by foot 700 pounds of food to the Arlington Food Assistance Center (AFAC);

    About 50 members of the Army’s 3rd U.S. Infantry Regiment delivered nearly 700 pounds of donated food to the Arlington Food Assistance Center this morning.

    In case the donation wasn’t impressive enough, the soldiers delivered the food on foot, marching 4 miles from Joint Base Myer-Henderson Hall to AFAC’s building in Shirlington with rucksacks on their backs.

    The 3rd Infantry Regiment is also known as the Old Guard. The donation was made by the Old Guard’s 4th Battalion, which consists of ceremonial companies, a military police company, and the guards of the Tomb of the Unknowns, among others.

    The AFAC says that they feed about 1800 families in the area.

  • 24 Medals of Honor to be awarded

    According to the Washington Post, the White House is set to announce the award of 24 Medals of Honor for past wars. According to the Post, these are previously “overlooked minority” awards.

    Mostly, I’m disappointed that the list doesn’t include SGT Rafael Peralta and Sergeant First Class Alwyn C. Cashe who pulled his Bradley crew from the burning vehicle and then died from his injuries.

    But there is a list of the 24 awardees at the Post link. Thanks to Chief Tango for the link. And thanks to the Post for the editor changing the headline from “winners” to “recipients” as indicated by the URL to the link.

  • Sergeant Joseph Love; saving the world one person at a time

    abc27 WHTM

    Sergeant Daniel Famous, a Pennsylvania National Guardsman instructor at Fort Indiantown Gap discovered that he needed a kidney last year. Fellow Guardsman Sergeant Joseph Love stepped up when he discovered that he was a match for SGT Famous, according to WHTM;

    Love started the rigorous, five-month process of testing to see if he could donate a kidney to Famous. He found out in August that he was a perfect match.

    “I just said, ‘Oh by the way, for the last five months I’ve been going through this testing process and I’m a match for your kidney. So, if you want it, it’s yours,’ and he was at loss for words, which he never is,” said Love.

    “I was just thinking about how selfless and how wonderful of a gift this was for one person to give another person. He’s basically given me the gift of life,” Famous said.

    Famous and Love will go under the knife just a few days after Valentine’s Day.

    “It’s part of the Army values, it’s part of the warrior ethos: never leave a fallen comrade. Selfless service. I mean these are things that the Army calls us to, but above the Army, I wanted to,” said Love.

    Looking for this article, I found another soldier who did the same thing last year for another soldier;

    Upon learning of Porter’s need for a kidney, [Retired Lt. Col. Beth Ward] immediately called The University of Kansas Hospital to begin the screening process. She’s now scheduled to donate her kidney to [Retired Lt. Col. Scott Porter] on Tuesday, Nov. 12, one day after Veterans Day. Although the procedure’s timing is random, both admit the proximity to Veterans Day holds special meaning.

    “How many times do you get a chance to save somebody’s life? I think that’s pretty awesome,” said Ward. “The military is like a family…if you can help some member of your family, why not?”

    I thought these stories would provide a contrast to the Wisconsin National Guard funeral detail story.