{"id":56919,"date":"2014-12-07T16:36:44","date_gmt":"2014-12-07T21:36:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/valorguardians.com\/blog\/?p=56919"},"modified":"2018-02-12T11:31:18","modified_gmt":"2018-02-12T16:31:18","slug":"alwyne-cashes-medal-of-honor-moves-slowly-forward","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/?p=56919","title":{"rendered":"Alwyn Cashe’s Medal of Honor moves slowly forward"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Alwyn<\/a><\/center><\/p>\n

The LA Times, <\/a>in their own way reports that Sergeant First Class Alwyn Cashe is still in the running for an award of the Medal of Honor, nearly a decade after he gave his life to save his troops from his burning Bradley. This has been my personal crusade – you know because Cashe and I are just alike – we were Bradley platoon sergeants. We look a lot alike, too – in the eyes. They issue those to us at ANCOC. His hair is a little short than I liked, though. I’d like to think that I would have done the same thing that SFC Cashe did in his circumstances;<\/p>\n

Cashe rescued six badly burned soldiers while under enemy small-arms fire. His own uniform caught fire, engulfing him in flames. Even with second- and-third degree burns over three-fourths of his body, Cashe continue to pull soldiers out of a vehicle set ablaze when a roadside bomb ruptured a fuel tank.<\/p>\n

[…]<\/p>\n

Sgt. Gary Mills…was inside the stricken Bradley fighting vehicle that day. He was on fire, his hands so badly burned that he couldn’t open the rear troop door to free himself and other soldiers trapped inside the flaming vehicle.<\/p>\n

Someone opened the door from outside, Mills recalls. A powerful hand grabbed him and yanked him to safety. He later learned that the man who had rescued him was Cashe, who seconds later crawled into the vehicle to haul out the platoon’s critically burned medic while on fire himself.<\/p>\n

“Sgt. Cashe saved my life,” Mills said. “With all the ammo inside that vehicle, and all those flames, we’d have all been dead in another minute or two.”<\/p>\n

Four of the six soldiers rescued later died of their wounds at a hospital. An Afghan interpreter riding in the Bradley died during the bomb attack. Cashe refused to be loaded onto a medical evacuation helicopter until all the other wounded men had been flown.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

SFC Cashe succumbed to his injuries a few weeks later, at Fort Sam Houston’s Brooke Army Medical Center surrounded by his family. The Army awarded him a Silver Star, but that doesn’t go far enough, in my opinion and now, that’s the opinion of his leadership apparently. They claim that for nearly ten years some nebulous cloud of war hung over SFC Cashe’s actions that day that is only now lifting.<\/p>\n

In the article, the LA Times quotes now-Brigadier General Gary Brito, then SFC Cashe’s battlion commander, as saying that if the events of that day had been clearer, he would have nominated Cashe for the Medal of Honor then.<\/p>\n

Brito, who is still on active duty, says he has spent the last seven years locating soldiers and obtaining sworn statements, which he has included in the latest packet he is submitting to the Army.<\/p>\n

One statement is from Lt. Gen. William G. Webster, Cashe’s division commander, who wrote: “The pain he suffered must have been unimaginable, and yet he continued to suffer in the name of saving others. I cannot remember a story that is its equal.”<\/p>\n

Taluto, who also commanded Cashe, wrote: “In all my years of service I have yet to witness or hear of such an act of bravery.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The article quotes Cashe’s sister, Kasinal Cashe White;<\/p>\n

When Cashe was able to speak, White said, his first words were: “How are my boys?” \u2014 his soldiers, she said.<\/p>\n

Then he began weeping, she said. He told her: “I couldn’t get to them fast enough.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

So, let’s get to Cashe a little faster, there, Pentagon.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The LA Times, in their own way reports that Sergeant First Class Alwyn Cashe is still … Alwyn Cashe’s Medal of Honor moves slowly forward<\/span>Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":55212,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[237,130],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-56919","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-big-pentagon","category-real-soldiers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56919","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=56919"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56919\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/55212"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=56919"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=56919"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=56919"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}