This Is Why MSgt. Tavis Delaney Is Receiving The Silver Star Today (Video)

Washington Air National Guardsman To Receive Silver Star -- MyNorthWest

A Washington Air National Guardsman will be honored with a Silver Star for heroism during an ambush by Taliban insurgents in Afghanistan last year.

Sgt. Tavis Delaney can be heard rallying his fellow soldiers to storm a nearby hillside toward more than 200 Taliban insurgents near the Pakistani border.

"How far is the bomb going to be?"

The Air National Guard says during the 13 hour firefight Delaney "bravely stood upright" exposing himself to enemy fire in order to call in air strikes.

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My Comment: After 13 hours of being engaged with the enemy .... I guess he (and the soldiers who followed him) had enough.

11 Silver Stars For One Afghan Battle (Video)

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My Comment: This battle occurred in 2008, but I still speechless when I read about it or see the above video.

Can A U.S. Soldier Fake His Own Silver Star?

Did Kerry's Swift Boat Hatchet Man Fake His Own Silver Star? -- American Thinker

Last August, Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus revoked a Silver Star medal formerly held by retired Navy Captain Wade R. Sanders. In a short, vague memorandum to the Chief of Naval Personnel, Mabus cited "subsequently determined facts and evidence surrounding both the incident for which the award was made and the processing of the award itself" as the reason. Such an action by the Navy is virtually without precedent.

There was no press release and no announcement. Eleven months later, a bare-bones report was finally published by the Navy Times. American Thinker picked up the story from WinterSoldier.com, and after Matt Drudge followed suit, it propagated rapidly.

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My Comment: The news article from the American Thinker focuses on the political connections between retired Navy Captain Wade R. Sanders and US Senator John Kerry .... but what I find amazing are the details behind the revocation of Captain Wade's Silver Star. I do not know of any modern case where such a decision was done .... or such a military award being revoked.

GI Gets Silver Star for Afghan Battle

From Military.com:

With blood gushing from his head and covering his legs, Staff Sgt. Sean Samaroo thought he was going to die.

So Samaroo said "good-bye to my wife and son" out loud.

But Thursday, 11 months after that searing battle in Afghanistan, the Army paratrooper, flanked by his wife, Natasha, and 13-year-old son, Dylan, received the Silver Star medal for heroism.

"There were a lot of heroes out there and some of them didn't get recognized as much as me," Samaroo said following a ceremony at Fort Jackson. "But I'm pretty thankful and honored."

The amiable 35-year-old Oklahoma native received the nation's third-highest award for his heroism during an early morning attack July 13 at Wanat, Afghanistan.

Badly outnumbered, Samaroo and some 50 U.S. soldiers stopped 200 Taliban fighters from overtaking their patrol base during a four-hour fight in the Waygul River Valley of Konar province.

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My Comment: Besides the heroism that he displayed that day, the other reason why he deserves this recognition is best summed by the following comment made by him:

"There were a lot of heroes out there and some of them didn't get recognized as much as me."

10 Green Berets To Receive Silver Star For Afghan Battle

Members of the Operational Detachment Alpha 3336 of the 3rd Special Forces Group endured a nearly seven-hour battle on a mountainside in Afghanistan's Nuristan province on April 6. (Courtesy Of Maj. Emanuel Ortiz Cruz)

From The Washington Post:

After jumping out of helicopters at daybreak onto jagged, ice-covered rocks and into water at an altitude of 10,000 feet, the 12-man Special Forces team scrambled up the steep mountainside toward its target -- an insurgent stronghold in northeast Afghanistan.

"Our plan," Capt. Kyle M. Walton recalled in an interview, "was to fight downhill."

But as the soldiers maneuvered toward a cluster of thick-walled mud buildings constructed layer upon layer about 1,000 feet farther up the mountain, insurgents quickly manned fighting positions, readying a barrage of fire for the exposed Green Berets.

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