Since the first military burial on May 13, 1864, Arlington National Cemetery has become the final resting place for more than 400,000 soldiers, sailors, airmen, Marines and their families. Those who on Sept. 11, 2001, died only a few hundred yards away at the Pentagon are buried here, as are the Challenger astronauts. Fifteen thousand soldiers from the Civil War — Union and Confederate — rest in Section 27 and Section 13, known as the Field of the Dead. Four thousand freed slaves, many identified only as “Citizen,” and two presidents also are buried at Arlington. Section 60 is the…
Browsing: Medal of Honor
[HTML1] We’ve uncovered a 2011 interview with Medal of Honor recipient Capt. John J. McGinty, III who recently passed away at age 73 in Beaufort, S.C. In the video by the publishers of ‘Medal of Honor: Portraits of Valor Beyond the Call of Duty’ McGinty recounts the harrowing 1966 battle for which he earned the medal. On July 15 of that year, his company was in Quang Tri Province, Vietnam, when they were assaulted by wave after wave of a North Vietnamese Army battalion. He and his men narrowly survived the hours-long fight after calling in danger-close air support and…
Army Staff Sgt. Ty Carter received the Medal of Honor this afternoon, a fitting tribute to a man who repeatedly braved enemy fire in Afghanistan while defending Combat Outpost Keating from a fierce Taliban attack in 2009. Before serving in the Army, however, Carter served as a Marine — and overcame a significant family tragedy. According to Carter’s hometown newspaper in Spokane, Wash., the newest Medal of Honor recipient’s brother was killed by a drunken friend playing with a shotgun at a party in 2000. Carter was a 20-year-old Marine serving in Okinawa, Japan, at the time: The brothers grew…
Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel for the first time detailed the hard choices his department will face if impacted by decade-long budget cuts — and it could include a historically low end strength for the Corps of just 150,000 Marines. This week’s issue of Marine Corps Times examines the true effects the the across-the-board spending cuts — set to continue unless Congress stops them — will have on the Defense Department. Smaller pay raises for troops, major cuts to personnel and reductions in housing allowances are all areas at risk, Hagel said. For Marines, the most jarring news out of Hagel’s…
The tape test is the only DOD-approved method of measuring body fat for members of the military. But some say it is inexact (which the Marine Corps acknowledges) and that it is unfair to large Marines who have an excellent appearance but run the risk of ending up in the body composition program for exceeding height and weight standards for their age groups. This week’s cover discusses this issue through the case of Sgt. Joshua Legier, 28, who at 6-feet 3-inches tall and 246 pounds exceeds his weight limit for his height. He got even bigger when he was on…
California Republican Rep. Duncan Hunter continues to feverishly pursue the Medal of Honor for fallen Marine Sgt. Rafael Peralta, who scooped a grenade under his body to save other Marines in Fallujah, Iraq on Nov. 15, 2004, according to Marines who saw him do it. He was awarded the Navy Cross – even though the Marine Corps recommended him for the Medal of Honor – after the Defense Department convened its own panel which concluded the evidence for the nation’s highest award for combat valor was not sufficient. Peralta’s family rejected the Navy Cross. Hunter has doggedly pursued the higher…
It’s rare indeed that Marine Corps Times will publish back-to-back cover stories on the same subject. Lance Cpl. William Kyle Carpenter’s story is exceptional, though. As I reported last week, the Marine Corps is investigating what happened in the moments before he and Lance Cpl. Nick Eufrazio were hit with grenade explosion in a guard post near Marjah, Afghanistan, on Nov. 21, 2010. Carpenter took the brunt of the blast, and the service is researching whether he deliberately attempted to protect Eufrazio. The story prompted a strong response from our readers — and for several of Carpenter’s fellow Marines present…
UPDATE: An updated version of this story has now been posted online here. You may recognize this face. That’s Lance Cpl. Kyle Carpenter, who was severely wounded in Afghanistan in 2010 when insurgents chucked a hand grenade onto the roof where he and another Marine, Lance Cpl. Nick Eufrazio, were posting security. In the months since the attack, as Carpenter has undergone numerous surgeries to address his injuries, he has become an ambassador, of sorts, for the Marine Corps and its wounded warriors, inspiring family, friends and fellow Marines with his undying optimism in the face of a difficult recovery.…
UPDATED: A White House spokesman tells Marine Corps Times that the beer shared by Obama and Meyer was home-brewed there. It’s called White House Honey Blonde Ale. That’s pretty sweet. By now, you’ve seen the photo above. It’s President Obama having a beer yesterday with Dakota Meyer, who will become today the first living Marine in 38 years to receive the Medal of Honor. The idea was reportedly Dakota’s. When the president’s staff called Meyer over the weekend in advance of today’s ceremony, the Marine asked if he could have a beer with Obama, White House press secretary Jay Carney…
President Obama will award the Medal of Honor tomorrow afternoon to Dakota Meyer, the first living Marine in 38 years to receive the nation’s top valor award. For many, the ceremony is heavily anticipated. There are many people still recovering from the scars created in Ganjgal, Afghanistan, on Sept. 8, 2009, when the heroism of Meyer and others prevented an awful situation from becoming even worse. As it was, the battle led to the death of five U.S. service members and at least eight Afghan troops. Meyer already is in Washington, and appeared Tuesday night at the Marine Corps Scholarship…
