New medal, Inherent Resolve published today

[ocsfollowme]

http://www.militarytimes.com/story/military/pentagon/2016/03/30/operation-inherent-resolve-campaign-medal-announced/82426460/

 

This is the first image of it that I have seen.

 

 

[Kadet]

Yes this was announced today. I sense another major combat operation coming.....

[ocsfollowme]

http://www.defense.gov/News-Article-View/Article/708382/carter-announces-operation-inherent-resolve-campaign-medal

 

WASHINGTON, March 30, 2016 — Service members who serve or have served in Iraq or Syria as part of Operation Inherent Resolve will receive the Inherent Resolve Campaign Medal, Defense Secretary Ash Carter announced in Tampa, Florida, today.

Carter announced the new award during the U.S. Central Command change-of-command ceremony. Army Gen. Lloyd J. Austin III transferred the command’s flag to Army Gen. Joe Votel.

Defense Secretary Ash Carter announced the creation of the Inherent Resolve Campaign Medal, March 30, 2016. DoD Illustration

“It is fitting then, that as we mark the change of command between these two leaders, that we introduce the Inherent Resolve Campaign Medal,” Carter said. “I am pleased to announce today, by the president’s order and upon the chairman’s and my recommendation, that our sailors, soldiers, airmen, and Marines serving in Iraq and Syria as part of Operation Inherent Resolve are now eligible for this medal and distinction.”

Award Retroactive

The award is retroactive to June 15, 2014, and is for service members based in Iraq or Syria, those who flew missions over those countries, and those who served in contiguous waters for 30 consecutive days or 60 nonconsecutive days, officials said.

The award distinctly recognizes service members battling terrorist groups in Iraq and Syria. Service members who were killed or were medically evacuated from those countries due to wounds or injuries immediately qualify for the award, as do members who engaged in combat.

Previously, the Global War on Terrorism Expeditionary Medal recognized service in Iraq and Syria, and service members in neighboring countries such as Turkey will continue to receive that award.

The president establishes campaign medals for large-scale and long-duration combat actions or operations. Inherent Resolve meets the criteria, officials said. The entire operational area has been subject to lethal combat operations. U.S. forces are executing an extensive air campaign in the region. A U.S. division-plus force is providing command and control, intelligence, and other advisory services.

The award is separate from the Iraq Campaign Medal awarded for service during operations Iraqi Freedom and New Dawn, officials said.

[12A54]

Really wish they would just go to a single medal with clasps for all of these. Unclutter. I got three medals/ribbons for one deployment!

 

Armed Forces Expeditionary Medal (or similar) with clasps for Panama, Somalia, Bosnia, Kosovo, Iraq, Afghanistan, etc. would be better in my opinion. Get rid of all the others.

 

Oh well.

[Wharfmaster]

Really wish they would just go to a single medal with clasps for all of these. Unclutter. I got three medals/ribbons for one deployment!

 

Armed Forces Expeditionary Medal (or similar) with clasps for Panama, Somalia, Bosnia, Kosovo, Iraq, Afghanistan, etc. would be better in my opinion. Get rid of all the others.

 

Oh well.

Yes please. Save the taxpayers a few bucks.

 

Wharf

[bobgee]

Totally agree. Armed Forces Expeditionary Medal with Clasps/Stars. Bobgee

[12A54]

Article about this new medal from The Atlantic:

http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2016/03/isis-military-medal-crusades/476214/

The New Anti-ISIS Medal: A Bit Too Crusadery?

During the Crusades of the Middle Ages, a typical Frankish knight wore “a coat of chain mail or scale armour, [a] shield and a helmet,” Piers Mitchell tells us in hisbook on warfare and medicine during the period. The chain mail, a mesh formed with interlinked metal rings, offered protection, but only to a point: It “could still be penetrated by lance, cross-bow bolt and arrow and even cut with a heavy blow from a good sword.” It proved feebler against the mace and, I imagine, was of little use against the siege weapons of the day, which could “propel rocks, Greek fire, boiling oil and water and, on occasion, amputated body parts.”

Chain mail, of course, has gone the way of the mace and Greek fire, which is why it’s surprising to see the armor make a comeback in a medal that the U.S. Defense Department unveiled on Wednesday to recognize soldiers for their service in Iraq or Syria as part of Operation Inherent Resolve, the U.S.-led military operation against the Islamic State. The medal features a mail-cloaked hand clutching a sword—a curious image for a campaign that largely consists of air strikes and support for local ground forces.

More importantly, it’s surprising because ISIS, in its propaganda, often depicts the Western participants in that campaign as modern-day Christian Crusaders invading the Middle East once again. In claiming responsibility for the recent bombings in Brussels, for example, ISIS asserted that it was targeting “Crusader Belgium, which did not stop targeting Islam and its people.”

“The display of such martial imagery is somewhat ironic, as the Pentagon has often gone out of its way to play down U.S. involvement in combat operations” against ISIS in Iraq and Syria, Thomas Gibbons-Neff wrote in The Washington Post on Wednesday. The imagery might also “be construed to imply religious zealotry—insignia and call signs that invoke armor-clad crusaders have embroiled the U.S. military in controversy before. Last year, two Army units were criticized for using crusader names, shields and imagery in their unit logos.”

In a description of the new medal posted to the Institute of Heraldry’s website, the military points to “an erect dagger enfiled by a scorpion held by a mailed hand,” which, if nothing else, is colorful.

When I asked the Defense Department whether the mailed hand was an intentional allusion to the Crusades, I was referred to a more detailed description of the medal from the Institute of Heraldry, which characterized the hand as “armored” rather than “mailed,” and consistent with past U.S. military iconography. Here’s part of that description:

The armored hand clutching the dagger represents strength and courage in the defense of liberty and freedom. This armored hand is widely used in military heraldry for this purpose. One of the more notable military symbols incorporating the armored hand is [that of] the [united States Air Force] Strategic Air Command.

(A previous “global war on terrorism” medal featured an eagle—that most American of symbols—crushing a serpent in its claws, flanked by crisscrossed swords, which in spirit isn’t so far off from the new award.)

And what of the impaled scorpion? On its site, the Institute of Heraldry notes that “the scorpion, symbolic for treachery and destruction, is found on most major land masses.” You could reasonably read this as a message that the United States is determined to stop the Islamic State’s far-flung predations.

Or you could get a little carried away and interpret the choice of the ubiquitous scorpion as a subtle rebuke to the notion that ISIS, and Islamist militants more broadly, have a monopoly on violent ideological extremism in the world. Which, come to think of it, recalls something President Obama once said with regard to ISIS: “Lest we get on our high horse and think [people invoking religion to commit violence] is unique to some other place, remember that during the Crusades and the Inquisition, people committed terrible deeds in the name of Christ.”

[Wharfmaster]

The eagle on the reverse also looks a lot like the WAAC badge.

 

 

Wharf

[Salvage Sailor]

Looks more like the NDSM Eagle at a different angle to me

[CHASEUSA11B]

I'm not a fan of the medal's appearance but that article from the Atlantic is a bit of a stretch. I'm pretty sure that's plate armor and not chain mail, and not exactly exclusive to the crusades

[CHASEUSA11B]

 

Looks a lot like the WAC badge to me too. Perhaps it's the spawn of the NDSM eagle and WAC eagle

[Kaigun Shosa]

Really wish they would just go to a single medal with clasps for all of these. Unclutter. I got three medals/ribbons for one deployment!

 

Armed Forces Expeditionary Medal (or similar) with clasps for Panama, Somalia, Bosnia, Kosovo, Iraq, Afghanistan, etc. would be better in my opinion. Get rid of all the others.

 

Oh well.

 

I also agree. It's getting ridiculous! There are too many "mickey mouse" awards out there. The office of Heraldry should reinstate campaign bars for a basic expeditionary medal. Stars can represent the campaign bars on the campaign ribbon. There needs to be a reevaluation of the awards system.

Too many made up medals and ribbons you end up looking like these dudes!

[atb]

 

I also agree. It's getting ridiculous! There are too many "mickey mouse" awards out there. The office of Heraldry should reinstate campaign bars for a basic expeditionary medal. Stars can represent the campaign bars on the campaign ribbon. There needs to be a reevaluation of the awards system.

Too many made up medals and ribbons you end up looking like these dudes!

That is not up to "the office of Heraldry." Military and civilian personalities and politics intrudes in all phases of modern awards and decorations development and adoption.

[Bob Hudson]

"Inherent Resolve" - could there be a worse name?

 

It sounds like a stop-smoking program.

[Wharfmaster]

"Inherent Resolve" - could there be a worse name?

 

It sounds like a stop-smoking program.

Good one Bob !

 

 

W

[USAFnav]

Wow, too much. What's the status of the Global War on Terrorism Service Medal (as opposed to the still-issued GWOT Expeditionary Medal)? What about the National Defense Service Medal? The NDSM should have been stopped when the GWOTSM started, or maybe I'm just confusing criteria....

AFEM with clasps/stars, and be done with it.

Pete

[turko]

What's the status of the Global War on Terrorism Service Medal...? What about the National Defense Service Medal? The NDSM should have been stopped when the GWOTSM started, or maybe I'm just confusing criteria....

 

They are still awarded concurrently, for eligible units. For the NDSM, you just have to be in the military, period. For the GWOT Service Medal, you have to be in a unit that is directly supporting a mission or deployment for the GWOT. For a while, everyone in the military got both regardless of what their unit was doing. I think they started cracking down on that a number of years ago, though.

 

I agree with you, it should be one or the other. While we're at it, let's get rid of the Army Service Ribbon and NCO school ribbon. And the Overseas Service Ribbon is way over-awarded, too.

[USAFnav]

Thanks for the GWOT Service Medal update. And let's also get rid of the Air Force Training Ribbon. Please.

Pete

[Brig]

Even Operational Names are getting too politically correct.

 

I agree, too many useless awards out there for the same thing...and I'm in the branch known for being stingy with awards! The GWOT and NDSM seem rather unnecessary, and fall into the everyone gets a medal mentality.

 

I like the mentality 100 years ago...30 year career and 5 ribbons made you a salty war dog. I had 5 by my 3 year mark...and still the only ones that mean anything to me are my campaign medals

[USAFnav]

Brig, That's interesting; my Desert Storm service, and the resultant campaign / service medals, means the most to me. Although I think I earned my Air Medal via some "interesting" combat support flying, and the Air Force Outstanding Unit Award with combat "V", I still like the fact that the campaign medals show active service equally among all types of soldiers, sailors, airmen, Marines, of all ranks and duties. But the MSM, Commendation, Combat Readiness, Training, etc. stuff is just not as meaningful to me. I do not mean to denigrate those medals in the eyes of others who have earned them, I'm merely giving my opinion of the medals I earned. Personally, I don't mind the NDSM since it does show military service during wartime, but be careful on the dates of authorization and don't combine it with another medal for basically the same thing (serving during wartime).

Thanks for your thoughts.

Pete

[joeclown]

Just a couple more medals and our troops will start looking like Russia Generals of WW2

[sigma9r]

I think clasps would be a great idea and, as mentioned above, a money saver. Still, with all of this great discussion, somebody needs to write something up for posterity in the Post.

Just an opinion

[firefighter]

 

I also agree. It's getting ridiculous! There are too many "mickey mouse" awards out there. The office of Heraldry should reinstate campaign bars for a basic expeditionary medal. Stars can represent the campaign bars on the campaign ribbon. There needs to be a reevaluation of the awards system.

Too many made up medals and ribbons you end up looking like these dudes!

 

I agree 100% with everyone about too many awards, But the AF SGT above is probably a CCT or paraRecueman and his top 7 ROWs are his valor or individual awards.8 or 9 of his ribbons are just campaign medals, not saying he doesn't deserve them.But do they/we really need that many?

[sigma9r]

Just a quick word about the NDSM vs the GWOTSM. I'm a NG/reserve retiree. We have stood ready for deployment for the GWOT since the beginning of it all. However, only active duty folks are eligible for the GWOTSM/EM. All service members are eligible for the NDSM. If your number doesn't come up for deployment and you get the GWOTSM then, in my humble opinion, the point about getting rid of the NDSM in favor of the GWOTSM is moot.

 

That's just my nit-picking opinion.

 

Pax, y'all

[Dave]

I'll jump in...I think the ribbon is pretty hideous looking. Who in the world chose those colors?