Monday, October 14, 2013

New Versions Question Dakota Meyer's Account of Battle at Afghanistan’s Ganjgal Valley in September 2009

I was reading this story Saturday night on my iPhone before bedtime, at WaPo, "For Medal of Honor recipient Capt. William Swenson, a rocky path to the White House."

It turns out that retired U.S. Army Capt. William Swenson will be honored this week with the Medal of Honor at a White House ceremony, although it took tremendous pressure to bring about the recognition. According to the report:
After returning from the battlefield, Swenson engaged in a lengthy and bitter dispute with the military over the narrative of one of the Afghan war’s most notorious firefights.

The questions he raised resulted in reprimands for two other officers and what he and others say was an effort by the Army to discredit him. His account also cast doubt on the exploits of another Medal of Honor recipient from the same battle, Dakota Meyer of the Marine Corps.

United in war, the two men have taken far different paths since. Meyer has found celebrity and success, with a book and a personal assistant, boosted by a story that Swenson considers an inflated and misleading account of that harrowing day.

Swenson — the first Army officer since the Vietnam War to be awarded the medal — has been unemployed since leaving the service in 2011. He is single and lives in Seattle, growing a thick beard and long hair, in contrast to the clean-cut look of his military days, and escaping often to the mountains to find solitude in “my forced early retirement.”

“Are you familiar with Pyrrhic victories?” Swenson said in a recent interview. “That’s what I specialize in.”
The details of the battle at the link, but here's more:
Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.) has never spoken with Swenson, but he was incensed when he learned about his case last year.

A former Marine who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, Hunter was frustrated by what he called the “armchair bureaucracy sitting back at the Pentagon changing what the guys on the ground are saying happened.”

The congressman took up Swenson’s cause, writing letters to high-ranking military officials. “It’s taken four years for Swenson to get the medal,” Hunter said in an interview. “Don’t tell me you can’t do it in six months.”

After an internal investigation, Army officials concluded that Swenson’s digital nomination packet had been lost in the computer system for 19 months. Landay also reported that the Army’s investigation had uncovered evidence that military officials may have improperly attempted to downgrade the original nomination to a Distinguished Service Cross.

An Army spokeswoman said this past week that Swenson’s award had not been downgraded and that Medal of Honor award procedures were not violated. Swenson was renominated in 2011 after Marine Gen. John R. Allen, then the commander in Afghanistan, took interest.

“The Army is reviewing ways to ensure this type of injustice does not happen again,” said spokeswoman Tatjana Christian, adding that it typically takes one to three years to process a Medal of Honor nomination before it reaches the White House. She also noted that a medal was awarded this spring to Army Chaplain Emil J. Kapaun, a Korean War prisoner of war who died in captivity in 1951.

During the delay, Westbrook’s widow, Charlene Westbrook, who lives in Colorado, shared her frustrations in telephone conversations with Swenson. “It was almost like a blacklist,” she said in an interview. “He said something, criticized the upper ranks, and he’s being punished for it.”

Swenson retreated further into private life while Meyer became a prominent public figure. Last fall, Meyer published an autobiography titled “Into the Fire,” co-written by military author Bing West. Meyer said in the book that he killed a Taliban fighter by bashing him on the head with a rock — a detail he had not told investigators after the battle.

In the book, Meyer and West praise Swenson and criticize the Army for its handling of his case. But Swenson remains skeptical of Meyer and the publicity he has sought. Swenson has not spoken publicly about the Ganjgal battle.
RTWT.

I'm not one to question anyone's service, and since I wasn't there it's difficult to be sure exactly what happened. Still, as I finished the article I closed the app on went back on Twitter, and up pops this tweet from Laura Ingraham in my timeline:


I thought to myself, "Damn, that guy Dakota's indeed a huge self-promoter, hmmm." And then tweeted this out:



Never did hear back from any of 'em on Twitter. So, wtf?

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