Swenson and Meyer

After reading Dan Lamothe's article in the Marine Corps Times regarding the "rift" between Army Captain Will Swenson and Marine Sergeant Dakota Meyer, I have to admit I'm extremely disappointed.  When it comes to events for which Medal of Honor (MoH) citations are written, one would like to think that there wouldn't be any drama or controversy.  Unfortunately, it seems as though some difference has arisen in light of Swenson's MoH.

Captain Will Swenson and Sergeant Dakota Meyer (Photo from Marine Corps Times)

I don't want to make this about the Army versus the Marine Corps or anything trivial.  However, I would like express my disappointment in the manner by which Capt. Swenson has decided to go public with the disputation he has concerning Meyer's MoH.

One of the areas that has been called into questions concerning Meyer's citation is the accuracy of some of the details.  As an officer in the Army, one would assume that Swenson has personally written citations for various awards for soldiers under his charge.  With that experience, he probably had several of those awards declined.  During Operations Enduring and Iraqi Freedom, the military has awarded significantly fewer MoHs than in previous eras.  Due to an inflated perception surrounding what warrants a MoH bureaucratic obstacles now surround awarding such prestigious medals that may not have existed in the past.

In the case of Meyer, it is not surprising to discover that some details may have been exaggerated.  What is surprising is that someone would find fault in a MoH recipient for accepting the public attention that would come with accepting such an award.  The awards system is broken.  In many cases awards which individuals do not rate are awarded and in other cases awards are withheld from servicemen who do.

Rather than publicly bringing his opinions to light in a manner that is discrediting to Meyer, I would expect a captain to to use his position to address the real problem here: the awards system.  Meyer has not behaved in anyway that is dishonorable, nor is he taking advantage of his MoH to seek the status of a celebrity.  He is simply behaving the way anyone would expect a twenty-something year old to behave.  In fact, I believe he is handling the responsibility quite well.  One would expect an older Army officer to go about his post-service years much differently than a younger Marine enlisted-man.  Regardless of how one chooses to live their lives after combat, I don't think anyone could say they are wrong.  However, I'm very disappointed that because the two have decided to live their lives differently that one would choose to handle it in this manner.

If anyone is expected to take the high ground in a matter such as this, you'd expect it to be the more experienced and educated officer.  With that said, I'm very impressed with the manner Meyer has handled this.  Hopefully, this debacle doesn't progress much further in the direction it seems to be heading.  Both men are deserving of the award they've been granted and I hope nothing arises that will take away from that.

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W&P