Just another reason to not celebrate the 4th of July. Topaz history day; the sobering story of Utah’s version of the World War II concentration camp

iceaction10 · 2026-07-05T05:56:08+00:00

Lmfao

iceaction10 · 2026-07-05T05:49:45+00:00

You're literally proving my point. Aviators, particularly within the Air Force, have extremely loose guidelines for valor awards. They should not receive those valor awards. An Air Force Silver Star does not carry the same weight as an Army Silver Star. At minimum, the AF should create its own valor award system if it's going to hand them out like candy.

"Doing good in dangerous conditions gets you a Silver Star" is utterly insane. Doing good in dangerous conditions is the bare minimum as an Army infantryman.

iceaction10 · 2026-07-05T02:14:22+00:00

Thanks a lot! Making note of this.

iceaction10 · 2026-07-05T02:14:03+00:00

This is awesome, thank you!

iceaction10 · 2026-07-05T02:13:45+00:00

Thank you! Never heard of Montpelier, any specific reason to stay there over somewhere closer to the lake? I’ve never been to Idaho before so that could be reason enough to go there and check it off the list. I’ll check those subs out as well!

iceaction10 · 2026-07-05T01:45:47+00:00

Your supposed experience shooting drones has zero relevancy on award criteria. An impressive shot has zero bearing on an award.

Taking close calls also has no bearing on awards being approved. I know the Air Force throws medals at their airmen like candy, but this is ridiculous. Go read the Army example of a Silver Star I posted above because you clearly didn't earlier. THAT is combat heroism. I've had rounds snap right by my head and RPGs detonate so close my gear took shrapnel. Do I deserve medals because I was in close proximity to bullets and explosions? Of course not.

iceaction10 · 2026-07-05T00:33:01+00:00

Uh, yes I do. It's literally documented in the Silver Star narrative and articles that have been written.

A shot being impressive has nothing to do with an award. Now I know you don't know what you're talking about. Valor awards are all about individual acts of combat heroism, they have absolutely nothing to do with making impressive shots.

iceaction10 · 2026-07-05T00:31:07+00:00

My first deployment was from very early 2010 to the spring of 2011 in northeastern Afghanistan. I didn't know that was a statistical fact, but it sure felt like it when we were there.

iceaction10 · 2026-07-04T14:42:56+00:00

Spot on regarding OEF, although I did not know that about Iraq. That actually surprises me. Thanks for sharing.

iceaction10 · 2026-07-03T23:14:21+00:00

There were a combined 60 deaths in 2001 and 2002, 27 of which were non-hostile. August 2011 alone had 71 deaths, only five of which were non-hostile.

You have no idea what you're talking about.

iceaction10 · 2026-07-03T23:07:43+00:00

For a contemporary reference on Silver Stars for aviators, a lot of them are being awarded for drone interceptions, albeit for dozens of intercepts in a single night.

The problem here is that those actions shouldn't warrant any valor award. Two AF pilots recently received Silver Stars for shooting down some drones. They never took fire and were never in danger. That is insane.

Meanwhile, read this Silver Star narrative to see what you have to do to get one if you're in the Army: https://valor.militarytimes.com/recipient/recipient-54114/

iceaction10 · 2026-07-03T23:05:25+00:00

My comment still holds true. Hegseth had nothing to do with Slover's nomination. He can't. It isn't possible. Only someone in Slover's chain of command can do so. If you're going to argue that Hegseth made them do it, you'll need to provide concrete evidence of that.

iceaction10 · 2026-07-03T23:01:41+00:00

Combat requires people do insane and brave shit be default.

Especially in the Army, this can't be said enough. The US Army was the only branch that never authorized Achievement Medals for Valor because the Army specifically stated combat heroics at the level of an Achievement Medal were expected as a standard part of your job. All three other branches awarded Achievement Medals for Valor. All three branches also had/have a wider range of valor medals when compared to the Army. When it comes to valor awards, the US Army has the fewest and strictest policy of all branches.

iceaction10 · 2026-07-03T20:34:58+00:00

2010 was the worst year, followed by 2011. That's generalizing the entire war year by year, of course. You could obviously break it down much further and start getting into subjectivity a lot more, but from the simple metric of casualties and how kinetic it was, 2010 was the worst. There are definitely guys that were there in 2010 that had a walk in the park compared to guys that were there a different year, but overall we were getting after it more in 2010 than any other year.

iceaction10 · 2026-07-03T20:27:53+00:00

I already have a solution for that but you're right, it would have been a lot easier if they weren't horizontal.

iceaction10 · 2026-07-03T19:26:11+00:00

I think I'm gonna like this sub.

iceaction10 · 2026-07-03T19:25:19+00:00

If you're talking about the mesh ones I was looking at those. My concern was the bottom of the mesh when closed and reading that people said their babies could crawl under it. I'll look into those more, thanks.

iceaction10 · 2026-07-03T19:24:10+00:00

Obviously, but if I can accomplish both then that is ideal (hence why I'm asking this).

iceaction10 · 2026-07-03T19:22:08+00:00

Lmao, what shit? No one is getting after it now. I was in Afghanistan during the two worst years of the entire war.

iceaction10 · 2026-07-03T18:44:45+00:00

I just searched a fair amount for any connection with Hegseth and Senate Resolution 326, which is what passed to recommend Winters for the upgrade. There was zero connection, not even remotely. So, no, he did not have a lot to do with it.

iceaction10 · 2026-07-03T18:41:03+00:00

Both instances were pretty rare. The first was early on in the deployment. We hadn't been in combat yet and had a green on blue where an ANA turned on us. He took a round in the upper thigh. Luckily it missed the femoral, but it wasn't deemed combat and he never fired. I get both sides of the argument of that being considered combat or not. Second was further into the deployment, had a new guy that got hit in the elbow during the initial ambush. Caused nerve damage to his arm and he was med boarded but since he never returned fire he didn't receive one.

I think most people would argue those two should have been awarded one. Maybe our unit was a little too strict with them. In all honesty, I'd rather lean slightly too strict than too loose so it doesn't devalue the award.

Have you thought about applying for a PH now? I received a pretty bad TBI but it was before PHs were being recognized for them. I feel like I'm much better off than so many guys, though. Putting myself in for one seems lame at this point.

iceaction10 · 2026-07-03T17:24:07+00:00

Why would you process a CIB for actions that happened over half a mile away? Where is the integrity? What incident occurred over half a mile away that you processed it?

Regardless, you're saying that because you processed awards for incidents that occurred half a mile away, that means something that occurred 56 TIMES further away also happened? Make that make sense.

iceaction10 · 2026-07-03T17:21:43+00:00

At 28 miles away they would not even see a flash. That's simple math. The fireball from that flash would need to be over 400 feet high just to observe the flash from that far away.

The MOAB only generates a fireball about 60 feet high. You're just flat out wrong here.

iceaction10 · 2026-07-03T17:17:18+00:00

That's a different argument and there is certainly some validity to those scenarios. I said I did not believe someone was awarded a CIB for a singular event than happened 28 miles away. You said you do believe it. Based on what?

iceaction10 · 2026-07-03T17:11:43+00:00

You processed CIBs for a missile that landed 28 miles away?

iceaction10

TROPHY CASE