VFW mobilizes to oppose rank of drone medal - Navy News | News from Afghanistan & Iraq - Navy Times

VFW mobilizes to oppose rank of drone medal

The 1.9 million-member Veterans of Foreign Wars is being mobilized by the group’s commander-in-chief to overturn a Pentagon decision to rank a new medal for drone operations higher in precedence than the Purple Heart.

In a message to all post, district and department managers, Vietnam veteran and former Marine John Hamilton says he wants every member of the nation’s largest organization for combat veterans to support House and Senate bills that would make certain the new Distinguished Warfare Medal ranks below the Purple Heart.

Defense Department officials, so far unswayed by complaints, want the new medal for cyber warriors and drone operators ranked ninth in order of precedence, ahead of the Bronze Star and Purple Heart.

“I cannot tell you how displeased I am with the new defense secretary for not overriding what has proven to be an extremely divisive decision by his predecessor, but the buck has not stopped yet,” Hamilton says in the letter.

There are 42 cosponsors of HR 833 and 11 cosponsors of S 470, similar bills ordering the Defense Department to reduce the ranking of the new medal.

“We have many friends in Congress who agree 100 percent with our position,” Hamilton said, “but the VFW needs you to get the other members of Congress off their duffs.

“This is a policy disagreement over the placement of the new medal, not whether drone operators, cyber warriors and others don’t deserve to be properly recognized for the tremendous impact they are bringing to the battlefield in real-time,” Hamilton said. “The VFW just adamantly believes that medals that can only be earned in combat must rank higher than new medals awarded in the rear.”