Courageous Restraint "Hold fire, earn a medal"

[Ken White]

And one from Rush Limbaugh

Why, Greyhawk, I'm surprised you listen to him. Never heard the guy speak, m'self.

But then I tend to ignore all the taking heads as they rarely contribute much.

That last one included here as only as explanation why this is suddenly getting attention a week after the first stories appeared.

Perhaps you're correct but I'm more inclined to blame sloppy main stream media reporting and editing added to civilian lack of knowledge. As Bob's World said, out of context...

So... Company Commander A in village A engages local leaders, establishes rapport, gets through a tour pretty much unscratched. In fact, never fires a shot. Over in village B Company Commander B experiences constant kinetic activity, high casualty rates...

End of tour. You're the Btn Commander. Who went "above and beyond?" How do you recognize them for it?

Not nearly enough info. Did the rapport actually accomplish anything or did it just exist? How kinetic was it, who initiated most of the contacts and how well did he do in the fights he had?

The real questions that Bn Cdr must answer have little to do with those two variables which are really sort of meaningless, rather they have to do with how well each did his job in totality for the deployment given the situations (plural) with which he had to deal. Their Cdr has all sorts of methods of rewarding -- or punishing, if warranted -- performance ranging from OERs (unimportant to some, vital to others) to hero badges (same discrimination criteria apply) to a slap on the back (always appreciated unless the Cdr is an @$*hole). Hopefully he knows his people, knows where their buttons are, knows what's important and does not have too much "help" from above...

And, most importantly; is fair.

Or we could use the simple or Ranger solution -- Bronze Stars for both and a "V" for the more kinetic locale.

Added: Apologies to Schmedlap, somehow I missed his intervening post. I coulda just said "What he said."