Maybe you'd like to hear about something other than idiot
Reservists and naked Iraqis.
Maybe you'd like to hear about a real American, somebody who
honored the uniform he wears.
Meet Brian Chontosh.
Churchville-Chili Central School class of 1991. Proud graduate
of the Rochester Institute of Technology. Husband and
about-to-be father. First lieutenant in the United States Marine Corps.
And a genuine hero.
The secretary of the Navy said so yesterday.
At 29 Palms in California Brian Chontosh was presented with the
Navy Cross, the second highest award for combat bravery the
United States can bestow.
That's a big deal.
But you won't see it on the network news tonight, and all you
read in Brian's hometown newspaper was two paragraphs of
nothing. Instead, it was more blather about some mental defective
MPs who acted like animals.
The odd fact about the American media in this war is that it's
not covering the American military. The most plugged-in nation
in the world is receiving
virtually no true information about what its warriors are doing.
Oh, sure, there's a body count. We know how many Americans have
fallen. And we see those same casket pictures day in and day
out. And we're almost on a first-name basis with the pukes who
abused the Iraqi prisoners. And we know all about improvised
explosive devices and how we lost Fallujah and what
Arab public-opinion polls say about us and how the world hates
us.
We get a non-stop feed of gloom and doom.
But we don't hear about the heroes.
The incredibly brave GIs who honorably do their duty. The ones
our grandparents would have carried on their shoulders down
Fifth Avenue.
The ones we completely ignore.
Like Brian Chontosh.
It was a year ago on the march into Baghdad. Brian Chontosh was
a platoon leader rolling up Highway 1 in a humvee.
When all hell broke loose. Ambush city.
The young Marines were being cut to ribbons. Mortars, machine
guns, rocket propelled grenades. And the kid out of Churchville
was in charge. It was do or die and it was up to him.
So he moved to the side of his column, looking for a way to lead
his men to safety. As he tried to poke a hole through the Iraqi
line his humvee came under direct enemy machine gun fire.
It was fish in a barrel and the Marines were the fish.
And Brian Chontosh gave the order to attack. He told his driver
to floor the humvee directly at the machine gun emplacement that
was firing at them. And he had the guy on top with the .50 cal
unload on them.
Within moments there were Iraqis slumped across the machine gun
and Chontosh was still advancing, ordering his driver now to
take the humvee directly into the Iraqi trench that was attacking
his Marines. Over into the battlement the humvee went and out
the door Brian Chontosh bailed, carrying
an M16 and a Beretta and 228 years of Marine Corps pride.
And he ran down the trench. With its mortars and riflemen,
machineguns and grenadiers.
And he killed them all.
He fought with the M16 until it was out of ammo. Then he fought
with the Beretta until it was out of ammo. Then he picked up a
dead man's AK47 and fought with that until it was out of ammo.
Then he picked up another dead man's AK47 and fought with that
until it was out of ammo.
At one point he even fired a discarded Iraqi RPG into an enemy
cluster, sending attackers flying with its grenade explosion.
When he was done Brian Chontosh had cleared 200 yards of
entrenched Iraqis from his platoon's flank. He had killed more
than 20 and wounded at least as many more.
But that's probably not how he would tell it.
He would probably merely say that his Marines were in trouble,
and he got them out of trouble. Hoo-ah, and drive on.
"By his outstanding display of decisive leadership, unlimited
courage in the face of heavy enemy fire, and utmost devotion to
duty, 1st Lt. Chontosh
reflected great credit upon himself and upheld the highest
traditions of the Marine Corps and the United States Naval
Service."
That's what the citation says.
And that's what nobody will hear.
That's what doesn't seem to be making the evening news.
Accounts of American valor are dismissed by the press as
propaganda, yet accounts of
American difficulties are heralded as objectivity. It makes you
wonder if the role of the media is to inform, or to depress, ?
To report or to deride. To tell the truth, or to feed us lies.
But I guess it doesn't matter.
We're going to turn out all right.
As long as men like Brian Chontosh wear our uniform."
- Major General Cooke
Caption:
Marine Capt. Brian R. Chontosh received the Navy Cross
Medal from the Commandant of the United States Marine
Corps, Gen. Michael W. Hagee, during an awards ceremony
Thursday at Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Training Center,
Twentynine Palms, Calif.
__________________
"It is always better to be judged by 12 than carried by 6"
Unknown
"Peace sells....but who's buying"
Megadeath
Location: West, Central Florida, Third World America
Posts: 6,342
Sounds like a heck of an adventure, at the very least! Too bad we don't have more truly brave men. Those evil ones would have reason to fear, for sure!
__________________
"They cannot be trusted.....The Romulans (our politicos) are without honor." Worf
On a more positive note:Navy Cross awarded 
