July 17, 2024 • 30 mins
Every Medal of Honor action is, by definition, heroic. But the story of Alwyn Cashe is about a very specific element of heroism: Sacrifice. In 2005, Sergeant First Class Alwyn Cashe was stationed in Iraq with his platoon. He was known for how deeply he cared about his soldiers’ lives– and their safety. On a night in October, he proved how far he would go to protect them… risking his own life not once, but five incredible times.
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Speaker 1 (00:15):
Pushkin Hello, Hello. Before we get on with our show,
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(00:37):
for Pushkin Plus on Apple Podcasts or by visiting Pushkin,
dot Fm, slash Plus. Now onto the episode. A dust
storm rolled over the small city of Samara in central Iraq.
The sky turned hazy red, and then as the sun set,
(00:59):
a dark and moonless black. It was mid October two
thousand and five, thirty one months since the US had
invaded the country. American forces had captured Sata Mussein almost
two years earlier, and still the war dragged on.
Speaker 2 (01:15):
A campaign on the harsh terrain of a nation as
large as California could be longer and more difficult than
some predict, and helping Iraqis achieve a united, stable and
free country will require our sustained commitment.
Speaker 1 (01:32):
American soldiers were settled into dozens of forward operating bases
around a rock. Every day was a combination of monotony
and dread. On that black October night, a convoy of
two American Bradley fighting vehicles traveled through the dust storm
up an unlit road. A Bradley is an armored personnel
(01:52):
carrier that rolls forward on tracks, not wheels. It has
a troop compartment in the back and a gun turret
at the front. Bradley's were mostly used for scouting missions,
and this night was one of those routine The Army
troops stationed nearby had done the same trip dozens, if
not hundreds of times in the balance between monotony and dread.
(02:15):
This was monotony until it wasn't. Suddenly a deafening blast,
a fiery explosion illuminated the night. The first of the
two Bradleys had hit an ied, an improvised explosive device.
If you've been watching from a distance that night, here's
what you would have seen. An armored vehicle engulfed in fire,
(02:37):
a soldier climbing out of a hatch and pulling a
burning man to safety, then that soldier too, catching fire,
a column of flame against the dark night sky. Over
the roar of the explosion, you'd hear the screams of
soldiers trapped inside the vehicle and then you'd see that
first man turned back to the fire, him Malcolm Gladwell.
(03:01):
And this is Medal of Honor Stories of courage. The
Medal of Honor is the highest military decoration in the
United States, awarded for gallantry and bravery in combat with
the risk of life, above and beyond the call of duty.
Each candidate must be approved all the way up the
chain of command, from the supervisory officer in the field
(03:24):
to the White House. This show is about those heroes,
what they did, what it meant, and what their stories
tell us about the nature of courage. Each Medal of
Honor action is by definition heroic, but the story of
Sergeant first Class Allwin Cash is about a very specific
(03:44):
element of heroism. Sacrifice, not the sacrifice that comes with
being in the wrong place at the wrong time, or
is the second decision that later turns out to have
been courageous and fatal, a kind of sacrifice that's more intentional,
more deliberate. We talk a lot about the acts of
(04:06):
bravery for which people receive something a metal recognition, but
there's always that flip side when someone loses something too
the sacrifice. It can be surprisingly easy to gloss over
what our heroes are giving up or the pain they're
going through. But it's hard to miss in the story
(04:28):
of Alwen Cash. If you want to get a good
sense of who Alwen Cash was in Iraq, you need
to talk to the people who served with him. General
Gary Britto would be at the top of that list.
Speaker 3 (04:50):
We have some ordinary people that just do some extraordinary
things when unexpected, and Cash was one of those.
Speaker 1 (04:57):
Brideau was Alwin's battalion commander in two thousand and five.
Now he's a four star general in charge of training
and leadership development across the entire Army, active Duty, National Guard,
and reserves. He guides and shapes the culture of the Army.
If anyone can tell you what makes a good soldier,
it's Brito. He knew and liked Olwen, not just as
(05:20):
a sergeant, but as a person.
Speaker 3 (05:23):
Very unassuming, very professional, newest stuff. And I had yet,
and I'll use the word the gruffness that I respected
and expected on noncommissioned officers.
Speaker 1 (05:36):
A non commissioned officer is one who hasn't gone to
college or through officer training. Cash had enlisted in the
Army right out of high school. He had grown up
in a big family in a small town in Florida.
He kept his dark hair in a buzz cut fade
and wore a modest mustache. He was a country guy
at heart, like.
Speaker 3 (05:55):
The fish, like to hunt, and he would bend your
ear on that if you've given him an opportunity to
do so.
Speaker 1 (06:01):
Albyn worked his way up the ranks, a real soldier's soldier.
For a time, he was a drill sergeant at Fort Benning, Georgia,
training troops. He was all about the basics, making sure
everyone had the foundations down. Then he pushed his guys
beyond those foundations to excellence. He was known for his
(06:22):
brutally honest sense of humor. Nothing shook him. But the
thing every person who served with Alwin will tell you
he truly cared for the soldiers in his command.
Speaker 3 (06:32):
What I respected and I saw it shine and start
any cash was the ability to connect to his soldiers.
A platoon was about thirty five years people was ill,
but he knew them, knew them by their name, knew
them by their nickname, knew what was going on at home,
disconnected to his troops.
Speaker 1 (06:50):
When he deployed to Iraq for the second time, in
two thousand and five. The men who served with him
saw him the way that General Breto did, as someone
who connected, who cared.
Speaker 4 (07:01):
He was more like that big big brother.
Speaker 1 (07:03):
This is Gary Mills, who was in Alwen's platoon.
Speaker 4 (07:07):
You know he didn't tell me Who's something that he
wouldn't do. I think it was a type of leader
that you can argue with him, but one minute later
you're going to have a beer.
Speaker 1 (07:14):
Alvin was only thirty five, but he'd seen a lot
during his years in the service. He knew how hard
it was to live an army life and have a family.
He had a wife and three young kids back in
the States. Here's Douglas Dodge, who was the second squad
leader of his platoon.
Speaker 5 (07:30):
I was going through some marital problems and Sergeant Cash
actually called my wife for Iraq and talked to her
at length, and then came to my chew our little
sleeping area and told me, hey, Dodge, go call your wife.
And I was like, why, what are you talking about?
And he said, I just had a long conversation with
her about stuff that's going on with you two. I
(07:50):
know you're having problems, and it's I want you to
have your head clear while we're out here doing stuff.
At the time, I was kind of angry because I
was tired. I just wanted to sleep, But he had
taken his time when he could have been sleeping, but
he took his precious time to try to take care
of me.
Speaker 1 (08:09):
So that's Olwen invested in his soldiers as whole people,
willing to give up his personal time to help them.
Unsolicited marital advice. It's not maybe the first thing you
think of when you think of a hero, but it
has everything to do with what will come next.
Speaker 3 (08:35):
One thing that really stuck out to me that evening
was pitch pitch black outside. All the nights I was out,
that was probably the darkest one.
Speaker 1 (08:46):
Forward Operating Base Mackenzie was in the middle of the
desert north of Baghdad. You can picture it, hot, sandy,
relentlessly beige concrete bunkers. The more than four hundred men
who were stationed there lived in contained housing units trailers really.
While some of the other American bases in the region
had seen very little fighting, that wasn't the case here.
(09:09):
Had been high for a while. Jimmy Hathaway was a
company commander at FOB Mackenzie, as he remembers that things
had been dicey in the Area of Operations, or as
they referred to it, the AO for months.
Speaker 6 (09:23):
We'd just come off of racky elections that year. It
had been a pretty rough time. Starting in September.
Speaker 1 (09:28):
There had been skirmishes around the base with the American
troops engaging with small arms fire or IEDs a few
days out of the week. The roads weren't safe, so
the troops had to secure the roots for supplies coming in.
Speaker 6 (09:42):
We'd had a pretty big incident with a convoy that
had been ambushed, and we knew that anytime a resupply
convoy came into our AO that there was potential for
loss of life, there's potential for damage to the vehicles
if we didn't go out and secure it.
Speaker 1 (09:58):
The night of October seventeenth, two thousand and five, a
patrol of two Bradley fighting vehicles was going to do
just that, drive the main supply route to make sure
it was clear, then drive right back. Leon Matthias was
Alwens team leader at the base.
Speaker 7 (10:14):
I remember specifically the weather being really really bad, so
it was like a dust storm moving through the area
and there was redy hair, So basically metowacs weren't supposed
to fly during that time period. But I just remember
it was a night patrol and we have to go
out because of a logistical convoy was coming in the
following day.
Speaker 1 (10:35):
Alwyn was in the first vehicle of the patrol. He
wasn't supposed to be.
Speaker 7 (10:39):
So normally on the patrol, the Petunia would lead out,
so I would be the lead patrol and then Starting
Cash would be the last vehicle in the convoy. But
that night I had just recently come back off of leave,
and Starting Cash said, hey, sir, I know you're just
back off of leave.
Speaker 1 (10:52):
I'm gonna lead the patrol tonight. It was a classic
example of Cash going above and beyond for somebody else.
Speaker 7 (10:58):
So he drives, he drives around me, and I see
him drive out, so I get back on my track
and so I am now behind him driving down the
road and we're going really, really slow, just because of
the visibility.
Speaker 1 (11:09):
There were nine men in the lead bradley up front,
there was Alwy and a gunner in the turret, plus
a driver in the troop compartment. In the back, there
were six men, an Iraqi interpreter and five soldiers, including
Douglas and Gary Mills.
Speaker 4 (11:24):
We were just in the back, just having funl like usual,
just getting my mind into you know, what was going
to happen. Then and boom, it kind of happened quick.
Speaker 1 (11:35):
The Bradley had run over an Ied.
Speaker 5 (11:39):
We had been hit by enough IED's already that you
knew when you heard it what it was. And I
heard that slap. But then in the next instant, I
was knocked unconscious. I was thrown into the ceiling of
the Bradley, and I don't know how long I was unconscious.
Speaker 1 (11:51):
For Bradley's are armored vehicles. They're built to run over
things like IED's and stay in the road. But something
was different that night.
Speaker 4 (12:01):
But I woke up.
Speaker 5 (12:02):
Then we were all on fire.
Speaker 1 (12:06):
The fuel cell of the Bradley had ignited. Fire was
surging upwards from the bottom of the vehicle.
Speaker 7 (12:13):
I am watching this vehicle in flames, so it wasn't
as if it was a slow burn. It was literally
He saw the explosion and the vehicle itself was in flames.
Speaker 1 (12:22):
Alwen wasn't injured in the blast, but as the fuel
cell drained, he was drenched in gasoline. He knew what
that meant he also could go up in flames at
any time. Alwen got to the driver's hatch and opened it.
He pulled the driver to safety, but the driver was
on fire, so now Alwan was on fire as well.
(12:43):
He extinguished the flames and then turned to the back
of the bradley. There were six men trapped back there.
The compartment was in flames. It was an oven.
Speaker 5 (12:53):
The first thing I remember is the pain from being
on fire, and I could hear everybody screaming, and I
just climbed up onto the bench seat because the floor
was all fire and you couldn't see anything. All I
could see was an orange glow.
Speaker 1 (13:06):
Alwin didn't hesitate. He went straight to the back of
the vehicle. He'd already sustained second and third degree burns
inside the compartment. Douglas reached for a tool and pried
at the door, and I managed to.
Speaker 5 (13:19):
Get the troop door open, and I just kind of
spilled out of the bradley onto the back road, and
that's when I saw Sergeant Cash at the back of
the bradley.
Speaker 1 (13:29):
Alwyn's uniform had burned so badly that it had melted
onto his body.
Speaker 5 (13:34):
It was very surreal because he had his helmet on,
his body armor on, and his boots on, but he
didn't have anything else on because they had been burned
off with him. And the only thing he asked me
was where the boys at? And I just kind of
looked at him and looked at the bradley and he said, hey,
I get the boys out, and then he just instantly
(13:54):
started climbing.
Speaker 1 (13:55):
In into the fire with no protection. Leon frantically called
back to base. Then he and the men in this
second vehicle raced towards the burning Bradley.
Speaker 7 (14:06):
By started cash. He's kind of the one that's going
back from the Bradley, pulling people out one by one,
and he just goes back over and over again.
Speaker 1 (14:17):
Alwen wasn't going to stop until every one of his
boys was accounted for. He went in once and helped
soldiers escape the troop compartment, and then he noticed that
two others were missing, so he went back into the
inferno again to pull them out, but where was the interpreter?
Alwen went back into Bradley another time.
Speaker 7 (14:36):
The last person that got out was the interpreter, and
his body was so lifeless he just pretty much drug
him out of that track.
Speaker 1 (14:43):
Alwen had been critically injured back when he'd saved the
first man, the driver, But he made the decision to
go back into the burning troop compartment five separate times.
He knew exactly what kind of sacrifice he was making,
yet he did it willingly, methodically. By the time Gary
(15:04):
Mills reached Olwen, seventy two percent of Alwen's body was
covered in second in third degree burns.
Speaker 4 (15:11):
I seen sorry Cash laying on the ground now that
he was burnt and everything, and he was just trying
to make sure they hate, Hey, your guys all right,
And I'm like, are you okay? You know, I mean
you you're burnt. I mean, you're dude, worse than I am.
But he was just making sure that we was okay.
Speaker 1 (15:30):
The forward operating base was only two miles away, but
there was a dust stone. Remember, Everything seemed to be
moving more slowly than usual. Finally, the metovac helicopters arrived.
The interpreter had died at the scene, Several of the
soldiers barely hung onto life all when included. Nevertheless, he
(15:51):
was the last one to get on the metavac. He
wanted to see everyone else get taken care of first.
He waited until they all were safe, and even then
he wouldn't get on a stretcher.
Speaker 7 (16:03):
He was like, no, I'm walking to this helicopter because
if he wanted to walk off the battlefield, the.
Speaker 1 (16:11):
Meta of Acts lifted off to the highest level of
triage facility nearby. Douglas was with Olwen.
Speaker 5 (16:18):
And there they began triaging and treating everybody, starting Cash.
The whole time there I could hear him yelling, well,
how are these are my guys? You know what's going
on with them? Are they okay?
Speaker 1 (16:28):
Where are they at the most badly burned men were
flown to Germany and then to Texas for more specialized care.
Alwin was one of them, and Gary Mills was two.
As soon as he was able, he insisted on seeing Alwen.
Speaker 4 (16:43):
They told me, no, I'm not supposed to go and
visit you know anybody like no, I'm going to visit.
I visited Saryn Cash and it was funny because, like
I said, we were both messed up, and he still
had jokes and just making sure I'm good it hits
you because it was like, man, even in how bad
(17:06):
a moment, it doesn't matter about it, no matter about
everybody else.
Speaker 1 (17:11):
There was hope that all of the soldiers might make it,
until there wasn't.
Speaker 4 (17:16):
That's when we started losing people and it just got
hard and hard every day.
Speaker 1 (17:21):
Of the nine people in the Bradley, only three would survive.
General Gary Britto remembers waiting to get news from the
men in the hospital.
Speaker 3 (17:31):
Every single night. Did not want to get that phone
call that somebody passed, and we did, Hey, how's he
doing well? Staff Sergeant George Alexander this first one, second call,
Doc Robinson, third call, especially Darren holl just kept up
at night. We just didn't want to get it what
you did. So we were really really just hoping, thank
(17:51):
fingers crossed, will he survived, Just holding on for hope. Okay,
don't die, don't die, don't die.
Speaker 1 (17:57):
In the hospital, Albyn kept his sense of humor and
his sense of duty intact. Everyone who loved him knew
how strong he was. As the weeks passed, they kept
up hope, but he had the worst of the burns,
and on November eighth, two thousand and five, Albin Cash
died in the hospital in San Antonio. He was the
(18:20):
last man to have gotten on the METAVAC and the
last man to succumb to his injuries. He held out
for as long as he could.
Speaker 5 (18:28):
He would say, it's going to be hard coming home
without the guys you came here with. And who would
have known that he would have been one of those people.
Speaker 1 (18:40):
Almost immediately, Britto put in for Alwin to get the
Silver Star, one of the Army's top awards for bravery.
It's a couple notches below the Medal of Honor. Britto
was still in Iraq, trying to keep his troops together,
boost morale, just survived the deployment. Everyone was exhausted at
that moment. The Silver Star for Alwin felt like the
(19:00):
right idea.
Speaker 3 (19:02):
There was a sense of numbness, just combat fatigue, and
I didn't see it. Then I see it now.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
Let me take a second to explain what differentiates the
Silver Star from a Medal of Honor. A Silver Star
is the Army's third highest decoration, given for distinguished gallantry
in action. The next step up is a Distinguished Service Cross,
given for extraordinary heroism in combat, and then sitting at
the top of the heap is the Medal of Honor.
(19:31):
Each one carries a huge amount of prestige, but the
Medal of honor has a stringent set of criteria. The
action comes at the risk of life and limb and
above and beyond the call of duty. In other words,
not something that your commanding officer could order you to do.
Those requirements might sound general, but in reality they're punishingly specific.
(19:54):
There aren't a huge variety of things that perfectly tick
all of those boxes. The iconic medal of honor worthy
action is throwing yourself on a grenade. It's an act
of pure selflessness and courage, done at a moment when
the enemy is in full attack. In fact, one hundred
and forty seven of the men who have been awarded
(20:15):
the medal received it for putting themselves in the way
of a grenade, and we've only had grenade since World
War One. What Alwen did sounds very much like throwing
himself on a grenade, doesn't it an act of supreme
self sacrifice on behalf of others at a time of peril.
You can't walk into a fire thinking you're going to survive.
(20:38):
Alwin's skin was charred, his lungs were failing, and yet
he kept returning to the inferno, knowing what that meant.
When Bretto and Alwen's family and friends thought about how
best to honor Alwen. They began to think that maybe
he deserved something more than a silver star. Maybe he
deserved the highest of all military honors.
Speaker 3 (21:00):
It was all my mind, just wait on me, all
my mind. So I sort of think about it, think
about it, said, I got to do this, not for me,
not for the unit, but for Cash in his troops.
This is earned.
Speaker 1 (21:11):
But there was a catch, a crucial one. There was
a third essential requirement for Medal of Honor eligibility. The
act of bravery has to take place in the field
of combat. That's why throwing yourself on a grenade fits.
The enemy threw a grenade at you, but almends Bradley
ran over an ied an explosive device that could have
(21:34):
been put there hours or even days before. That's not combat.
If Brito wanted to put his hero up for the
greatest of military honors, he needed to know more about
what happened on that black October night. Alwend Cash had
fought to the death for his men, and now Brito
was going to fight for him.
Speaker 3 (21:56):
I just did not know the process. Thought I did,
but did not know the process.
Speaker 1 (22:01):
He had no idea. What a feat of endurance it
was going to be. We'll be right back. The success
of a Medal of honor recommendation hinges on the nomination package,
(22:24):
which takes an enormous amount of research, paperwork, witness statements, hundreds,
if not thousands of pages alone. Among military medals, the
medal of honor requires quote incontestable proof of the performance
of the meritorious conduct. That's one thing if you're a
professional historian. It's another if you're employed full time by
(22:47):
the United States Army, moving up the ranks protecting your country.
Bretto was learning on the job an Army officer with
a side gig as a detective.
Speaker 3 (22:58):
So was honored to be part of it, a little
angry that it was taking long, partly because of my actions.
I own that and not understanding what had to be done.
I remember one time I even asked myself, Gee, why
didn't you talk to the right people the first time
they could tell you? And I met these folks as
I went up the ranks, said, was doing my job,
doing our job.
Speaker 1 (23:20):
What Brito needed was for someone to give him evidence
that there had been a battle at the crash site,
proof that the soldiers were engaging the enemy. That meant
painstakingly interviewing every survivor he could find, prodding their memories.
But that meant forcing people to relive a night that
they may not have wanted to relive, where many had
(23:40):
been badly wounded, to revisit chaos, confusion, explosions, all under
the shadow of darkness. General Britto submitted Alwyns pack. At
once it was rejected. A second time it was rejected,
sacrificing hours that turned into days, and then days that
(24:02):
stretched to years. Britto searched for every last bit of
testimony for over a decade, and then came a stroke
of luck.
Speaker 3 (24:12):
A noncommissioned officer that I'd been trying to reach for many, many,
many years, who had first hand witness knowledge of what happened.
I found him should be embarrassed to see this. But
in octoberfest we were attending a Fortpenning, Georgia, and I
approached him and said, hey, would you be willing to
provide your account?
Speaker 1 (24:30):
Britto had run out of options. This was his last chance.
He had tried to get testimony from the veteran before,
to no avail. The man hadn't replied he was battling PTSD.
To go back was just too painful. But there he was,
face to face with Brito by sheer chance. Britto said,
(24:50):
just tell me what you saw that night, said.
Speaker 3 (24:53):
You write it. I'll give you write in a pen
on a napkin. We'll get it done. And he did.
Speaker 1 (24:57):
And what did the soldier confirm that in all of
the confusion of that October night he had heard guns firing,
bullets pinging off the burning Bradley. It been an ambush,
it was combat.
Speaker 3 (25:13):
And that account coupled with everything else, I cut it
to the point of where the true requirements of witness statements,
concept sketches, you name, it was all there. Then I
just had to wait.
Speaker 1 (25:27):
Sixteen years after that red Knight sky in Iraq, on
December sixteenth, twenty twenty one, President Joe Biden awarded all
In Cash the Medal of Honor. His wife Tomorrow was
there to receive it on his behalf.
Speaker 8 (25:43):
Sergeant Cash and his family gave everything for our country.
The devotion to his memory in their years working to
make sure that his courage and selflesses were properly documented
and honored is a testament to the love he inspired
on the legacy left behind. Sergeant first Class Cash is
now the seventh individual to receive a Medal of Honor
(26:04):
for his actions and operation of RACKI Freedom and the
first African American to reach even since the Vietnam War.
Speaker 1 (26:12):
General Gary Briddo was there too. Of course, I think
it's safe to say that nobody in the audience was
as thrilled as he was.
Speaker 3 (26:20):
And I truth or lending told my wife at that moment,
you know, if I retired tomorrow, I'm happy because of this.
Speaker 1 (26:31):
There are lots of tributes to Alwyn Cash out in
the world. The post office in his little hometown of Ovido, Florida,
is named after him. The Army Reserve Training Center in Sanford,
Florida is named in his honor too, So is the
memorial garden at Fort Stewart in Georgia. And just as
may General Briddo went to the ceremony that named the
(26:52):
entry gate to the training grounds at Fort Moore formerly
Fort Benning for Alwen, those monuments will last long after
the final man from Alwy's patoon is gone. But I'd
argue that the memorials that truly matter are the ones
you've been listening to. The voices of the men whose
lives he changed, the ones that painted portrait of the
(27:15):
soldier he was, and the extraordinary sacrifice he made. His
burden that.
Speaker 7 (27:22):
He carried continually was we can bring everyone home, like
as if most are in an organization and you have
your teammates to your left and right. But he literally
felt as if he had been entrusted with the service
members that he was with in this cartoon, and in
that was the constant dan through everything that he said
ends it.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
Saying that you'll walk through fire for someone is a cliche.
We've all heard it all in cash actually did it
not once, but five times. Sacrifice may not be the
element of heroism that's most valued by the Medal of Honor,
but unlike gallantry in battle, it's the thing that the
(28:02):
rest of us can actually relate to. We sacrifice in
little ways all the time, or at least we should.
When we give up a comfortable seat on the bus
for someone who needs it more, when we take a
few precious hours to help a struggling neighbor or a stranger.
Those small acts of sacrifice are testament to our shared humanity.
(28:26):
So I want you to picture that night in October
two thousand and five. A column of flame on the horizon,
a man returning again and again and again and again
to a burning vehicle to save the people inside. And
not in the silence of an empty desert, but in
the middle of an ambush under attack from a hidden enemy.
(28:48):
One last crucial detail that made all the difference in
the world. That is heroism by any definition, and that
sacrifice had a ripple effect. We've seen this over and
over again in stories about the Medal of Honor. Someone
commits an extraordinary act of courage and people become tied
(29:10):
to it in a powerful way. It changes them. Remember
Doug Mounroe, the Coastguard hero, and his best friend Mike Cooley,
who raised and lowered the flag at his grave every
day for forty years. What Gary Britdo did for Alwyn
echoes that theme. He sacrificed his time over more than
(29:31):
a decade to honor his fallen comrade. If you sacrifice
yourself for those who serve, those who serve will sacrifice
for you. Medal of Honor. Stories of Courage is written
(29:58):
by Meredith Rollins and produced by Meredith Rollins, Constanza Gallardo
and Izzy Carter. The show is edited by Ben Nadaph Haffrey,
Sound design and additional music by Gorski, recording engineering by
Nita Lawrence, fact checking by Arthur Gombert's original music by
Eric Phillips. If you want to learn more about our
(30:19):
Medal of Honor recipients, follow us on Instagram and Twitter.
We'll be sharing photos and videos of the heroes featured
on this show. We'd also love to hear from you
dm us with a story about a courageous veteran in
your life. If you don't know a veteran, we would
love to hear a story of how courage was contagious
in your own life. You can find us at Pushkinbonds.
(30:43):
I'm your host, Malcolm Babo
Pushkin Hello, Hello. Before we get on with our show,
I want you to know that your Pushkin Plus subscription
grants you early access to Medal of Honor episodes one
week before they were released to the public. That's one
week of exclusive access. If you want to listen to
more episodes a week before they're widely available, sign up
(00:37):
for Pushkin Plus on Apple Podcasts or by visiting Pushkin,
dot Fm, slash Plus. Now onto the episode. A dust
storm rolled over the small city of Samara in central Iraq.
The sky turned hazy red, and then as the sun set,
(00:59):
a dark and moonless black. It was mid October two
thousand and five, thirty one months since the US had
invaded the country. American forces had captured Sata Mussein almost
two years earlier, and still the war dragged on.
Speaker 2 (01:15):
A campaign on the harsh terrain of a nation as
large as California could be longer and more difficult than
some predict, and helping Iraqis achieve a united, stable and
free country will require our sustained commitment.
Speaker 1 (01:32):
American soldiers were settled into dozens of forward operating bases
around a rock. Every day was a combination of monotony
and dread. On that black October night, a convoy of
two American Bradley fighting vehicles traveled through the dust storm
up an unlit road. A Bradley is an armored personnel
(01:52):
carrier that rolls forward on tracks, not wheels. It has
a troop compartment in the back and a gun turret
at the front. Bradley's were mostly used for scouting missions,
and this night was one of those routine The Army
troops stationed nearby had done the same trip dozens, if
not hundreds of times in the balance between monotony and dread.
(02:15):
This was monotony until it wasn't. Suddenly a deafening blast,
a fiery explosion illuminated the night. The first of the
two Bradleys had hit an ied, an improvised explosive device.
If you've been watching from a distance that night, here's
what you would have seen. An armored vehicle engulfed in fire,
(02:37):
a soldier climbing out of a hatch and pulling a
burning man to safety, then that soldier too, catching fire,
a column of flame against the dark night sky. Over
the roar of the explosion, you'd hear the screams of
soldiers trapped inside the vehicle and then you'd see that
first man turned back to the fire, him Malcolm Gladwell.
(03:01):
And this is Medal of Honor Stories of courage. The
Medal of Honor is the highest military decoration in the
United States, awarded for gallantry and bravery in combat with
the risk of life, above and beyond the call of duty.
Each candidate must be approved all the way up the
chain of command, from the supervisory officer in the field
(03:24):
to the White House. This show is about those heroes,
what they did, what it meant, and what their stories
tell us about the nature of courage. Each Medal of
Honor action is by definition heroic, but the story of
Sergeant first Class Allwin Cash is about a very specific
(03:44):
element of heroism. Sacrifice, not the sacrifice that comes with
being in the wrong place at the wrong time, or
is the second decision that later turns out to have
been courageous and fatal, a kind of sacrifice that's more intentional,
more deliberate. We talk a lot about the acts of
(04:06):
bravery for which people receive something a metal recognition, but
there's always that flip side when someone loses something too
the sacrifice. It can be surprisingly easy to gloss over
what our heroes are giving up or the pain they're
going through. But it's hard to miss in the story
(04:28):
of Alwen Cash. If you want to get a good
sense of who Alwen Cash was in Iraq, you need
to talk to the people who served with him. General
Gary Britto would be at the top of that list.
Speaker 3 (04:50):
We have some ordinary people that just do some extraordinary
things when unexpected, and Cash was one of those.
Speaker 1 (04:57):
Brideau was Alwin's battalion commander in two thousand and five.
Now he's a four star general in charge of training
and leadership development across the entire Army, active Duty, National Guard,
and reserves. He guides and shapes the culture of the Army.
If anyone can tell you what makes a good soldier,
it's Brito. He knew and liked Olwen, not just as
(05:20):
a sergeant, but as a person.
Speaker 3 (05:23):
Very unassuming, very professional, newest stuff. And I had yet,
and I'll use the word the gruffness that I respected
and expected on noncommissioned officers.
Speaker 1 (05:36):
A non commissioned officer is one who hasn't gone to
college or through officer training. Cash had enlisted in the
Army right out of high school. He had grown up
in a big family in a small town in Florida.
He kept his dark hair in a buzz cut fade
and wore a modest mustache. He was a country guy
at heart, like.
Speaker 3 (05:55):
The fish, like to hunt, and he would bend your
ear on that if you've given him an opportunity to
do so.
Speaker 1 (06:01):
Albyn worked his way up the ranks, a real soldier's soldier.
For a time, he was a drill sergeant at Fort Benning, Georgia,
training troops. He was all about the basics, making sure
everyone had the foundations down. Then he pushed his guys
beyond those foundations to excellence. He was known for his
(06:22):
brutally honest sense of humor. Nothing shook him. But the
thing every person who served with Alwin will tell you
he truly cared for the soldiers in his command.
Speaker 3 (06:32):
What I respected and I saw it shine and start
any cash was the ability to connect to his soldiers.
A platoon was about thirty five years people was ill,
but he knew them, knew them by their name, knew
them by their nickname, knew what was going on at home,
disconnected to his troops.
Speaker 1 (06:50):
When he deployed to Iraq for the second time, in
two thousand and five. The men who served with him
saw him the way that General Breto did, as someone
who connected, who cared.
Speaker 4 (07:01):
He was more like that big big brother.
Speaker 1 (07:03):
This is Gary Mills, who was in Alwen's platoon.
Speaker 4 (07:07):
You know he didn't tell me Who's something that he
wouldn't do. I think it was a type of leader
that you can argue with him, but one minute later
you're going to have a beer.
Speaker 1 (07:14):
Alvin was only thirty five, but he'd seen a lot
during his years in the service. He knew how hard
it was to live an army life and have a family.
He had a wife and three young kids back in
the States. Here's Douglas Dodge, who was the second squad
leader of his platoon.
Speaker 5 (07:30):
I was going through some marital problems and Sergeant Cash
actually called my wife for Iraq and talked to her
at length, and then came to my chew our little
sleeping area and told me, hey, Dodge, go call your wife.
And I was like, why, what are you talking about?
And he said, I just had a long conversation with
her about stuff that's going on with you two. I
(07:50):
know you're having problems, and it's I want you to
have your head clear while we're out here doing stuff.
At the time, I was kind of angry because I
was tired. I just wanted to sleep, But he had
taken his time when he could have been sleeping, but
he took his precious time to try to take care
of me.
Speaker 1 (08:09):
So that's Olwen invested in his soldiers as whole people,
willing to give up his personal time to help them.
Unsolicited marital advice. It's not maybe the first thing you
think of when you think of a hero, but it
has everything to do with what will come next.
Speaker 3 (08:35):
One thing that really stuck out to me that evening
was pitch pitch black outside. All the nights I was out,
that was probably the darkest one.
Speaker 1 (08:46):
Forward Operating Base Mackenzie was in the middle of the
desert north of Baghdad. You can picture it, hot, sandy,
relentlessly beige concrete bunkers. The more than four hundred men
who were stationed there lived in contained housing units trailers really.
While some of the other American bases in the region
had seen very little fighting, that wasn't the case here.
(09:09):
Had been high for a while. Jimmy Hathaway was a
company commander at FOB Mackenzie, as he remembers that things
had been dicey in the Area of Operations, or as
they referred to it, the AO for months.
Speaker 6 (09:23):
We'd just come off of racky elections that year. It
had been a pretty rough time. Starting in September.
Speaker 1 (09:28):
There had been skirmishes around the base with the American
troops engaging with small arms fire or IEDs a few
days out of the week. The roads weren't safe, so
the troops had to secure the roots for supplies coming in.
Speaker 6 (09:42):
We'd had a pretty big incident with a convoy that
had been ambushed, and we knew that anytime a resupply
convoy came into our AO that there was potential for
loss of life, there's potential for damage to the vehicles
if we didn't go out and secure it.
Speaker 1 (09:58):
The night of October seventeenth, two thousand and five, a
patrol of two Bradley fighting vehicles was going to do
just that, drive the main supply route to make sure
it was clear, then drive right back. Leon Matthias was
Alwens team leader at the base.
Speaker 7 (10:14):
I remember specifically the weather being really really bad, so
it was like a dust storm moving through the area
and there was redy hair, So basically metowacs weren't supposed
to fly during that time period. But I just remember
it was a night patrol and we have to go
out because of a logistical convoy was coming in the
following day.
Speaker 1 (10:35):
Alwyn was in the first vehicle of the patrol. He
wasn't supposed to be.
Speaker 7 (10:39):
So normally on the patrol, the Petunia would lead out,
so I would be the lead patrol and then Starting
Cash would be the last vehicle in the convoy. But
that night I had just recently come back off of leave,
and Starting Cash said, hey, sir, I know you're just
back off of leave.
Speaker 1 (10:52):
I'm gonna lead the patrol tonight. It was a classic
example of Cash going above and beyond for somebody else.
Speaker 7 (10:58):
So he drives, he drives around me, and I see
him drive out, so I get back on my track
and so I am now behind him driving down the
road and we're going really, really slow, just because of
the visibility.
Speaker 1 (11:09):
There were nine men in the lead bradley up front,
there was Alwy and a gunner in the turret, plus
a driver in the troop compartment. In the back, there
were six men, an Iraqi interpreter and five soldiers, including
Douglas and Gary Mills.
Speaker 4 (11:24):
We were just in the back, just having funl like usual,
just getting my mind into you know, what was going
to happen. Then and boom, it kind of happened quick.
Speaker 1 (11:35):
The Bradley had run over an Ied.
Speaker 5 (11:39):
We had been hit by enough IED's already that you
knew when you heard it what it was. And I
heard that slap. But then in the next instant, I
was knocked unconscious. I was thrown into the ceiling of
the Bradley, and I don't know how long I was unconscious.
Speaker 1 (11:51):
For Bradley's are armored vehicles. They're built to run over
things like IED's and stay in the road. But something
was different that night.
Speaker 4 (12:01):
But I woke up.
Speaker 5 (12:02):
Then we were all on fire.
Speaker 1 (12:06):
The fuel cell of the Bradley had ignited. Fire was
surging upwards from the bottom of the vehicle.
Speaker 7 (12:13):
I am watching this vehicle in flames, so it wasn't
as if it was a slow burn. It was literally
He saw the explosion and the vehicle itself was in flames.
Speaker 1 (12:22):
Alwen wasn't injured in the blast, but as the fuel
cell drained, he was drenched in gasoline. He knew what
that meant he also could go up in flames at
any time. Alwen got to the driver's hatch and opened it.
He pulled the driver to safety, but the driver was
on fire, so now Alwan was on fire as well.
(12:43):
He extinguished the flames and then turned to the back
of the bradley. There were six men trapped back there.
The compartment was in flames. It was an oven.
Speaker 5 (12:53):
The first thing I remember is the pain from being
on fire, and I could hear everybody screaming, and I
just climbed up onto the bench seat because the floor
was all fire and you couldn't see anything. All I
could see was an orange glow.
Speaker 1 (13:06):
Alwin didn't hesitate. He went straight to the back of
the vehicle. He'd already sustained second and third degree burns
inside the compartment. Douglas reached for a tool and pried
at the door, and I managed to.
Speaker 5 (13:19):
Get the troop door open, and I just kind of
spilled out of the bradley onto the back road, and
that's when I saw Sergeant Cash at the back of
the bradley.
Speaker 1 (13:29):
Alwyn's uniform had burned so badly that it had melted
onto his body.
Speaker 5 (13:34):
It was very surreal because he had his helmet on,
his body armor on, and his boots on, but he
didn't have anything else on because they had been burned
off with him. And the only thing he asked me
was where the boys at? And I just kind of
looked at him and looked at the bradley and he said, hey,
I get the boys out, and then he just instantly
(13:54):
started climbing.
Speaker 1 (13:55):
In into the fire with no protection. Leon frantically called
back to base. Then he and the men in this
second vehicle raced towards the burning Bradley.
Speaker 7 (14:06):
By started cash. He's kind of the one that's going
back from the Bradley, pulling people out one by one,
and he just goes back over and over again.
Speaker 1 (14:17):
Alwen wasn't going to stop until every one of his
boys was accounted for. He went in once and helped
soldiers escape the troop compartment, and then he noticed that
two others were missing, so he went back into the
inferno again to pull them out, but where was the interpreter?
Alwen went back into Bradley another time.
Speaker 7 (14:36):
The last person that got out was the interpreter, and
his body was so lifeless he just pretty much drug
him out of that track.
Speaker 1 (14:43):
Alwen had been critically injured back when he'd saved the
first man, the driver, But he made the decision to
go back into the burning troop compartment five separate times.
He knew exactly what kind of sacrifice he was making,
yet he did it willingly, methodically. By the time Gary
(15:04):
Mills reached Olwen, seventy two percent of Alwen's body was
covered in second in third degree burns.
Speaker 4 (15:11):
I seen sorry Cash laying on the ground now that
he was burnt and everything, and he was just trying
to make sure they hate, Hey, your guys all right,
And I'm like, are you okay? You know, I mean
you you're burnt. I mean, you're dude, worse than I am.
But he was just making sure that we was okay.
Speaker 1 (15:30):
The forward operating base was only two miles away, but
there was a dust stone. Remember, Everything seemed to be
moving more slowly than usual. Finally, the metovac helicopters arrived.
The interpreter had died at the scene, Several of the
soldiers barely hung onto life all when included. Nevertheless, he
(15:51):
was the last one to get on the metavac. He
wanted to see everyone else get taken care of first.
He waited until they all were safe, and even then
he wouldn't get on a stretcher.
Speaker 7 (16:03):
He was like, no, I'm walking to this helicopter because
if he wanted to walk off the battlefield, the.
Speaker 1 (16:11):
Meta of Acts lifted off to the highest level of
triage facility nearby. Douglas was with Olwen.
Speaker 5 (16:18):
And there they began triaging and treating everybody, starting Cash.
The whole time there I could hear him yelling, well,
how are these are my guys? You know what's going
on with them? Are they okay?
Speaker 1 (16:28):
Where are they at the most badly burned men were
flown to Germany and then to Texas for more specialized care.
Alwin was one of them, and Gary Mills was two.
As soon as he was able, he insisted on seeing Alwen.
Speaker 4 (16:43):
They told me, no, I'm not supposed to go and
visit you know anybody like no, I'm going to visit.
I visited Saryn Cash and it was funny because, like
I said, we were both messed up, and he still
had jokes and just making sure I'm good it hits
you because it was like, man, even in how bad
(17:06):
a moment, it doesn't matter about it, no matter about
everybody else.
Speaker 1 (17:11):
There was hope that all of the soldiers might make it,
until there wasn't.
Speaker 4 (17:16):
That's when we started losing people and it just got
hard and hard every day.
Speaker 1 (17:21):
Of the nine people in the Bradley, only three would survive.
General Gary Britto remembers waiting to get news from the
men in the hospital.
Speaker 3 (17:31):
Every single night. Did not want to get that phone
call that somebody passed, and we did, Hey, how's he
doing well? Staff Sergeant George Alexander this first one, second call,
Doc Robinson, third call, especially Darren holl just kept up
at night. We just didn't want to get it what
you did. So we were really really just hoping, thank
(17:51):
fingers crossed, will he survived, Just holding on for hope. Okay,
don't die, don't die, don't die.
Speaker 1 (17:57):
In the hospital, Albyn kept his sense of humor and
his sense of duty intact. Everyone who loved him knew
how strong he was. As the weeks passed, they kept
up hope, but he had the worst of the burns,
and on November eighth, two thousand and five, Albin Cash
died in the hospital in San Antonio. He was the
(18:20):
last man to have gotten on the METAVAC and the
last man to succumb to his injuries. He held out
for as long as he could.
Speaker 5 (18:28):
He would say, it's going to be hard coming home
without the guys you came here with. And who would
have known that he would have been one of those people.
Speaker 1 (18:40):
Almost immediately, Britto put in for Alwin to get the
Silver Star, one of the Army's top awards for bravery.
It's a couple notches below the Medal of Honor. Britto
was still in Iraq, trying to keep his troops together,
boost morale, just survived the deployment. Everyone was exhausted at
that moment. The Silver Star for Alwin felt like the
(19:00):
right idea.
Speaker 3 (19:02):
There was a sense of numbness, just combat fatigue, and
I didn't see it. Then I see it now.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
Let me take a second to explain what differentiates the
Silver Star from a Medal of Honor. A Silver Star
is the Army's third highest decoration, given for distinguished gallantry
in action. The next step up is a Distinguished Service Cross,
given for extraordinary heroism in combat, and then sitting at
the top of the heap is the Medal of Honor.
(19:31):
Each one carries a huge amount of prestige, but the
Medal of honor has a stringent set of criteria. The
action comes at the risk of life and limb and
above and beyond the call of duty. In other words,
not something that your commanding officer could order you to do.
Those requirements might sound general, but in reality they're punishingly specific.
(19:54):
There aren't a huge variety of things that perfectly tick
all of those boxes. The iconic medal of honor worthy
action is throwing yourself on a grenade. It's an act
of pure selflessness and courage, done at a moment when
the enemy is in full attack. In fact, one hundred
and forty seven of the men who have been awarded
(20:15):
the medal received it for putting themselves in the way
of a grenade, and we've only had grenade since World
War One. What Alwen did sounds very much like throwing
himself on a grenade, doesn't it an act of supreme
self sacrifice on behalf of others at a time of peril.
You can't walk into a fire thinking you're going to survive.
(20:38):
Alwin's skin was charred, his lungs were failing, and yet
he kept returning to the inferno, knowing what that meant.
When Bretto and Alwen's family and friends thought about how
best to honor Alwen. They began to think that maybe
he deserved something more than a silver star. Maybe he
deserved the highest of all military honors.
Speaker 3 (21:00):
It was all my mind, just wait on me, all
my mind. So I sort of think about it, think
about it, said, I got to do this, not for me,
not for the unit, but for Cash in his troops.
This is earned.
Speaker 1 (21:11):
But there was a catch, a crucial one. There was
a third essential requirement for Medal of Honor eligibility. The
act of bravery has to take place in the field
of combat. That's why throwing yourself on a grenade fits.
The enemy threw a grenade at you, but almends Bradley
ran over an ied an explosive device that could have
(21:34):
been put there hours or even days before. That's not combat.
If Brito wanted to put his hero up for the
greatest of military honors, he needed to know more about
what happened on that black October night. Alwend Cash had
fought to the death for his men, and now Brito
was going to fight for him.
Speaker 3 (21:56):
I just did not know the process. Thought I did,
but did not know the process.
Speaker 1 (22:01):
He had no idea. What a feat of endurance it
was going to be. We'll be right back. The success
of a Medal of honor recommendation hinges on the nomination package,
(22:24):
which takes an enormous amount of research, paperwork, witness statements, hundreds,
if not thousands of pages alone. Among military medals, the
medal of honor requires quote incontestable proof of the performance
of the meritorious conduct. That's one thing if you're a
professional historian. It's another if you're employed full time by
(22:47):
the United States Army, moving up the ranks protecting your country.
Bretto was learning on the job an Army officer with
a side gig as a detective.
Speaker 3 (22:58):
So was honored to be part of it, a little
angry that it was taking long, partly because of my actions.
I own that and not understanding what had to be done.
I remember one time I even asked myself, Gee, why
didn't you talk to the right people the first time
they could tell you? And I met these folks as
I went up the ranks, said, was doing my job,
doing our job.
Speaker 1 (23:20):
What Brito needed was for someone to give him evidence
that there had been a battle at the crash site,
proof that the soldiers were engaging the enemy. That meant
painstakingly interviewing every survivor he could find, prodding their memories.
But that meant forcing people to relive a night that
they may not have wanted to relive, where many had
(23:40):
been badly wounded, to revisit chaos, confusion, explosions, all under
the shadow of darkness. General Britto submitted Alwyns pack. At
once it was rejected. A second time it was rejected,
sacrificing hours that turned into days, and then days that
(24:02):
stretched to years. Britto searched for every last bit of
testimony for over a decade, and then came a stroke
of luck.
Speaker 3 (24:12):
A noncommissioned officer that I'd been trying to reach for many, many,
many years, who had first hand witness knowledge of what happened.
I found him should be embarrassed to see this. But
in octoberfest we were attending a Fortpenning, Georgia, and I
approached him and said, hey, would you be willing to
provide your account?
Speaker 1 (24:30):
Britto had run out of options. This was his last chance.
He had tried to get testimony from the veteran before,
to no avail. The man hadn't replied he was battling PTSD.
To go back was just too painful. But there he was,
face to face with Brito by sheer chance. Britto said,
(24:50):
just tell me what you saw that night, said.
Speaker 3 (24:53):
You write it. I'll give you write in a pen
on a napkin. We'll get it done. And he did.
Speaker 1 (24:57):
And what did the soldier confirm that in all of
the confusion of that October night he had heard guns firing,
bullets pinging off the burning Bradley. It been an ambush,
it was combat.
Speaker 3 (25:13):
And that account coupled with everything else, I cut it
to the point of where the true requirements of witness statements,
concept sketches, you name, it was all there. Then I
just had to wait.
Speaker 1 (25:27):
Sixteen years after that red Knight sky in Iraq, on
December sixteenth, twenty twenty one, President Joe Biden awarded all
In Cash the Medal of Honor. His wife Tomorrow was
there to receive it on his behalf.
Speaker 8 (25:43):
Sergeant Cash and his family gave everything for our country.
The devotion to his memory in their years working to
make sure that his courage and selflesses were properly documented
and honored is a testament to the love he inspired
on the legacy left behind. Sergeant first Class Cash is
now the seventh individual to receive a Medal of Honor
(26:04):
for his actions and operation of RACKI Freedom and the
first African American to reach even since the Vietnam War.
Speaker 1 (26:12):
General Gary Briddo was there too. Of course, I think
it's safe to say that nobody in the audience was
as thrilled as he was.
Speaker 3 (26:20):
And I truth or lending told my wife at that moment,
you know, if I retired tomorrow, I'm happy because of this.
Speaker 1 (26:31):
There are lots of tributes to Alwyn Cash out in
the world. The post office in his little hometown of Ovido, Florida,
is named after him. The Army Reserve Training Center in Sanford,
Florida is named in his honor too, So is the
memorial garden at Fort Stewart in Georgia. And just as
may General Briddo went to the ceremony that named the
(26:52):
entry gate to the training grounds at Fort Moore formerly
Fort Benning for Alwen, those monuments will last long after
the final man from Alwy's patoon is gone. But I'd
argue that the memorials that truly matter are the ones
you've been listening to. The voices of the men whose
lives he changed, the ones that painted portrait of the
(27:15):
soldier he was, and the extraordinary sacrifice he made. His
burden that.
Speaker 7 (27:22):
He carried continually was we can bring everyone home, like
as if most are in an organization and you have
your teammates to your left and right. But he literally
felt as if he had been entrusted with the service
members that he was with in this cartoon, and in
that was the constant dan through everything that he said
ends it.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
Saying that you'll walk through fire for someone is a cliche.
We've all heard it all in cash actually did it
not once, but five times. Sacrifice may not be the
element of heroism that's most valued by the Medal of Honor,
but unlike gallantry in battle, it's the thing that the
(28:02):
rest of us can actually relate to. We sacrifice in
little ways all the time, or at least we should.
When we give up a comfortable seat on the bus
for someone who needs it more, when we take a
few precious hours to help a struggling neighbor or a stranger.
Those small acts of sacrifice are testament to our shared humanity.
(28:26):
So I want you to picture that night in October
two thousand and five. A column of flame on the horizon,
a man returning again and again and again and again
to a burning vehicle to save the people inside. And
not in the silence of an empty desert, but in
the middle of an ambush under attack from a hidden enemy.
(28:48):
One last crucial detail that made all the difference in
the world. That is heroism by any definition, and that
sacrifice had a ripple effect. We've seen this over and
over again in stories about the Medal of Honor. Someone
commits an extraordinary act of courage and people become tied
(29:10):
to it in a powerful way. It changes them. Remember
Doug Mounroe, the Coastguard hero, and his best friend Mike Cooley,
who raised and lowered the flag at his grave every
day for forty years. What Gary Britdo did for Alwyn
echoes that theme. He sacrificed his time over more than
(29:31):
a decade to honor his fallen comrade. If you sacrifice
yourself for those who serve, those who serve will sacrifice
for you. Medal of Honor. Stories of Courage is written
(29:58):
by Meredith Rollins and produced by Meredith Rollins, Constanza Gallardo
and Izzy Carter. The show is edited by Ben Nadaph Haffrey,
Sound design and additional music by Gorski, recording engineering by
Nita Lawrence, fact checking by Arthur Gombert's original music by
Eric Phillips. If you want to learn more about our
(30:19):
Medal of Honor recipients, follow us on Instagram and Twitter.
We'll be sharing photos and videos of the heroes featured
on this show. We'd also love to hear from you
dm us with a story about a courageous veteran in
your life. If you don't know a veteran, we would
love to hear a story of how courage was contagious
in your own life. You can find us at Pushkinbonds.
(30:43):
I'm your host, Malcolm Babo
Host
Malcolm Gladwell
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