Ethical Dilemmas Involving the Military Awards Process

Abstract

Non-Commissioned Officers (NCO) face many ethical decisions when recommending soldiers for military awards. There are numerous circumstances when our NCOs have been faced with two Soldiers that deserve commendation and the commands guidance is to recommend only one Soldier. NCOs' are the first line supervisors of most Soldiers in the Army today. It is the NCO that must be able to identify when one of their Soldiers deserve and or earned a military award. The NCO must be able to articulate the achievement, commendable performance, outstanding service, and in many cases today heroism, gallantry and bravery when recommending military awards. This will allow our chain of command to understand the Soldiers accomplishments and recommend approval or not. Army commands have issued guidance on the type and or percentage of awards to recommend for wartime service, training events, inspections, and other military operations. This guidance in some cases is too extreme and not in keeping with the regulation and history of military awards. We must ensure that as Senior Leaders we do not put our subordinate leaders in these ethical dilemmas and support their recommendations.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Jan 03, 2006
Accession Number
ADA631449

Entities

People

  • Robert H. Levis

Organizations

  • United States Army Sergeants Major Academy

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Human Systems

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Cold War
  • Counseling
  • Dictionaries
  • General Officers
  • Guidance
  • Information Operations
  • Law
  • Leadership
  • Management Personnel
  • Military Operations
  • Professional Development
  • Regulations
  • Standards
  • Supervisors
  • Training
  • United States

Readers

  • Military History of the United States in the 20th Century.
  • Military Leadership and Professional Education.