WASHINGTON - President Obama hailed the first living soldier to receive the Medal of Honor since the Vietnam War Tuesday as a modern Audie Murphy for heroically storming a Taliban ambush to save his trapped rifle team.
Staff Sgt. Salvatore Giunta, 25, of Iowa, is the first living service member to serve in Iraq or Afghanistan to be given the nation’s highest honor.
"I'm going to go off script here for a second and just say, I really like this guy," Obama said at a White House ceremony honoring Giunta attended by family, friends, members of his unit and past recipients of the Medal of Honor.
"It was his mother, after all, who apparently taught him as a young boy in small-town Iowa how to remove the screen from his bedroom window in case of fire," Obama said with a chuckle.
"What she didn't know was that, by teaching Sal how to jump from his bedroom and sneaking off in the dead of night, she was unleashing a future paratrooper who would one day fight in the rugged mountains of Afghanistan, 7,000 miles away."
Giunta, a paratrooper and rifle team leader with Company B, 2d Airborne Battalion, 503d Infantry Regiment of the 173rd Airborne Brigade, saved at least two pals during combat Oct. 25, 2007, in the Korengal Valley of Afghanistan.
An insurgent ambush split Giunta's squad, and he went into the open to pull one comrade to safety and then fought to free a dying pal who was being dragged away by Taliban fighters.
Obama compared Giunta to World War II hero Audie Murphy, the most decorated soldier of World War II.
Seven heroes who served in Iraq and Afghanistan have received the Medal of Honor posthumously.
After the ceremony, an emotional Giunta told reporters he would gladly give his hard-earned medal back if it would bring his two fallen comrades back to life.
CNN
Giunta was a specialist serving with the 2nd Battalion, 503rd Infantry Regiment on his second tour of duty in Afghanistan when his unit was attacked on the night of October 25, 2007. According to Defense Department documents, Giunta and his fellow soldiers were walking back to base along the top of a mountain ridge when the enemy attacked from their front and their left. Taliban fighters barraged the Americans with AK-47s, rocket propelled grenades and Soviet-era large machine guns.
Giunta saw several of his fellow soldiers go down. He ran forward, throwing grenades and returning enemy fire, to help one soldier who had been shot but was still fighting, the documents say. Then he noticed one of the wounded soldiers was missing.
Searching for his wounded friend Sgt. Josh Brennan, Giunta ran over a hill where moments before Taliban fighters had been shooting at him. Now he was alone, out of sight of his fellow soldiers, in an area that the Taliban had controlled just moments before.
Giunta saw two Taliban fighters dragging Brennan away. He ran after them, killing one and wounding the other, who ran off.
Giunta instantly started providing first aid to Brennan, who had been shot at least six times, the documents say. Eventually a medic arrived and a helicopter was called in to take Brennan to a hospital, but he later died of his wounds.
Giunta's action, however, meant that Brennan was not at the mercy of the Taliban, and his parents would be able to give him a proper burial instead of wondering what became of him.
Giunta's quick response to the Taliban attack also helped his unit repulse the enemy fighters before they could cause more casualties, the Defense Department documents note.
Giunta was shot twice, with one round hitting his body armor and the second destroying a weapon slung over his back. He was not seriously hurt.
Giunta has said he is determined to make the medal, at least symbolically, belong to others.
"It is a great thing," Giunta told CNN after learning he would receive the medal. "But it is a great thing that has come at a personal loss to myself and so many other families."
Giunta said when he first learned he would receive the Medal of Honor, "I felt lost. I felt kind of angry ... just because, you know, this is so big. This is, it came at such a price. It came at the price of a good buddy of mine, not just Brennan. But Mendoza. Mendoza died that night as well."
The squadron's medic, Hugo Mendoza of El Paso, Texas, was caught with the rest of the group.
"These two men on that day made the biggest sacrifice anyone can ever make. And it's not for a paycheck."
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