sitting on your ass > getting hurt in combat

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Big Phoenix

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To me it seemed like a way to raise the prestige of drone operators above that of wannabe pilots. Probably to push people towards the field. It's complete crap though.
This whole thing is just a result of the Air Force being managed by idiots. For like the first decade of UAVs being used and managed, AF only allowed actual trained pilots to "fly/pilot" UAVs instead of off loading the job pretty much anyone who can look at a screen and move a joystick(now they actually do what they should of done all along, have pure UAV operators and not force trained pilots to fly them). Anyways this medal is pretty much to give a pat on the back to pilots who were/are forced to do a job they shouldnt really be doing.

At the same time though medals do get handed out like candy. I was awarded a Naval Achievement Medal(looked at as a joke by everyone in the marines/navy) for really no reason at all, other than my unit was allowed to award X number of medals. And of course like I said earlier my first sergeant getting a fucking bronze star for riding a desk all deployment.
 

Lejina

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This whole thing is the military's fault. You have guys who aren't in combat writing policy to ensure that other guys who aren't in combat are recognized for eval/promotion purposes. Which isn't necessarily a bad thing. Not every job is deployment heavy and there needs to be ways to acknowledge people who excel in all fields. But damn...
You don't need to give a medal for that tho. "Sgt Blogging did an admirable job administering whatever the fuck and displayed great enthusiasm and creativity when faced with something" Ranks 7th of 54 and Ready for immediate promotion. Done.

Why throw a medal in there? The Purple Heart is already rather strange (a medal for being wounded, not actually accomplishing anything) but giving medals for qualifications is just wacky, those aren't worth more than a single line in the qualifications list of the individual. Shit like riding a desk honorably shouldn't warrant more than a coin. Medals are nice and all, but drowning men with meaningless medals just cheapens the value of the real stuff.
 

chaos

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Medals count for promotion points. Same reason we have shit like good conduct and JSAM/NAM/whatever.