Feb. 2, 2007 - Circulating somewhere in the Pentagon is a list of dozens of soldiers and Marines who committed acts of supreme valor during the war in Iraq. One serviceman, for example, charged a row of Republican Guards under fire, killing 20 enemy soldiers. At least three others jumped on grenades to save their brothers. Yet relatively few medals have been issued in the 4-year-old war. The Medal of Honor, for instance, the highest citation a soldier or Marine can receive, has been handed out only twice since the war began, both times posthumously. By comparison, the military gave 245 Medals of Honor to combatants in Vietnam and 464 to veterans of World War II. Lesser medals, like the Distinguished Service Cross, have also been hard to come by for Iraq servicemen.
