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Humbert "Rocky" Versace
Jon Swanson
Ben A. Salomon
Ed. W. Freeman
The nation's highest award for valor honors the memory of two genuine American heroes.
Story by Heike Hasenauer
Photos by SFC Larry Lane
ON May 23, President Bill Clinton paid the nation's greatest homage to two of America's most heroic soldiers.
In a somber White House ceremony, he presented their widows with the nation's highest award for military valor, the Medal of Honor. Awarded to only 3,000 service members in America's history, it was last presented by President Ronald Reagan; it went to a soldier honored, belatedly, for valor in Vietnam.
As the Army Band played a mournful rendition of "America the Beautiful," Carmen Gordon clutched her 3-year-old daughter, Brittany, and consoled her 6-year-old son, Ian.
It was her husband and their father, MSgt. Gary Gordon , 33, along with SFC Randall Shughart , 35, whom the nation was honoring.
On the small stage set up in the East Room, Stephanie Shughart joined the Gordons and President Clinton. She and her husband had been married only two years, and the couple had no children.
The men, both assigned to the U.S. Special Operations Command at Fort Bragg, N.C., were on a military mission with Task Force Ranger in Somalia on Oct. 3, 1993, when they died "in the most courageous and selfless way any human being can," Clinton said.
"They died ... for a noble and important cause, to give [CWO 2 Michael] Durant and others a chance to live," he said about the downing of two Army helicopters on that day and the subsequent rescue attempt by Gordon and Shughart.
Gordon, a sniper team leader, and team member Shughart had been in the lead helicopter en route to an assault on a Mogadishu building when the helicopters came under automatic weapon and rocket-propelled grenade fire.
The men returned fire, but the two follow-on aircraft were shot down. Gordon and Shughart quickly provided cover to the closest of the two helicopters until Army Rangers could establish a defensive perimeter around it.
The two soldiers then flew to the second crash site to assist its four injured crewmen, including copilot Durant, who was later captured by the Somalis and held captive for 11 days.
When they again came under fire, Gordon and Shughart realized the full brunt of the Somalis' hostility and knew that, without their help, their comrades on the ground had little chance of survival.
Without hesitation, they volunteered to go in, fully aware that their own chances for survival would be slim, recalled Sgt. Paul Shannon, the helicopter crew chief who had been aboard the chopper with the two snipers.
When their third frantic request was approved, Gordon and Shughart had directed Shannon to hover low to the ground so they could jump in.
But debris from the wreckage and heavy ground fire precluded their first attempt, and they were finally inserted some 100 meters south of the crash site.
When they hit the ground, equipped with only their sniper rifles and pistols, "they fought their way through a dense maze of shanties and shacks to reach the critically injured crew members," the MOH citations read.
Upon reaching the site, they immediately pulled Durant and his crew members from the aircraft and established a defensive perimeter, putting themselves in the most vulnerable positions.
Gordon and Shughart killed an undetermined number of Somali attackers and when their ammunition was almost spent, returned to the wreckage to retrieve whatever weapons and ammunition they could find.
Gordon gave some of the ammo to Durant and then rejoined Shughart to patrol the perimeter.
In the end, Shughart was killed when his own ammunition ran out. Gordon, who again returned to the wreckage for a rifle that contained five last rounds, handed the weapon to Durant saying simply "good luck." Soon after, Gordon was also killed. "Anyone in their right mind wouldn't have done what they did," said Shannon. "But they passionately believed in the creed that says, 'I will not fail those with whom I serve.'"
"Without a doubt, I owe my life to these two men and their bravery," said Durant, who, following his release from captivity, came home to a hero's welcome.
Durant told reporters then that the real heroes did not come home. "Those guys came in when they had to know it was a losing battle," he said about Gordon and Shughart. "There was nobody else left to back them up. If they had not come in, I wouldn't have survived."
Eighteen U.S. soldiers died that day, among them - with the exception of Durant and Shannon - all the crew members aboard the three helicopters.
The events of that day galvanized U.S. opposition to a continued military involvement in Somalia and helped speed the redeployment of U.S. troops from the beleaguered African nation in March.
"Sergeants Gordon and Shughart died ... to give Durant and others a chance to live," Clinton told Carmen Gordon and Shughart's widow, Stephanie. But, "they were part of a larger mission - a difficult one - that saved hundreds of thousands of innocent Somalis from starvation and gave that nation a chance to build its own future." Recent Recipients:
Alfred Rascon (February 8, 2000) for the valor of his service on March 26, 1966, in Vietnam , when, in the words of President Clinton at the ceremony, "In the middle of an intense firefight, Alfred was everywhere." For the valor of their service during World War II , the following African Americans received the Congressional Medal of Honor on January 13, 1997:
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