Hiawatha soldier may be first living Medal of Honor recipient since Vietnam

A Hiawatha soldier may be in line to become the first living recipient of the Congressional Medal of Honor since the Vietnam War.

Neither Pentagon nor congressional officials would confirm that Staff Sgt. Salvatore Giunta, who has been nominated for the Medal of Honor, was one of at least three Medal of Honor nominations working through the system. The three nominees served in sparsely populated valleys in eastern Afghanistan that U.S. troops have abandoned in recent years.

Giunta, a Cedar Rapids Kennedy High School graduate who served two tours in Afghanistan, was nominated for the award for his role in preventing a wounded fellow soldier from being dragged away during a fire fight in the Korengal River Valley in northeast Afghanistan.

According to a July 1 Washington Post story, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/06/30/AR2010063005346.html?hpid=topnews, the Pentagon has recommended the White House consider awarding the Medal of Honor to a living soldier for the first time since the Vietnam War. The Pentagon would not identify the soldier to avoid influencing the White House review.

Giunta, 24, was nominated for efforts to save a comrade during a firefight in northeast Afghanistan in 2007.

According to New York Times Magazine, which chronicled the firefight in February 2008, Giunta's unit was ambushed by insurgents. After a bullet hit his armor chest plate, Giunta chased enemy soldiers who were dragging away a wounded comrade, Josh Brennan.

“I started shooting,” he told the Times. “I emptied that magazine. They dropped Brennan.” Brennan later died of his injuries.

Read the story at http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/24/magazine/24afghanistan-t.html?pagewanted=1.

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District Rep. Dave Loebsack would not confirm that Giunta was the subject of the Post story.

Sabrina Siddiqui would only say, “If Sal was to get the Medal of Honor, he would be the first living service member from Iraq or Afghanistan wars to receive it.”

After a Thanksgiving 2009 meeting with Giunta in Vicenza, Italy, Loebsack called him “the most unassuming guy you could imagine.”

Giunta is the son of Steve and Rose Giunta of Hiawatha.