Valor in Iraq earns Medal of Honor

By Deborah Sharp, USA TODAY

Sgt. 1st Class Paul Ray Smith of Tampa left his wife and two children to go to the war in Iraq. At 33, he came to think of the soldiers he led as his "boys." Many were younger than him by a decade or more.

Smith wrote to his family that he was prepared to give everything he had to make sure "all my boys make it home." In a battle near the airport in Baghdad two years ago, he kept that promise. But in doing so he died, the only member of his platoon lost that day, April 4, 2003.

Sgt. 1st Class Paul R. Smith's family will receive the first Medal of Honor awarded in Operation Iraqi Freedom. At a White House ceremony Monday, exactly two years after his death, Smith's family will be presented with his Medal of Honor, the nation's highest award for battlefield valor. It's a rare honor.

"Sgt. 1st Class Smith answered the calling, completed the mission, saved his fellow soldiers and made the supreme sacrifice in doing so," said Maj. Elizabeth Robbins, an Army spokeswoman.

Smith was based at Fort Stewart in Georgia and served in several hot spots since enlisting in the Army in 1989. Shortly after the war in Iraq began, his 11th Engineer Battalion of the Army's 3rd Infantry Division had the task of creating a holding area for prisoners of war. Smith found a spot within a courtyard near the airport in Baghdad and set his men to work building a cell.

But Iraqi forces advanced. Soon, Smith's platoon was under attack by as many as 100 enemy soldiers, according to news and military accounts. Smith tossed a grenade over the wall, and then he climbed atop an armored vehicle. Disregarding personal danger, he sprayed the attacking troops with .50-caliber machine gun. According to the Army, he told a soldier who accompanied him to "feed me ammunition whenever you hear the gun get quiet." He aimed more than 300 rounds at the Iraqis before he was killed by enemy fire.

"Smith's actions saved the lives of at least 100 soldiers ... and resulted in an estimated 20-50 enemy soldiers killed," the citation reads. His "conspicuous gallantry, above and beyond the call of duty," according to the citation, protected the soldiers in his platoon as well as other troops at an aid station nearby.

Smith's heroism met an important criteria for the medal: He rushed in to defend others, knowing he could lose his life in the process. Audie Murphy, a World War II hero who became a movie star, earned his Medal of Honor for a similar action: Manning a machine gun on a burning, abandoned tank, he killed 50 advancing German soldiers.

"It's a situation where most rational people would back out, and they wouldn't be criticized," says David Burrelli, a Library of Congress researcher who specializes in military matters. "It's going beyond what you're supposed to do."

Smith was born in El Paso and moved to Tampa when he was 9. One of four siblings, he loved to collect rocks and was good at taking things apart. When he stripped a radio, there were always pieces left over, but it still ended up working. He loved to fish, "but we'd have starved to death if we'd had to depend on his fishing skills," jokes Smith's sister, Lisa DeVane, 37.

He enlisted in the Army right after graduating from Tampa Bay Technical High School. He met his wife, Birgit, when stationed in Germany. They married in 1992. Since her husband was killed, Birgit Smith, 38, says she's heard from the wives of other soldiers who survived that day.
"They say, 'Because of your husband, mine made it home,' " she says. "Paul laid down his life for his soldiers."

DeVane says the black-and-white, right-or-wrong ways of the military suited her brother. He rode his soldiers hard, insisting that everything be done by the book. But he had a soft side, too. He was thrilled when DeVane gave birth three years ago to his niece. DeVane named the girl Olivia Ray, making Paul's middle name her daughter's as well. "I still cry, and I still miss him," DeVane says. "He's the perfect example of good and decent. I learned a lot about life from my little brother."

Smith once drove 40 miles from Fort Stewart to deliver a teddy bear to the young daughter of one of his men, who was hospitalized with a serious illness. Another time, he counseled a soldier having marital problems, arranged visits with the base chaplain and financial experts, and allowed him time away from Fort Stewart to settle his problems in family court.

"I'd always seen him as this hard (guy), but when I had a problem, it was like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, he was so nice," says Robert Mullins, 24, a former solider who trained under Smith at Fort Stewart and served with him in Kosovo. "He would talk to me like a brother, or a father."

Mullins, now a mechanic in Knoxville, Tenn., says he's proud of his former sergeant. But as a father of three, he also thinks about the children Smith left behind. "I don't think a medal can heal those wounds," he says.

Smith's widow says she works to keep his memory alive for their children, David, 11, and Jessica, 18. Smith adopted Jessica, Birgit's daughter from a previous relationship, after the couple married. President Bush will present the medal to young David at Monday's ceremony.

Smith's body was cremated, and most of his remains were scattered over Tampa Bay. But Birgit Smith keeps a portion of her husband's ashes in a locket that hangs from the windshield of her car. She believes her husband's spirit is still with her. Sometimes she smells his aftershave or feels the embrace of his arms around her. Once his picture fell off the wall, and she was sure it was Paul, sending a message that he's always there watching over her.

"We feel him all around us," she says.

Home