Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has directed a five-person panel to review the 20 Medals of Honor that the Army awarded to soldiers for their actions at the Battle of Wounded Knee in South Dakota on Dec. 29, 1890.
A senior defense official who spoke exclusively with Military.com on Monday said that the goal is “to ensure no soldier was recognized for conduct that did not merit recognition under the standards applicable at that time,” such as attacking noncombatants and those who have surrendered, or the murder or rape of a prisoner.
The events of Wounded Knee took place along a creek that lends its name to the massacre on the Pine Ridge Reservation in the southwest corner of South Dakota. While the events of that day are sometimes described as a battle, in fact the U.S. Army — amid a campaign to repress the tribes in the area — killed hundreds of unarmed members of the Lakota Sioux tribe, including many women and children, while attempting to disarm Native American fighters who had already surrendered at their camp.
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The review is hardly the first to consider revoking the military’s highest award for gallantry from troops who were given the award in the past. However, the review of the awards for Wounded Knee itself is the result of several years of lobbying and pressure from Congress, the South Dakota legislature,…
