Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel spoke some common sense language in scrapping a plan to award medals to those who operate unmanned drone aircraft from control centers thousands of miles from the battlefield.

http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/04/15/17765235-hagel-drops-controversial-medal-for-drone-operators?lite&ocid=msnhp&pos=1

Hagel’s decision rescinds an act proposed by his immediate predecessor, former Secretary Leon Panetta, who had wanted to create a medal that individuals could earn for their work in conducting the war with the unmanned aircraft and other cyber operations.

The Pentagon instead will assign a pin that these service personnel can attach to existing medals. Observers have compared it to the “V” placed atop Bronze Star medals, which recognizes valor on the battlefield.

I don’t have a problem with recognizing the valuable work being done by these highly trained servicemen and women. Creating a new medal, though, seems a bit much.

Veterans groups and other critics had called the award the Nintendo Medal; its official name is the Distinguished Warfare Medal. The Nintendo reference, though, brings to mind what the military brass told us time and again when the public saw video of the air attacks that began the Iraq War in 2003.

“War isn’t a video game,” they would remind us. Indeed it isn’t.

A pin attached to an existing medal provides significant recognition for the work being done by drone controllers.