Sgt. 1st Class Paul Ray Smith could have retreated, but doing so would have allowed Iraqi troops to overrun an American aid station at Baghdad International Airport. Instead, Sgt. Smith grabbed a rifle and antitank weapon and continued fighting, holding off about 100 enemy soldiers.
When a fellow soldier shouted at Smith to take cover, Smith refused. “He gave me the cut-throat symbol,” the soldier recalled. “He was not leaving.” Smith received a severe head wound and died at his post. Yet his efforts stopped the April 4, 2003, assault.
Two years later, President Bush presented the Medal of Honor to Smith’s 11-year-old son David.
Drawing from this soldier’s example, the Army drew up a new creed as it tightened training procedures: “I will always place the mission first. I will never accept defeat. I will never quit. I will never leave a fallen comrade.”
Smith’s widow commented, “Paul is showing the soldiers what it means to be a soldier.”
