Criticism over lack of medals database

Lawmakers last week criticized the Defense Department for failing to create a searchable database of medals recipients, a potential solution to identifying and prosecuting people who falsely claim to have received the honors. Witnesses from the Veterans of Foreign Wars and a private medals database joined GOP Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah), chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform subcommittee, in rejecting assertions by Pentagon officials about major improvements in military record-keeping. Anyone making false claims of receiving military honors could be prosecuted under a 2006 law, the Stolen Valor Act. Conviction could mean imprisonment for up to six months, or up to a year for false claims of receiving the Medal of Honor. A House hearing focused on military records, maintained by services and the National Personnel Records Center in the St. Louis area. Witnesses representing the services said there are searchable computer databases of records, but not one for medals. "We are fundamentally failing to fulfill this mission" of identifying false claims, Chaffetz said. "Why can't we create a database of what medals they earned?"

James Nierle, president of the Navy's Board of Decorations and Medals, said "in a perfect world ... to have those in a database would be of some benefit." Some have questioned whether the cost is worth it. C. Douglas Sterner, curator of the Military Times "Hall of Valor," which maintains a private medals database, and Joseph Davis, director of public affairs for the Washington office of the Veterans of Foreign Wars of the United States, said they think it is.

-- AP