Combat Action Ribbon/Combat Infantry Badge

Genre and Sub Genre: Rites of Passage, Material

Language: English

Country where Item is from: United States of America

Informant Data: Originally from Bay Area, California, Jonathan Kong is a Dartmouth student veteran, ’18, and studies Economics. He served 6 years in the United States Navy assigned as a Combat Corpsman with Marine Corps Infantry. He has deployed three times and has conducted combat operations in Sangin, Afghanistan of Helmand Province. He has billets as an Assistant Leading Petty Officer, Senior Line Corpsman, Battalion Training Petty Officer, and Combat Trauma Management Instructor. He was awarded the Silver Star Medal for heroic actions against the enemy and risking one’s own life to save wounded Marines, as well as the Combat Action Ribbon, Afghanistan Campaign Medal, Fleet Marine Force device, and Enlisted Surface Warfare device.

Social/ Cultural Context: Jonathan was interviewed in his home at an off-campus house for Dartmouth student veterans. He has been at Dartmouth for one years and was able to speak about various different topics. I briefly explained the focus of our collection and simply allowed him to speak freely about topics he chose.

Item: As it pertains to rites of passages, combat experience is one of the most respected of all. Only about 10% of the military are actually in combat roles and of that 10% only a small portion actually engage in combat during their deployments. Because much of a troop’s training is focused on preparation for combat, it is a momentous occasion to engage in your first firefight with the enemy. It carries a huge honor. This distinction is represented by the awarding of either the Combat Action Ribbon (Navy and Marine Corps) or the Combat Infantry Badge (Army). In order to receive these awards, the service member must receive and return an attack. I.e. The enemy shoots at you, you shoot back.

Associated file: 

Combat Action Ribbon:
CAR

Combat Infantry Badge:
CIB

Transcript of Associated File:

So basically… in the Navy and Marine corps, especially among grunts (which are infantry guys) the single most important rite of passage is getting your CAR, which is the Combat Action Ribbon. It pretty much means that you actually went to combat and fired your weapon. And believe it or not, its actually a pretty small population of the military that legitimately goes and fights. Most dudes sit around on big bases and eat ice cream and steak. I’m not even kidding. So pretty much, everyone is a boot unless they have a CAR. And a boot is just like a derogatory term for fuckin new guy. So you could have higher rank and no CAR and people would still think you’re a boot – at least in infantry. Of course, you can’t directly say it to higher ranking people. But that’s basically how it is. In infantry, you’ve either seen combat or you haven’t. I think it’s pretty similar in the Army except they call theirs a Combat Infantry Badge.

Informant’s Comments: informant was pretty relaxed talking about combat and noted that the idea of combat PTSD was “bullshit.” He said that most infantry guys, who are the ones who actually see combat, enjoy combat and love to do it. It’s much respected in the military and a lot of young infantrymen strive for that goal. However, society and the media has created this false narrative of the broken veteran which has begun to plague the veteran community.

Collector’s Comments: Considering the informant had spent six years serving in the military, has gone on three deployments, and served in various different roles in the military, I felt that his opinion and information was very reliable.

Collector’s Name: Jenna Shin

Tags/Keywords: Material Lore, Rites of Passage