Victorian Cross Awarded to Australian SAS Trooper

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The first Australian soldier to be awarded the Victoria Cross in 40 years doesn't see himself as a hero, but the prime minister insists Trooper Mark Donaldson is "the stuff of Australian legend".

Trooper Donaldson, 29, was awarded the VC medal - the nation's highest military honour - for rescuing a coalition interpreter during fighting in Afghanistan last year.

The Special Air Service (SAS) soldier is the first person to receive the Victoria Cross for Australia.

It was established in 1991 to replace the Imperial VC awarded previously to 96 Australians.

Trooper Donaldson said the award was a great honour, but it wouldn't change who he was.

"I'm still Mark Donaldson," he modestly told reporters after receiving the award at Government House in Canberra.

"I don't see myself as a hero, honestly.

"I still see myself as a soldier first and foremost."

But Prime Minister Kevin Rudd begged to differ.

Trooper Donaldson had joined an exclusive list of Australian heroes, he said.

"Generations of school children will now know of the story of Trooper Mark Donaldson.

"It is a story of a hero, one which will be told in classrooms, workplaces and watering holes for many years to come."

Trooper Donaldson was travelling in a coalition convoy in Oruzgan Province on September 2 when it was ambushed by enemy forces.

In the chaos that followed, Trooper Donaldson ran, under machine gun fire, across nearly 100 metres of open ground to rescue a wounded interpreter.

He also deliberately exposed himself to enemy fire to draw attention away from injured soldiers.

Trooper Donaldson said he acted on instinct and didn't think about the danger.

"I just saw him there, I went over there and got him, that was it."

The last Australian to win the Imperial VC, Keith Payne, was delighted Trooper Donaldson survived last year's ambush.

"Your chances of coming out alive are pretty negative, and he never got hit, that's amazing," he told reporters after the ceremony.

Mr Payne, now 75, won his VC during the Vietnam War in July 1969 after helping to rescue up to 40 of his wounded men.

The Vietnam veteran backed Mr Rudd's comments, describing Trooper Donaldson as exceptional.

"He's just like another soldier, except he's not another soldier, he's a soldier with a Victoria Cross."

Trooper Donaldson's wife, Emma, said her husband was devoted to the army.

"He was married to the army before he married me, and I support him all the way," she told reporters.

There were nervous moments being an army spouse, Ms Donaldson admitted, but she always believed her man would come home because he was so well trained.

In keeping with military protocol, defence force chief Angus Houston saluted Trooper Donaldson during Friday's ceremony.

"As the highest-ranking member of the defence force, there has been no current serving member that I salute, until now," he said.

"Tradition holds that even the most senior officer will salute a Victoria Cross recipient as a mark of the utmost respect for their act of valour."

When presenting the medal, Governor-General Quentin Bryce described Trooper Donaldson as an "inspiration".

"We are here to dedicate your contribution, your unconditional surrender to duty and humanity, your abandonment of your own necessity so that others may be secured," Ms Bryce said.
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http://au.news.yahoo.com/a/-/latest/5265191/aussie-soldier-40-years-gets-vc/

Australian vet of Afghan war wins top valor medal
By ROD McGUIRK – 1 hour ago

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — Pinned down by a maelstrom of machine-gun bullets and rocket-propelled grenades in a Taliban ambush, Trooper Mark Donaldson made a move that defied logic.

The 29-year-old Australian left cover and deliberately exposed himself to insurgent fire in an attempt to draw it away from his wounded comrades.

For his actions during the battle last year in Afghanistan's Uruzgan province, Donaldson was awarded the Victoria Cross on Friday — the highest military honor in the British Commonwealth. He is the first Australian in 40 years to receive the award.

The insurgents opened fire on a patrol of Australian, U.S. and Afghan troops on Sept. 2, 2008, as it returned to base after killing at least 13 Taliban during an operation the previous day, defense officials said.

The attackers were well entrenched, coordinated and effective fighters, Donaldson's citation said.

Donaldson, a commando in the Special Air Services, moved quickly to counterattack, darting from cover to cover, training fire on the enemy.

He then decided to expose himself in hopes of protecting the wounded.

"This selfless act alone bought enough time for those wounded to be moved to relative safety," his citation said.

The patrol tried to maneuver their humvees out of the trap. With the casualties taking up all available space inside, Donaldson was left to run along side his vehicle.

But as they made their way out, he spotted a severely wounded Afghan interpreter who was being left behind.

He broke from cover again, crossing 90 yards (80 meters) of open ground to grab the interpreter and carry him back to the patrol.

Throughout the two-hour running battle that covered more than two miles (4 kilometers) before the patrol shook off the enemy, Donaldson gave first aid to wounded soldiers between exchanges of gunfire with the enemy.

More than a dozen coalition troops were wounded; none died.

"Trooper Donaldson's acts of exceptional gallantry in the face of accurate and sustained enemy fire ultimately saved the life of a coalition force interpreter and ensured the safety of other members of the combined Afghan, U.S. and Australian force," the citation said.

But Donaldson — who was feted as a hero by Prime Minister Kevin Rudd at Friday's award ceremony in Canberra — said he was just doing his job.

"I'm trained to fight and that's all we do — it's instinct and it's natural," the red-haired Donaldson told reporters after the ceremony, where Governor General Quentin Bryce pinned the medal to the front of his dress uniform.

"You don't really think about it at the time; you just do what you've got to do," he said.

His wife, Emma, who attended the ceremony with their 2-year-old daughter Kaylee, said she would not ask her husband to be more careful in the future.

"He was married to the army before he married me and I support him all the way," she said.

Donaldson is the 97th Australian to receive the award since the South African Boer War of 1899-1902. About half have died during their acts of bravery.

"Generations of school children will now know of the story of Trooper Mark Donaldson," Rudd said at the ceremony. "It is a story of a hero, one which will be told in classrooms, workplaces and watering holes for many years to come."

Introduced by Britain's Queen Victoria in 1856, the Victoria Cross is the highest military honor for countries that were once part of the British Empire.

The United States' highest military accolade for valor, the Medal of Honor, has so far been given once for service in Afghanistan, in October 2007 to the family of Navy Seal Lt. Michael Murphy who was killed in action in 2005.

Four of the medals have been awarded for service in Iraq.

British Royal Marine Lance Cpl. Matthew Croucher earned a George Cross last year for diving on a live grenade to protect his men in Afghanistan. His body armor absorbed most of the blast and he was not seriously hurt.

The George Cross is as high a distinction as the Victoria Cross, but the latter is only awarded for bravery during direct confrontation with the enemy.

Keith Payne, 75, was the last Australian to win the Victoria Cross.

"His life now is changed forever," said Payne, who earned the award for bravery in Vietnam in 1969.
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http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jb3Gy7GX9JeJgiLsld6JLjCiBxkgD95O4DVG0

Sounds like a Really great guy.
Its well Deserved:cool:
 
Sounds like something from a movie what he was doing. Congrats to him. ust be awesome that in the future school children will be told about this guy!
 
My great, great, Granddad won the Victoria Cross :)

EDIT\ The two stories are in fact remarkably similar. My great, great, Granddad also won it for drawing enemy fire to help save the lives of his comrades in Afghanistan!
 
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I love this kind of stuff :)

Hats off to him, our soldiers and everyone who protects their own country with their life.
 
Grrrrr said:
My great, great, Granddad won the Victoria Cross :)

EDIT\ The two stories are in fact remarkably similar. My great, great, Granddad also won it for drawing enemy fire to help save the lives of his comrades in Afghanistan!
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Was that during the Second Afghan War?

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Trooper Mark Donaldson is a very brave man, I salute him :)
 
simulatorman said:
Was that during the Second Afghan War?

.................................................

Trooper Mark Donaldson is a very brave man, I salute him :)
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Yep:

Maiwand, Afghanistan, 28 July 1880, Gunner James Collis, Royal Horse Artillery.

For conspicuous bravery during the retreat from Maiwand to Kandahar when the officer commanding the battery was endeavouring to bring in a limber with wounded men under a cross-fire, in running forward and drawing the enemy's fire on himself, thus taking off their attention from the limber.

James Collis was invested with his Victoria Cross by Lord Roberts in Poona, India, on the 11th July 1881.

http://www.victoriacross.org.uk/bbcollis.htm

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I can't get over how similar the stories are, it's quite remarkable
 
simulatorman said:
You must be very proud to have him in your family. Have you seen the medal?
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I am, it's a fantastic story and he was an incredibly brave man. With regards the medal sadly no one know where it is...

He was convicted of bigamy later in life and sentenced to 18months in jail with hard labour. The terms (at the time) of the warrant of the Victoria Cross stated that the medal had to be forfeited in the event of any crime which attracted a sentence of more than six months. He was already suffering hard times and had pawned his medal for just eight shillings (40p). The Metropolitan Police who arrested him had to retrieve the VC from the pawnbrokers and the War Office paid the redemption fee.

There is a lot more to the story which you can see in the link above including him finally being recognised with a Victoria Cross headstone 80 years after his death. A service which i attended :)
 
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