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By Lauren Giella
Senior Reporter
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Photography by Robert Capa/ International Center of Photography/ Magnum Photos ; Illustration by Charlie Davis
Heroism is a fraught subject in the United States of America of 2026. In a nation so cleaved by political tribalism that even the meaning of patriotism is contested terrain, the heroes of one half tend to be villains for the other. Those called courageous by some are considered traitorous by others. We have sorted ourselves into competing mythologies, each with its own pantheon and its own enemies list—and the distance between them grows wider by the year.
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Which is why, on the occasion of America’s 250th birthday, it seems worthwhile to focus on a form of heroism that is undeniable to all: the acts of valor that have earned the Medal of Honor, the U.S. military’s highest distinction.
The criteria for the medal set out by federal law are demanding and narrow. To be considered, a service member must commit an act in direct combat that goes above and beyond the call of duty—often at the risk of, or the sacrifice of, their own life. A rigorous investigation is required which combs through eyewitness accounts and documentation, followed by a chain-of-command review and final approval by the president. Of the more than 40 million Americans who have served in uniform, only 3,536 have received the honor.
All of which is why the Medal of Honor is, by design, a limited definition of heroism never intended to exhaust the category. There are many heroes—in a classroom, an emergency room, or a community leveled by disaster, for example—who do not qualify. In one glaring example of its limits, because of the requirement that the medal be earned in combat roles, only one woman has been a recipient.
But that restricted scope exists precisely because the award is meant to honor something specific: the moment when a human being, under the most extreme duress imaginable, chooses to place the life of another over their own.
“It wasn’t courage that gave me the will to do what I had to do in Vietnam,” Sgt. Sammy Davis told Newsweek. He was recognized with the Medal of Honor in 1968 for crossing a river under enemy fire, already wounded himself, to pull three fallen soldiers to safety. “It was the love for my brothers.”
Defining the American Experiment
What makes this an especially fitting subject for America’s semiquincentennial is that the Medal of Honor captures both of the defining features of the American experiment, which have been in tension since the nation’s founding. They may never be fully resolved and perhaps never should.
We speak of the first, individual liberty, constantly. The language of rights, of personal freedom, of the self-reliant citizen who answers to no one and needs nothing from the crowd is the animating myth of the republic, inscribed in the Declaration of Independence and subject to discord ever since.
But there is a second essential element of America, one we’re prone to omit during our perpetual internecine quarrels: The American Revolution was not won by individuals, but by the citizens of 13 separate colonies, wary of one another, divided by geography, economy and culture but who chose nevertheless, against considerable odds and at great personal peril, to act as one to become the United States. “We must all hang together,” Benjamin Franklin is credited with saying at the signing of the declaration, “or, most assuredly, we shall all hang separately.”
He was making a gallows joke, but he was also stating the foundational logic of the republic that individual liberty, unmoored from collective commitment, is just another word for vulnerability. The first word of the Constitution, after all, is not “I” but “We.”
The nation’s third president, Thomas Jefferson, understood this, too. In his first inaugural address in 1801, to a country already fracturing along partisan lines that would look familiar today, he implored his fellow citizens to “unite with one heart and one mind,” and reminded them that without the “harmony and affection” of social bonds, “liberty and even life itself are but dreary things.”
At its core, the Medal of Honor is a monument to both of these characteristics. It is not awarded for individual accomplishment alone—not for the most kills, the highest rank or the longest service, but for a decision, often made in a fraction of a second, to put someone else first. That sentiment—not patriotism in the abstract but love in the particular—runs through every account of a Medal of Honor action. And it is a love as old as the republic itself.
To celebrate America’s 250th birthday, Newsweek is honoring these brave men (and one woman) who put their lives on the line for their country and their fellow soldiers. In partnership with the National Medal of Honor Museum in Arlington, Texas, we are highlighting 250 of their courageous and heroic stories. While this list only represents a fraction of those brave military actions, each serves as a reminder of the kinds of sacrifice that were required to build our country—an essential part of the American spirit if we are to sustain it.
A Single Decision Made Under Fire
The Medal of Honor was born at the moment when American unity faced its greatest challenge. In 1861 during the Civil War, Senator James W. Grimes of Iowa, the chairman of the Committee on Naval Affairs, introduced a bill to create a medal to bestow upon sailors for valiant action during battle. The following year, a similar bill for a Medal of Honor for the Army was introduced by Senator Henry Wilson of Massachusetts. Today, there are individual versions for the Navy, Army and Air Force.
The 3,536 Americans who have since received the accolade come from every corner of the country and era of its history—western folk heroes, Native American tribal leaders, immigrants, freed slaves and future movie stars, senators and presidents. They fought across more than 20 conflicts, from the Civil War to the Global War on Terror. What they share is not background or biography, but a single decision made under fire.
“[Medal of Honor recipients] chose to do something extraordinary in a moment that mattered, and we can all make that same choice in our own lives,” said Cory Crowley, the executive vice president of the National Medal of Honor Museum Foundation. The medal, he says, symbolizes what we can be as individuals and as a country “when we put our own selves aside and think about others.”
“You don’t have to put on a military uniform to do it, you don’t have to be in a particular field to do it. You can do it for your family, your community or your peers at any time.”
After walking into a deadly ambush of Viet Cong forces, Col. Jack Jacobs took charge, fought back, led his men out of rice paddies that had become a kill zone, then repeatedly risked his own life to pull the wounded soldiers who remained to safety. In that moment, Jacobs told Newsweek, he knew that he was the only person who could help because so many others had already been incapacitated. “I thought that if somebody didn’t do something, we were all going to die,” Jacobs said. “Nothing brings out leadership, nothing brings out filial piety, nothing brings out friendship and sacrifice more than being in combat with people on whom you rely and who rely on you.”
The stories of Medal of Honor recipients have been recounted in books and reenacted on screen, to be revered by history buffs and casual film fans alike because their actions have less to do with the geopolitical context of the war they fought and more to do with the sheer selflessness, courage and humanity displayed in the face of certain death.
These men were young and had volunteered for or were drafted into wars they had no say in starting. They were no doubt scared, but they knew it was their duty to serve as part of a team to complete their mission and protect their platoons, because if they didn’t, it would be another mother’s son, another woman’s husband, another child’s father facing down enemy fire.
Author and military historian Barrett Tillman has written several books about Medal of Honor recipients, including 2002’s Above and Beyond: The Aviation Medals of Honor. As he’s come to know Medal of Honor recipients throughout his career, he said there is one consistent factor among them. “The enduring lesson is unflinching loyalty to one’s friends in dire circumstances,” Tillman told Newsweek. “That sentiment is separate from patriotism, although I’ve never known or met a recipient who was anything other than ‘True Red, White and Blue.’”
‘You Don’t Think About Your Own Fear’
Spc. 5 Jim McCloughan was gearing up to be a teacher and wrestling coach when he got the call from Uncle Sam to head out to Vietnam in 1968. “I was only doing my job,” he told Newsweek. “I had a spot on the team, and my job was being their medic, and I tried to do that the best that I could.”
McCloughan credits the mental discipline and self-reliance he learned facing his opponent one-on-one on the mat as a college wrestler for preparing him for what he needed to do in a war zone, surrounded by enemy fighters, to save wounded soldiers.
McCloughan earned his Medal of Honor for his actions during a 48-hour period in May of 1969 when he repeatedly ran into open fields amid enemy fire while advancing on Nui Yon Hill to treat and rescue wounded soldiers, refusing evacuation to treat his own injuries.
“I thought about what I needed to do to save that other individual,” he said. “People can’t tell me that they’re not afraid in those situations, because I can tell you that the adrenaline is flowing as fast as it can flow. But if you think about the other person and concentrate on what you’re doing, then you don’t think about your own fear.”
After the war, he returned home and spent four decades as a teacher and coach at South Haven High School before he was presented with the medal in 2017. Now 80 years old, McCloughan says that he wears his medal for the 89 men he went into battle with, the unknown soldiers who never came home and the soldiers whose heroic acts were witnessed by no one.
For soldiers like him, the action that earned a Medal of Honor was not a brave decision; to them, it was the only decision. They did not jump on a grenade or charge at an enemy tank because they wanted a shiny medal or bragging rights. They did it because they found themselves at a place and time where it was only their actions that could ensure those they were fighting alongside would make it home.
Meredith Rollins is a producer and writer for Medal of Honor: Stories of Courage, a podcast hosted by journalist Malcolm Gladwell and author, advocate and U.S. Army veteran J.R. Martinez.
“All of these men felt like they were just doing their job,” she told Newsweek, “and even the stories that are so improbable and reflect such heroism or such brilliant split-second decision-making—those people still look back on that action and say, ‘I’m doing what anybody else in my situation would have done.’”
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The Potential To Be Extraordinary
Most of us will never step foot on a battlefield or experience war firsthand. But that doesn’t mean we can’t be heroes. That duty to protect the people around us is not confined to combat. You don’t need to wear fatigues to fulfill that bedrock American obligation. It’s the same spirit that pushes all of us to show up for family, friends and strangers alike and do the right thing even when no one’s looking, without expectation of reward.
When Davis, Jacobs, McCloughan and other Vietnam veterans returned home to the United States, it was a tumultuous time of anti-war sentiment, social change and political unrest. But as he travels around the country speaking with schools and other community organizations, McCloughan offers a message of peace.
“I would love to see us have a little more harmony in this country,” he said. “We have to enjoy the freedom, but not to a point where we’re selfish or egocentric. What is it that I can do for my neighbor, what is it that I can do for my family?”
If the message of the Medal of Honor can be summed up by one idea, it is that we are all born with the potential to be extraordinary.
“We’re not asking you to do the impossible or go out and be a perfect person,” the Medal of Honor Museum’s Crowley said. “We’re just asking you, in those very consequential times when you know that your actions may be the only actions that can have an impact on that situation, it is incumbent upon you to think about others and to do the right thing.”
And as its recipients explain, courage doesn’t just happen when you’re outnumbered and facing enemy fire in the depths of a hostile jungle or a foreign hilltop. Courage is needed every day.
“Anytime you say valor or bravery, people always think about physical bravery, but just as important is moral courage—and there is a paucity of that,” Jacobs said.
“I’m afraid we need more of it if we’re going to be successful for the next 250 years,” he continued. “These are all things that we know work in combat, and they have to work in civilian life as well.”
Photography by Robert Capa/ International Center of Photography/ Magnum Photos
Read more in our stories on the living Medal of Honor recipients, the history of discrimination that delayed Medal of Honor recognition and the Medal of Honor in film; and see our gallery of 250 recipients.
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