TSgt. Joseph Deslauriers received the Silver Star for gallantry during combat in Afghanistan last year during a Nov. 14 ceremony at the Pentagon. Despite being injured by an IED detonator Desalauriers, an Explosive Ordnance Disposal technician aided in disarming the device, clearing the way for the evacuation of two injured Marines on Sept. 23, 2011. The act was “less as a case of spontaneous valor and more as a predictable outcome of circumstance and character intercepting on the battlefield,” Col. Jim Slife, commander of the 1st Special Operations Wing, said at the ceremony. “Valor is of the moment—character is built over a lifetime,” he added. Earlier during the same patrol, Deslauriers disarmed an IED, aided in treating wounded comrades, and cleared a helicopter landing zone to evacuate the injured. He was assigned to the 1st Special Operations Civil Engineer Squadron at Hurlburt Field, Fla. (Hurlburt report by A1C Hayden Hyatt)
While U.S. defense officials have spent much of the past decade warning that China is the nation’s pacing threat and its People’s Liberation Army represents an urgent threat in the Indo-Pacific, several defense researchers are skeptical that the PLA has the human capital, the structural ability, or the political appetite…