The Chula Vista family of fallen Marine Sgt. Rafael Peralta will accept his Navy Cross during a Camp Pendleton ceremony June 8 — more than six years after the medal was first awarded.
The Peraltas’ decision is a milestone, but perhaps not the conclusion, in a controversial case that has seen many unusual developments involving whether he should receive the nation’s highest combat decoration, the Medal of Honor.
Marine officials nominated Peralta for the top distinction after he reportedly used his body to smother a grenade in Fallujah, Iraq, in 2004. President George W. Bush publicly praised him, and he has been lionized in books and a documentary.
But in a much-dissected decision, then-Defense Secretary Robert Gates ultimately chose not to approve the Medal of Honor for Peralta because of questions surrounding whether he was already too injured to understand what he was doing. Gates’ decision came after he convened an unprecedented review panel that involved experts in areas such as forensics, medicine and the military.
The overall body of evidence in the case includes the panel’s findings, testimony from troops who said they witnessed Peralta’s heroism and other Marines who said the tale of valor was made up.
Until now, Peralta’s family has declined to accept the posthumous Navy Cross, the nation’s second-highest combat decoration for valor.
“The Navy Cross doesn’t make him any more of a hero than he already is. The Marine Corps and every congressman who worked for his due recognition already knew of his true value,” Rosa Maria Peralta, his mother, said through a translator Thursday.
“We are receiving the medal now because its motive is for a greater cause. That is to offer the medal to the USS Rafael Peralta in his honor. That ship contains his spirit,” she said.
In 2012, the Navy announced that it would build and name a destroyer in honor of Peralta — a tribute that apparently contributed to the family’s change of heart.
Rafael’s younger brother, Ricardo, said his mother’s decision to receive the award is partly spurred by fatigue from the long fight to get a medal upgrade.
“She’s growing older. She can only take so much. It took a toll,” said Ricardo Peralta, who enlisted in the Marine Corps in 2010 to honor his brother’s memory. The 24-year-old is now a student at Southwestern College in Chula Vista. “It is emotionally stressful. I’ve tried to ignore the politics of it.”
Navy Secretary Ray Mabus is scheduled to award the Navy Cross, a Camp Pendleton spokeswoman said Thursday. The Washington Post first reported the upcoming ceremony.
Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Alpine, will also try to attend, spokesman Joe Kasper said.
Hunter, also a Marine veteran who served in Iraq, helped lead the fight to upgrade Peralta’s medal.
And that battle may not be over.
Kasper said Hunter is biding his time. Mid- and high-level bureaucrats in the Pentagon who may have blocked the appeals starting with Gates’ tenure will eventually retire.
All this is going to take is someone who will take an objective look,” Kasper said. “There will be a right opportunity to start working this again. This is not the time.”
