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NCO pitches a new award for grunts who’ve earned the CIB and EIB

If you ask Sgt. Robert Flak, he’ll tell you it’s not fair that infantrymen who’ve earned the Combat Infantryman Badge and Expert Infantryman Badge are not allowed to wear both awards at the same time — and he’s not even a grunt. “I was always around the infantry, and I’d hear them talking about how…

If you ask Sgt. Robert Flak, he’ll tell you it’s not fair that infantrymen who’ve earned the Combat Infantryman Badge and Expert Infantryman Badge are not allowed to wear both awards at the same time — and he’s not even a grunt.

“I was always around the infantry, and I’d hear them talking about how they had to pick between the EIB and the CIB, and … they never get passing recognition from their peers or subordinates or superiors,” said Flak, a human resources specialist. “I thought, ‘this is not fair,’ but they said, ‘this is how it is.’”

But Flak feels so strongly about it that he has designed a new badge that would represent both infantry awards, and he’s actively spreading the word about the award, talking to anybody who will listen. He’s even pitched a written proposal to senior Army leaders, including Sergeant Major of the Army Dan Dailey.

via www.armytimes.com

As a dual qualified guy, I kinda like this idea.

I fairly often ignored a minor provision of AR670-1 and wore the EIB from time to time, as I actually had to work for that.

But I was (and stil am) proud of my CIB.

This should be a fairly simple process.

And let us not forget our medic brothers, and do the same for them.

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Responses to “NCO pitches a new award for grunts who’ve earned the CIB and EIB”

  1. ron snyder

    Seems to this Not a Former Army type that the EIB is an invented badge for those that went thru some training. CIB is an award to recognize that you saw the Elephant. EIB? So you had some training. Medals should mean something, not just that you had training or were physically somewhere, or were in a specific unit. Should troops get a medal because they went thru some PT?
    My Dad (WWII ETO) thought that of all his medals the CIB was the one he was most proud of. EIB? I think he would have laughed at that, even be a bit irritated at it being a spin-off of the CIB.

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  2. SFC Dunlap 173d RVN

    Is this duffel blog??

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  3. timactual

    “as I actually had to work for that”
    You didn’t have to work for your CIB? I sure worked for mine.

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  4. Esli

    Ron, historically the passing rate for EIB testing is about ten percent. It doesn’t just reflect “some training” but that the wearer is truly an expert in the necessary skills of the job and was tested to an exacting standard and graded by a person that probably didn’t even want to pass you. Essentially every recipient met that standard, and you know that by virtue of the fact that they are wearing it. When it was invented, in the forties during war, the army authorized EIB recipients an extra $8 a month, which was nothing to sneeze at. Pretty sure CIB recipients don’t get extra pay… (obviously they get their combat pay but not for the CIB.) I don’t want to denigrate the CIB and it does mean something very honorable but many have been passed out more for “being there” as opposed to “having done that.” I don’t have a CIB and couldn’t, as I am a tanker (I earned my EIB in 1987 as an infantryman) and don’t have an opinion on the actual topic at hand but, of the perhaps 25 or so things I have been awarded over my time in the army, my EIB is one that I am probably most proud of. Lastly I will say that as we revert to a peacetime army again, more or less, the EIB is the gold standard for what we want our infantrymen to be wearing.

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  5. Grumpy Old Fart

    I was 1 of 3 in my Battalion that was awarded an EIB in Berlin, 1981or 1982 (I’m old and suffer from CRS these days).
    I’ve heard it described by folks brighter than me that the difference between the two awards is that the EIB means you know your job, and the CIB means you did your job: I’ve always liked that definition.

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  6. McThag

    I’ll just sit here in my tank wearing my nothing badge…
    😉
    And my no-shoulder braid with my dress uniform…
    I was a “casualty” for the medic badge course once, those dudes DO work their asses off for it.

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  7. Krag

    Does having an EIB give you more points towards promotion? Is it a “win once, were always” thing, or re-certified periodically?

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  8. Esli

    I believe that it us ten promotion points. There is no requirement to recertify it. I did each task so many times in the training that I could probably still do them. Alas, the army has retired many of the items of equipment that I tested on.

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