Remember the Ramrods: An Army Brotherhood in War and Peace

An extraordinary re-envisioning of the scope and ambitions of the contemporary military memoir: the Iraq War’s only living Medal of Honor recipient examines the bonds and wounds of war across two decades.After fourteen years apart, forty veterans of brutal close-quarters combat, lost souls to a man, were brought back together when one of them, the author, received the Medal of Honor.

Their impromptu reunion in June 2019 helped heal them all—and saved more than a few of them too.

This is their story.In 2004, David Bellavia’s U.S.

Army unit, an infantry battalion known as the Ramrods—2nd Battalion 2nd infantry regiment, 1st Infantry Division—fought and helped win the Battle of Fallujah, the bloodiest episode of the Iraq War.

On November 10, 2004, Bellavia single-handedly cleared a fortified enemy position that had pinned down a squad from his platoon.