The Army of Occupation of Germany Medal is a type of decoration of the United States military which was created by the (55 Stat. 781) act of the United States Congress on November 21, 1941. The decoration recognizes those members of the U.S. military who served in the European occupation force following the close of the First World War.
The medal is retroactive by design and is awarded to any service member who performed occupation garrison duty in either Germany, or the former Austria-Hungary, between the dates of November 12, 1918 and July 11, 1923. The medal was primarily created due to the rising tension with Germany, between 1939 and 1941, and also as a means to honor the World War I service of General of the Armies John J. Pershing, whose likeness appears on the actual medal. Initially the blue edge stripe was wavy, to signify the Rhine River, but that proved impractical to mass produce and was changed to a straight line.
The first Army of Occupation of Germany Medal was presented to General of the Armies Pershing with retroactive presentations made to any service member upon application to the United States War Department. Ironically, less than three weeks after the medal was first authorized, the United States was attacked at Pearl Harbor which led to another full-scale war with Germany, now allied with Japan.
Famous quotes containing the words army, occupation and/or germany:
“I was interested to see how a pioneer lived on this side of the country. His life is in some respects more adventurous than that of his brother in the West; for he contends with winter as well as the wilderness, and there is a greater interval of time at least between him and the army which is to follow. Here immigration is a tide which may ebb when it has swept away the pines; there it is not a tide, but an inundation, and roads and other improvements come steadily rushing after.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“It is impossible to enjoy idling thoroughly unless one has plenty of work to do. There is no fun in doing nothing when you have nothing to do. Wasting time is merely an occupation then, and a most exhausting one. Idleness, like kisses, to be sweet must be stolen.”
—Jerome K. Jerome (1859–1927)
“It is the emotions to which one objects in Germany most of all.”
—Franz Grillparzer (1791–1872)