After a North Vietnamese mortar shell rocks their Douglas AC-47 gunship, A1C John L. Levitow, stunned and wounded by shrapnel, flings himself on an activated, smoking magnesium flare, drags himself and the flare to the open cargo door, and tosses it out of the aircraft just before the flare ignites. For saving his fellow crew members and the gunship, Levitow is later awarded the Medal of Honor. He is the first enlisted man to receive the MOH for action in Vietnam.
The U.S. military is maintaining a beefed-up presence in the Middle East, including fighters and air defense assets, following the U.S. strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities June 22 and subsequent retaliation by the Iranians against Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar.
