Pentagon now considering database of medal recipients

— -- After years of rejecting the idea, the Pentagon is now considering the creation of a publicly accessible database of military valor awards as a way to deter military fakers.

The internal review comes after the Supreme Court in June struck down a 2006 law that made it a federal crime to lie about receiving military medals. The high court said the law violated the First Amendment right to free speech.

However, the justices acknowledged that preserving the integrity of military honors is important. They specifically suggested that the Defense Department help create an online database where the public could check up on politicians, job applicants and others who claim to be decorated heroes.

Now the Defense Department agrees that may be a good idea. "We are exploring the option of standing up a database of valor awards," Pentagon spokesman George Little said Tuesday. "We have not arrived at a conclusion yet, but that process is ongoing."

The study will be led by Erin Conaton, the Defense Department's undersecretary for personnel and readiness, Little said.

The decision to consider the database reverses the Pentagon's longstanding dismissal of the idea. As recently as July 5 a Pentagon official said there were no plans to revisit the matter because a 2009 study concluded that a database was not viable because of privacy concerns and missing personnel records burned in a 1973 fire.

The scope of a potential database remains unclear. "We are talking about not just Medals of Honor, but a wide range and a very large number of other awards," Little said.

Including a broader group of medals would make the database more effective, but Little said the goal would be to ensure there is "integrity to the data."

Under current military procedures, most valor awards are handled locally by individual commands and their records are maintained locally.

The Supreme Court pointed to several non-governmental efforts to create a database, such as the Military Times Hall of Valor, which includes more than 100,000 citations of post-Civil War awards, including the Medal of Honor and all of the second-tier valor awards, the Distinguished Service Cross, Navy Cross and Air Force Cross.

Advocates for a large-scale database say the Pentagon is overstating the challenges.

Doug Sterner, curator of the Military Times Hall of Valor, estimates that compiling a comprehensive database would cost no more than $10 million. That would cover the costs of hiring a team of data entry workers to type and digitalize existing unclassified government records.