Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth presented upgraded valor awards to three Marines who held their ground during the 2021 Abbey Gate suicide bombing in Kabul, five years after Pentagon bureaucrats quietly downgraded their original commendations.
At a ceremony in the Pentagon's Hall of Heroes on Wednesday, Hegseth pinned Bronze Star Medals with "V" devices for valor on Gunnery Sgt. Jonathan Eby and Lance Cpl. Jordan Houston. Cpl. Michael Gretzon received a Navy and Marine Corps Commendation Medal with a "V" device. All three earned the recognition for actions during and after the August 26, 2021, ISIS-K suicide bombing at Abbey Gate that killed 13 American service members and at least 170 Afghan civilians, Newsmax reported.
The awards came only after a War Department review concluded that original valor recommendations for the Marines had been inappropriately downgraded, a finding Hegseth did not let pass without comment. Seven Marines total had their awards upgraded as part of that review, though the Pentagon has not publicly identified the other four.
Hegseth calls out 'bureaucratic caution or maybe politics' behind five-year delay
Hegseth framed the ceremony as both an overdue correction and a rebuke of the leadership culture that allowed it to happen. He told the audience the three Marines stood in the blast zone with minimal cover, fully aware of an imminent suicide threat, yet refused to abandon their post because fellow Marines and thousands of civilians depended on them.
When the bomb detonated, Hegseth said, the three did not seek cover. They secured the perimeter, kept their fellow Marines focused, and pulled wounded to safety.
"Yet for half a decade, this building allowed bureaucratic caution or maybe politics to stand in the way of proper recognition. Today, on this milestone anniversary, we declare that those days are over."
He went further, tying the award downgrades to a broader institutional failure. As Fox News reported, Hegseth argued that a military unwilling to honor its frontline heroes projects weakness rather than strength.
"For too long, leadership in this capital city failed to match that frontline courage with administrative backbone, inappropriately downgrading the original award submissions that these men rightfully deserved. You see, a military that downplays its front-line heroes to avoid uncomfortable political truths only projects weakness."
Hegseth has made a series of forceful moves since taking the helm at the Pentagon, from ordering annual testosterone screenings for troops over 30 to restructuring how the department handles media access. The Abbey Gate ceremony fit squarely within his stated mission of restoring what he calls the "warrior spirit" inside the defense establishment.
'Bold as lions', what the three Marines did at Abbey Gate
Hegseth opened his remarks with a line from the Book of Proverbs: "The wicked flee when no one pursues, but the righteous are as bold as a lion." He applied it directly to Eby, Gretzon, and Houston.
"On that chaotic day, you men were bold as lions. When the wicked sought to sow terror, these men stood as lions at that gate, bold in their purpose, fierce in their resolve, and unbreakable in their courage."
The mission the Marines were given, Hegseth said, was "almost unfathomably unpredictable, difficult, and fraught with an unknown amount of risk, yet known at the same time, which is sort of the worst duality." He described the Abbey Gate assignment as one where the threat was acknowledged but the Marines had no option to withdraw.
The New York Post reported that Hegseth directly accused the Biden administration of downgrading the original award submissions for political reasons, a charge the former administration has not publicly addressed.
Hegseth pledged that the pattern would not continue under his watch.
"America's warriors will be fiercely supported, and our military's lethal edge will not be compromised by deskbound bureaucracy or lawyers in the cheap seats."
The Pentagon has navigated a turbulent stretch under Hegseth's leadership, including an ongoing power struggle with Army Secretary Driscoll, who plans to step down by year's end. But the Abbey Gate ceremony drew bipartisan attention to a question that has lingered since 2021: why the Marines who responded to one of the deadliest attacks of the entire Afghanistan war waited years for proper recognition.
Hidden classified documents surface in renewed Afghanistan withdrawal review
The ceremony also carried a forward-looking dimension. Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell announced that investigators had recently recovered classified documents related to the Afghanistan withdrawal, material he said had been deliberately concealed.
Parnell, as the Washington Examiner reported, did not hold back about the discovery.
"Recently, my team recovered highly relevant classified documents, material that should have been disclosed, stashed and hidden away in safes where they would not be found."
Parnell added that the review would follow the evidence "to wherever it leads and to whoever it touches," and that the department would not accept "incomplete or comfortable answers." The broader Afghanistan withdrawal review remains ongoing, and Hegseth said a final report is expected by the end of the year.
The Pentagon's original investigation of the Abbey Gate attack concluded that no enemy small-arms fire followed the blast, and that shots heard afterward were warning shots from U.S. and coalition personnel. A 2024 supplemental review reaffirmed those findings. Hegseth's description of the Marines pulling wounded to safety "under direct fire" introduces a tension that the available reporting does not resolve.
Hegseth has also been at the center of other significant policy shifts, including a directive from President Trump to scale back joint military exercises with South Korea and a recent legal win when an appeals court reinstated the Pentagon's escort requirement for journalists.
Trump marks the anniversary with pointed blame for Biden
President Trump posted on Truth Social to mark the fifth anniversary, honoring the 13 service members killed and placing blame for the attack squarely on the withdrawal ordered by former President Joe Biden.
"This catastrophe was a result of Sleepy Joe Biden's totally botched Withdrawal from the Country, which left our wonderful Servicemen and women defenseless, and allowed the Taliban to free thousands of bloodthirsty terrorists and criminals held at Bagram Prison."
Trump called the Abbey Gate bombing "one of the greatest atrocities in the History of our Nation" and said it resulted from "the sheer incompetence of Joe Biden and the Democrats who were in charge." The Pentagon identified the bomber as Abdul Rahman al-Logari, a member of ISIS-K, the Islamic State's Afghanistan affiliate.
The attack on August 26, 2021, remains the single deadliest day for American forces in Afghanistan in over a decade. It came during the final, chaotic days of the U.S. withdrawal from a 20-year war, as thousands of Afghans and Americans crowded the gates of Hamid Karzai International Airport seeking evacuation. Gold Star families have spent the years since pressing for transparency about what the Defense Department knew and when.
Hegseth cast the ceremony as part of a larger effort to rebuild trust between the Pentagon and the men and women it sends into combat. He said the upgraded awards were not just about correcting a bureaucratic failure but about restoring deterrence itself.
"It starts with the sacred trust between the War Department and the warriors we send into harm's way."
Three Marines held the line at Abbey Gate when everything around them fractured. It took five years and a change in leadership for the Pentagon to hold up its end.
