The award criteria have changed over time to include different types of injuries and different types of combat.
More than 1.8 million Purple Heart medals have been presented to military service members since the award was created in 1792, according to the National Purple Heart Hall of Honor.
“The Purple Heart Medal means a hell of a lot to me and almost every flag officer that I have met in the last 30 years. You don’t ask for it. You don’t aspire to it. You don’t run towards it. It’s just, you got it because you bled for the country,” explained Irwin Joel Brilliant, 80, who retired from the U.S. Navy after 30 years of service.
Brilliant is a Vietnam War veteran who, as a lieutenant, commanded roughly 60 sailors under the Mobile Support Team - 2 (MST 2) as part of a Special Warfare Combatant Craft Crewman (SWCC) team responsible for reconnaissance and boat operations for Sea, Air, and Land (SEAL) team night operations.
Brilliant graduated from the University of North Carolina with a naval reserve officer training corps scholarship and commissioned as a naval officer in 1966. Two years later, he was sent to Vietnam.
“I am a survivor of the Vietnam War,” Brilliant explained. “When we came back, not only were we somewhat ignored, we were spat upon. The Vietnam War was probably 90% political and everybody hated the war and hated the loss of life and we were the convenient target for their anger and disgust, even though most of the guys were drafted. They went and fought, not because they volunteered for it, so these holidays are the opportunity for the civilians to step up and show their appreciation for the ones who have sacrificed the most either by getting wounded in combat or died from combat.”
The U.S. military had a total of 58,220 in-theater deaths during the Vietnam War; 2,566 of those killed were Sailors, according to the Defense Casualty Analysis System.
Brilliant completed two tours in Vietnam and operated out of the Binh Thuy Naval Support Activity base on the Bassac River in the middle of the Mekong Delta in southern Vietnam, approximately five miles upriver from the U.S. Army base of Can Tho. During Brilliant’s first tour, from 1968 to 1969, he served as the boat squadron commander for a team of eight men.
Brilliant traveled about three times a week in an Army helicopter, usually a Bell UH-1 Iroquois, commonly known as a Huey, to do reconnaissance in preparation for SEAL team operations that would occur one to two weeks later and usually at night.
“It was my responsibility to do the recon because it was my team’s responsibility to get the platoon or the squad from where we were to an operating target area. It’s all via the rivers and canals, so I would be doing the recon for the target operation that would be the following week usually. We would do the recon a week or two or more in advance for obvious tactical reasons,” he recalled.
Brilliant’s team also operated two boats, usually one 24-footer and one 36-footer, for a 12-man SEAL team and provided cover fire for night operations that took place about four times a week. Cover consisted of .50 caliber machine guns mounted on the boats, mini guns, mortars, or grenade launchers depending on the requirements of the mission, which included riverside ambushes, preventing kidnappings, and controlling weapons trafficking.
“We would capture or stop the transportation of people, weapons, and supplies, on the river or inland, and depending on where it was, would determine who was really doing the bulk of the work. If it was anything inland, off the water, the SEAL squad or platoon would go independently. We would land them and then we would extract them. We would also provide any cover that they needed, also coordinate any air coverage that they needed,” Brilliant said.
In the late 1960s, Brilliant’s team used 36-foot Landing Craft Personnel Light dating from World War II that were modified for weapons and armament or modified Boston Whaler boats that ranged from 13 to 16 feet. During that same period, Boat Support Unit 1 based in Coronado, California, produced new boats designed specifically for SEAL team operations including the 36-foot Medium SEAL Support Craft (MSSC) and the 24-foot Light SEAL Support Craft (LSSC), a major improvement for operations.
“24-footer propulsion was twin 427 forward gas engines,” explained Brilliant. “The same engine you’d see in a huge Ford car. You couldn’t hear it when it was coming towards you. It would go about 70 knots top speed with eight fully loaded men onboard … Conceptually, you wanted to come in at night, slow and in the dark, not be seen or heard. When you leave you want to go out of there going 70 knots.”
After his first tour was up, Brilliant re-upped for a second tour, which began in early 1970 and ended at the end of the year. He served in the same command and was the officer in charge of approximately 60 men from eight boat detachments in the southern Vietnam. It was during his second tour that Brilliant received a Purple Heart for an injury sustained during an early morning recovery effort.
On May 15, 1970, MST 2 grounded a boat with SEALs onboard in a mud flat at about 3 a.m. and needed help getting out of the mud. Brilliant arranged for a U.S. Army Boeing CH-47 Chinook helicopter to transport him and another Sailor to the location of the stranded boat at dawn.
“One of my guys and I jumped off the rear of the Chinook into the mud while boats off the side were suppressing the sporadic enemy small arms fire through the tree line,” he recounted. “Then we lashed heavy cables to the Chinook and the boat. The Chinook was able to lift the boat out of the mud area and put it in the river, but we covered it and got it back to where it was based.”
When he jumped into the mud, he landed on a punji stick, which pierced through his boot, puncturing his foot. A punji stick is a sharpened bamboo stick set in a pit with its point facing upward. Booby trapped pits usually contained several punji sticks that were concealed from view and often covered in feces to promote infection.
Brilliant remembered his foot hurting, but he was too busy to pay attention to the pain. “Two or three hours later, after showering and cleaning up, the puncture I had in my foot, which went through my boot, still looked a little bit ugly, so I went to a corpsman to get it cleaned to make sure I wouldn’t have any infections,” he said. “The corpsman taped it up, and that was it … he put the report in.”
Brilliant received a Purple Heart for his injury. He completed his tour in Vietnam and continued to serve in the Navy for more 30 years; half of his time as active duty and the other half as a part-time U.S. Navy Reservist. Brilliant retired as a Captain in Sept. 1996.
When Brilliant thinks back to his time in Vietnam, he said Bill Early comes to mind. Early commanded SEAL Team Two during the Vietnam War and was often referred to as the “father of the SEAL team,” according to Brilliant. Seal Team Two and Brilliant’s team conducted complex missions in areas that only the Vietnamese had previously navigated.
Brilliant described the missions as “brand new and creative” and credited Early with the idea. “He drew up the operational plans with us. Just his style, his mannerism, his engagement with us, probably created one of the more important and successful styles. If I’m having an operation and I’m the guy in charge, I’m going to be engaging all of my enlisted men for their input and their expertise and their knowledge to make that as successful an operation as possible. That, in those days, was unheard of for an officer,” recalled Brilliant.
Those lessons stuck with Brilliant when he transitioned to the private sector after retiring from military service. He still relies on those lessons as a volunteer for veterans organizations like the Military Order of the Purple Heart (MOPH), where he serves as the state commander.
Brilliant and other Purple Heart recipients attend events such as reinternments or burials of World War II or Korean War veterans at Punchbowl and render honors to the deceased military members and their families along with other veteran organizations such as the American Legion and Veterans of Foreign Wars.
As a group, MOPH members also meet monthly. Brilliant sees value in these regular meetings of Purple Heart recipients.
“It’s an opportunity for the members to really spend an hour or two with veterans who have been wounded and feel comfortable that they can both share their experience formally or informally, fully or just partially, but be recognized for that sacrifice, be appreciated for that sacrifice where they wouldn’t feel comfortable doing that in public.”
Brilliant is also on the board of directors of the Wounded Warrior Ohana, a nonprofit that helps service members and their families improve their relationships and engagements for better overall health, safety, and life enjoyment. He is also on the board of directors for the Oahu Veterans Council with the group’s founder, Edward R. Cruickshank, 79, a fellow Purple Heart recipient as well as the chapter commander of Oahu’s MOPH with its 13 members.
Cruickshank said National Purple Heart Day is an opportunity for the community to thank all military personnel for serving, especially the Purple Heart recipients.
“I think it’s a big day for all of us, but the real thing is to honor those that are no longer here and honor their families for the sacrifices that everybody made,” he said.
Brilliant said he’s moved by the way the Oahu community responds to the military.