Winning the Medal of Honor can be a lengthy process. And do recipients get anything other than the distinctive light-blue-beribboned medal? Nearly 1 million medals have been awarded to troops in Afghanistan and Iraq, but most are given wholesale to entire units at the end of their tours, and aren’t so much for courage as for persistence there have been only eight Medals of Honor won since 9/11. So just what does it take to win the Medal of Honor, generally awarded by the President on behalf of Congress, which is why it is sometimes called the Congressional Medal of Honor? By law, it is awarded to someone who has “distinguished himself conspicuously by gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty.” (One woman has earned the distinction: Mary Walker for her medical work during the Civil War.) There are lesser awards for bravery, but the Medal of Honor is reserved only for the most valorous actions. He was cited for trying to save comrades caught in an ambush in Korengal Valley – terrain since relinquished by the U.S. The next day, the White House announced that Salvatore Giunta, 25, would be the first living recipient of the nation’s highest decoration for battlefield bravery since Vietnam. and Afghan troops during a nighttime firefight in Konar Province near the Pakistan border. Last Thursday, the White House awarded the medal to Robert Miller, 24, who died in January 2008 while saving the lives of U.S. Follow week was an extraordinary one for the Medal of Honor, which the nation bestowed on two Army staff sergeants serving in Afghanistan.