Why a Medal of Honor Recipient is Suing Former Employer BAE Systems

The Medal of Honor is the highest military decoration in the United States.

It is awarded to those who display courage on the battlefield above and beyond the call of duty.

Marine Sergeant Dakota Meyer is a recipient.

He received the Medal of Honor from President Obama two months ago, for his service in Afghanistan.

And yesterday Sergeant Meyer filed a defamation lawsuit against defense contractor, BAE Systems.

Sergeant Meyer was working for the company earlier this year but got into a dispute with his superiors.

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Lisa Mullins: The Medal of Honor is this nation’s highest military decoration. It’s awarded to those who display courage on the battlefield above and beyond the call of duty. Marine Sergeant Dakota Meyer is a recipient. He received the Medal of Honor from President Obama two months ago for his service in Afghanistan. And yesterday, Sergeant Meyer filed a defamation lawsuit against the defense contractor, BAE Systems. Sergeant Meyer was working for the company earlier this year, but he got into a dispute with his supervisors. Julian Barnes is reporting this story in today’s Wall Street Journal. He’s now in Washington, DC. Remind us first, Julian, what Dakota Meyer did to earn the Medal of Honor.

Julian Barnes: in 2009 Dakota Meyer was stationed along the Afghan Pakistan border. His group of marines and soldiers he was traveling with came under a ambush attack from Taliban insurgents. Sergeant Meyer, then a corporal, was at the back of that patrol. He was told to stay there, but he disobeyed orders, making multiple runs with his Humvee to rescue soldiers and marines. That was in 2009 and then he left the military in 2010.

Mullins: And he took a job ultimately with BAE, this is a British company that has operations here in the United States. What happened to him at BAE that got him into trouble with his bosses?

Barnes: He was working on a system of weapons, scopes, thermal scopes for snipers. And is trained as a sniper, he was expert at showing how these systems worked training soldiers. Also, finding improvement of them. That there was, according to his lawsuit, a proposal within BAE to try and sell these to Pakistan. Like many soldiers and marines who’ve been stationed along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, Dakota Meyer had a, has a view of Pakistan as an unreliable ally at best. He wrote into his supervisor that he joined BAE to try to help the guys in the field, and here he felt that he would be doing something that would harm them.

Mullins: So is this particular kind of sniper scope something that Dakota Meyer would especially take issue with versus any other kind of defense equipment he worked with?

Barnes: Well, the reason Dakota Meyer according to the lawsuit took issue with this is he felt that the scopes that BAE had developed were better than the scopes that the US soldiers and marines currently had in the field. And so he was making the case we’re about to give Pakistan, or sell to Pakistan, a scope that’s better than the US guys have on the other side of the field, and that is what really galled him because he didn’t trust the Pakistanis not to give these to the Taliban, and he didn’t trust the Pakistanis to not use them against the US.

Mullins: Okay, so what Dakota Meyer then is saying, this Marine Sergeant and Medal of Honor recipient, is saying is that the company then, BAE retaliated against him. How?

Barnes: In retaliation, according to the lawsuit, he said they began ridiculing him. The supervisor sort of made it uncomfortable, mocked the fact that Mr. Meyer was up for the Medal of Honor. And then his supervisor, according to the lawsuit, started making remarks to people that Dakota Meyer had a drinking problem and that he was mentally unstable. Most damaging to Dakota Meyer, according to the lawsuit, the supervisor after Dakota decided to leave BAE told this other company that was gonna hire Dakota that he was mentally unstable and had a drinking problem. This is what the defamation at the heart of the lawsuit is.

Mullins: So what is BAE saying in response?

Barnes: Well, this is a difficult position for a major defense contractor. They obviously have to, they want to, they are going to defend themselves from this lawsuit, but they also don’t want to be seen to denigrate Dakota Meyer and bent over backward yesterday to acknowledge his service to the country and to talk about how much of an inspiring person he is.

Mullins: Julian, I know that you covered Dakota Meyer when he was given the Medal of Honor. Is there a bigger picture here of perhaps recent veterans, veterans of particularly Afghanistan and Iraq and their relationship with the defense industry as it is now? Is there anything bigger here or is this you think a one off involving a very prominent veteran?

Barnes: You know, it’s interesting that you ask that. This morning after the story ran I got a number of emails from veterans who said thanks for writing this story; you know, Dakota Meyer is famous, but we’ve had that happen on a smaller level with us as we’ve tried to get jobs. You know, the military is very sensitive to veterans being portrayed as mentally unstable or having drinking problems. These are hot button issues for veterans. A lot of them think that they are stereotyped as mentally unstable because of their experiences in wars like Iraq and Afghanistan. So this story is resonating with a number of veterans and veteran groups.

Mullins: All right, Julian Barnes of the Wall Street Journal bringing us up to speed on the defamation lawsuit filed by Medal of Honor winner, Marine Sergeant Dakota Meyer against BAE Systems. Thank you, Julian.

Barnes: Thank you.

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Julian Barnes reported the story in today’s Wall Street Journal.