175 articles
Max Manus
Max Manus (Maximo Guillermo Manus, 1914–1996) was a Norwegian resistance fighter in Kompani Linge and the Oslo gang, known for the Mardonius ship sabotage and the 1945 sinking of the Donau, later a businessman and subject of the 2008 film Max Manus.
Michael A. Grinston
Michael A. Grinston, a retired U.S. Army soldier, served as the 16th Sergeant Major of the Army from 2019 to 2023. He championed the Sergeants Major Assessment Program.
Michael Durant
Michael J. Durant (born 1961), American Army Night Stalker pilot, MH-60 Super Six Four, shot down October 3, 1993 at Mogadishu, held 11 days by Aidid forces, later author and Pinnacle Solutions CEO.
Mike Vining (soldier)
Mike R. Vining (born 1950) is a retired U.S. Army sergeant major, Vietnam EOD technician, and founding member of Delta Force, its first EOD specialist, veteran of Eagle Claw, Urgent Fury, and Desert Storm.
Mikhail Tolstykh (Михаил Сергеевич Толстых)
Mikhail Tolstykh (Михаил Сергеевич Толстых), call sign Givi, DPR separatist commander of the Somalia battalion in the Donbas war; fought at Ilovaisk and Donetsk airport, EU-sanctioned 2015, killed in Makeyevka office explosion 8 February 2017.
Military career of Elvis Presley
Elvis Presley's U.S. Army service, 1958-1960: drafted at Memphis, trained at Fort Hood with the 2d Medium Tank Battalion, 37th Armor, then served in the 3rd Armored Division at Friedberg, West Germany, rising to sergeant before discharge at Fort Dix.
Milunka Savić
Milunka Savić (Милунка Савић) was a Serbian war heroine of the Balkan Wars and the First World War, described as the most decorated woman soldier of the Great War.
Mohamedou Ould Slahi
Mohamedou Ould Slahi, Mauritanian writer born 1970, held 14 years at Guantánamo Bay without charge; author of the bestseller Guantánamo Diary (2015), basis of the 2021 film The Mauritanian; released October 17, 2016, now a Dutch citizen.
Nate Boyer
Nate Boyer is a retired Army Green Beret who became an NFL long snapper with Seattle in 2015 at 34 and co-founded Merging Vets & Players.
Nicholas Irving
Nicholas Irving, nicknamed "The Reaper", is a former US Army Ranger sniper of the 3rd Ranger Battalion, 75th Ranger Regiment, known for a claimed 33 kills in 100 days in Afghanistan, the memoir The Reaper, and Fox's American Grit.
Omar al-Mukhtar (عمر المختار)
Omar al-Mukhtar (عمر المختار), a Libyan teacher and Senussi sheikh, led the armed resistance to the Italian occupation of Cyrenaica for twenty years until his capture and hanging in 1931.
Oscar Jenkins
Oscar Jenkins, Australian teacher from Melbourne who joined Ukraine's International Legion in 2024, was captured by Russia in December 2024 and sentenced to 13 years as a mercenary by a Luhansk court; reports of his execution were disproven.
Peter Francisco
Peter Francisco (Pedro Francisco, 1760-1831), the "Virginia Giant," a Portuguese-born orphan raised in Virginia who became a celebrated Revolutionary War soldier; his documented service is real, but famous feats like the Camden cannon are largely legend.
Peter McAleese
Peter McAleese (1942–2024), Scottish soldier and mercenary of the Parachute Regiment, 22 SAS, Rhodesian SAS and 44 Parachute Brigade; led the 1989 Cali Cartel-funded Operation Phoenix plot against Pablo Escobar and wrote No Mean Soldier.
Pratap Singh of Idar
Pratap Singh of Idar (प्रतापसिंह), also Pertab Singh, was a Jodhpur prince who ruled Idar from 1902 to 1911 and fought in campaigns from Afghanistan to Palestine.
Pritilata Waddedar (প্রীতিলতা ওয়াদ্দেদার)
Pritilata Waddedar (প্রীতিলতা ওয়াদ্দেদার), 1911–1932, Bengali revolutionary, Bethune College philosophy graduate, and first woman member of Surya Sen's Chittagong group; led the 1932 Pahartali European Club raid and died by cyanide at 23.
Reg Seekings
Reg Seekings (Albert Reginald Seekings) was a British SAS soldier who rose from private to squadron sergeant major and became one of the Second World War's most decorated special forces soldiers.
Robert J. O'Neill
Robert J. O'Neill, born in Butte, Montana, is a retired US Navy SEAL of SEAL Teams 2, 4, and 6 with 400+ combat missions and 52 decorations, known for claiming he fired the shots that killed Osama bin Laden in the 2011 Abbottabad raid, an account disputed by Matt Bissonnette and other SEALs.
Rochus Misch
Rochus Misch (1917–2013), German Waffen-SS Oberscharführer, served as Hitler's bodyguard, courier, and telephone operator 1940–1945 and was the last surviving occupant of the Führerbunker, later a memoirist.
Rom Braslavski (רום ברסלבסקי)
Rom Braslavski, a German-Israeli man and former IDF soldier, was taken hostage by Palestinian Islamic Jihad on October 7, 2023. He was held for 738 days.
Roman von Ungern-Sternberg (Роман фон Унгерн-Штернберг)
Roman von Ungern-Sternberg (Роман фон Унгерн-Штернберг, 1885/1886–1921), the Baltic German "Mad Baron," was a tsarist cavalry officer and White warlord who seized Urga in February 1921, restored the Bogd Khan, ruled Mongolia brutally, and was captured and executed by the Red Army in September 1921.
Roza Shanina (Роза Георгиевна Шанина)
Roza Georgiyevna Shanina (Роза Георгиевна Шанина), Soviet female sniper of the 3rd Belorussian Front, credited with 59 confirmed kills, first woman of her front awarded the Order of Glory, killed in East Prussia in January 1945.
Rudy Boesch
Rudy Boesch (Rudolph Ernst Boesch, 1928-2019) was a retired US Navy SEAL, one of the first SEALs of 1962 and the longest-serving 'Bullfrog,' best known as the oldest-ever Survivor contestant, finishing third on Survivor: Borneo in 2000 at 72.
Rufus Putnam
Rufus Putnam (1738–1824), American Revolutionary engineer and brigadier general, chief engineer under Washington, founder of the Ohio Company of Associates and of Marietta, Ohio, first Northwest Territory settlement; surveyor-general 1796–1803.
Sabrina Harman
Sabrina D. Harman, also spelled Harmon in some accounts, was a US Army Reserve military police specialist of the 372nd MP Company convicted in 2005 of detainee abuse at Abu Ghraib and sentenced to six months in prison.
Saif al-Adel
Saif al-Adel (سيف العدل) is the nom de guerre of Mohammed Salahuddin Zeidan, an Egyptian ex-army officer who is al Qaeda's de facto leader, operating from Iran since 2002.
Sam Brown (military)
Sam Brown, retired U.S. Army captain and Nevada Republican, severely burned by a 2008 Afghanistan IED; lost Senate races in 2022 and 2024, later nominated VA Under Secretary for Memorial Affairs.
Sam Davis
Sam Davis (1842–1863), Confederate soldier and Coleman's Scouts courier, executed by hanging at Pulaski, Tennessee, on November 27, 1863, after refusing to name his contact; known as the "Boy Hero of the Confederacy" and "the South's Nathan Hale."
Saman Kunan (สมาน กุนัน)
Saman Kunan (สมาน กุนัน), aka Ja Sam, was a former Thai Navy SEAL diver, 38, who died 6 July 2018 delivering oxygen tanks in the Tham Luang cave rescue, the operation's first and only fatality.
Sanjay Kumar (संजय कुमार) (soldier)
Sanjay Kumar (संजय कुमार), born 1976 in Bilaspur, Himachal Pradesh, is a retired Indian Army Honorary Captain of 13 JAK Rifles awarded the Param Vir Chakra for his 4 July 1999 assault on Point 4875, Flat Top, in the Kargil War's Mushkoh Valley.