The Bundeswehr Cross of Honour for Valour (or Ehrenkreuz der Bundeswehr für Tapferkeit in German) is the highest military decoration of the Bundeswehr, and the highest class of the Bundeswehr Cross of Honour. The decoration is the first combat valour award presented by Germany since World War II.
Since World War II, Germany has seen its military as a defensive force, but during the 1990s Germany began playing a bigger role with its military within the European Union. After the September 11 attacks on the United States, Germany joined ISAF in Afghanistan and has continued to deploy Bundeswehr troops to areas under combat conditions.
The President of Germany Horst Köhler granted authorization for this valour decoration on 18 September 2008. On 10 October 2008, the directive creating the Bundeswehr Cross of Honour for Valour became law upon being published in the Federal Law Gazette and the Federal Gazette. The first recipients of the Cross of Honour for Valour were four soldiers caught up in a suicide attack by Taliban forces on 20 October 2008 southwest of Kunduz, Afghanistan.
The Bundeswehr Cross of Honour Design
The Medal is round, shows a German eagle on a Cross pattée surrounded by a wreath of oak leaves.
On the reverse it reads FÜR BESONDERE VERDIENSTE BUNDESWEHR (For special merits — Bundeswehr). There is an oak leaf above the word Bundeswehr and that side is also surrounded by an oak leaves wreath.
The ribbon is black with two red stripes beside it and golden stripes on the edges as the colors of the German flag, the ribbon bar has a small clasp of the decoration grade attached to it.
