How did he “lose his stripes?”
when his superior officer takes time out of the war effort to write a “historically bad performance review” to take away his stripes.
Not exactly stated.
How did he “lose his stripes?”
???Smith was assigned to KP duty the week that he was awarded the Medal of Honor as punishment for arriving late to a briefing.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maynard_Harrison_Smith
A fun old quote, that I cannot source.
“Lopsided men run circles around the hills of success.”
THE AWARD CEREMONY took place at Thurleigh on July 15, 1943, and the Eighth Air Force went all out. Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson flew in from Washington, D.C., carrying Smith’s medal in his pocket, and the guest list included seven generals, two radio networks, an air force band, and a busload of reporters. There was just one problem: no Smith. A frantic search found him toiling in the mess-hall kitchen—a punishment for twice returning late from leave.
The privileges Smith was given—or took—grated on the other men. Matters came to a head in late 1944 when Major Thomas F. Witt, the 306th’s operations officer, recommended Smith be demoted to private because of what Witt called poor job performance—a humiliating slap in the face for a Medal of Honor recipient. Calling Smith’s attitude “insufferable,” Witt said Smith showed “no responsibility to his duties, or to his officers and fellow NCOs.” He often wasn’t available when needed, Witt wrote, and “repeated warnings and reprimands have been a necessity” to get any work from him. On December 17, 1944, the air force busted Smith, who angrily called his demotion “the rotten deal that lousy outfit gave me via the great judgement of Witt, and some of his cohorts.” That same day, a medical review board permanently grounded him, and on February 2, 1945, he was sent home to the States, ending what 306th historian Russell A. Strong called “a long and somewhat touchy relationship between those in command and Smith.”
https://www.historynet.com/the-checkered-life-of-snuffy-smith.htm