COL Kyle Walton ’01 Selected for 2025 Nininger Award
The West Point Association of Graduates is pleased to announce that COL Kyle Walton, Class of 2001, has been selected to receive the 2025 Alexander R. Nininger Award for Valor at Arms, which will be presented at West Point, New York on November 21, 2025.
On April 6, 2008, in Afghanistan’s desolate Skok Valley, then-CPT Walton heroically distinguished himself as the ground force commander of Operation Detachment Alpha 3336, 3d Special Forces Group (Airborne), Special Operations Task Force-33, Combined Joint Special Operations Task Force-Afghanistan when his unit encountered extremely accurate machine gun, sniper, and Rocket Propelled Grenade fire in all directions from a numerically superior Hezebela Islami Gulbadin (HIG) insurgent group. Walton and his unit were on a mission to kill or capture a Joint Priority Effects List target of HIG. After inserting via CH-47 into the objective area at nearly 10,000 feet, Walton led his element through a fast-moving stream and began the climb up the ice-covered mountain toward the objective. Approximately halfway up, the insurgents engaged, critically wounding one ODA 3336 member and several Afghan commandos and killing the detachment’s interpreter. With total disregard for his own personal safety, Walton exposed himself to deadly fire in order to pull his critically wounded teammate back to a semi-covered position and then continued to maintain effective command and control of five different maneuver elements while repeatedly engaging numerous HIG fighting positions. While pulling more casualties to cover, the tip of his rifle barrel was shot off, but Walton, knowing his weapon was no longer accurate beyond a short distance and despite being impacted by two rounds to his helmet, courageously continued to identify targets for other soldiers to engage. As the situation deteriorated and the casualties mounted, Walton realized that his entire element was in danger of being completely overrun and relayed this information to his headquarters, requesting the placement of danger close attack helicopter and fixed-wing close air support on all known and suspected insurgent positions and authorizing the use of 2000-pound bombs to be dropped almost directly on top of his position in order to prevent insurgent forces from overrunning the American and Afghan elements. His audacious decision allowed just enough freedom of maneuver to evacuate all casualties down a 60-foot cliff in preparation for medical evacuation.
Throughout the six-and-a-half-hour battle that saw more than 150 insurgents killed, Walton’s unwavering combat leadership and poise under fire inspired all under his command and was directly responsible for saving the lives of U.S. and Afghan soldiers. For his actions during the 2008 Battle of Shok Valley, Walton received the Silver Star, the United States Armed Forces’ third-highest military decoration for valor in combat.
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