on august 26, 2015, most of us awoke surrounded by the comforts of home, but captain matt rowland who was a special tactics officer and staff sergeant forrest sibley, a combat controller, woke up a world away in afghanistan. and in a sickening twist of fate, at a helmand province checkpoint, two men camouflaged as soldiers opened fire on a u.s. vehicle and we lost matt and forrest that day. in their combined 12 years of service, matt and forrest deployed seven times, and in addition to the purple hearts, forrest earned five bronze stars, including one for valor. and very, very soon, we will posthumously honor matt's heroism with a silver star, which as you know, is one of the highest medals we reserve for gallantry in action against enemies of the united states. now as i mentioned, matt and forrest weren't the only airman lost to the hands of our enemies since our august address. we also bid a painful farewell to major adrianna vorderbruggen, technical sergeant joseph lemm, staff sergeant louis bonacasa, staff sergeant michael cinco, staff sergeant chester mcbride and staff sergeant p