While stationed in the Philippines with the Army's 126th Infantry Regiment, 32nd Infantry Division, Dirk Vlug was ordered to set up a roadblock on the Ormoc Road. On the morning of December 14, 1944, a group of heavily armed Japanese tanks barreled into the barricade and began ambushing a group of surprised American soldiers with heavy machine-gun fire. Reacting on balls and instinct, Vlug pulled an ultimate boss move: He armed himself with a bazooka and six rounds of ammunition before charging at the tanks, rushing headfirst into an insane five-tanks-against-one-solider scuffle.

This story is mind-blowing. During the 2003 invasion of Iraq, a group of enemy combatants opened fire on Brian Chontosh and his platoon of Marines on a highway to Baghdad. Unfortunately for the enemy, Chontosh took his coffee with a shot of kick-ass on that particular morning. When coalition tanks blocked forward progress and left his platoon vulnerable to enemy fire on all sides, Chontosh battled through the bind, scooping up enemy weapons to continue fighting. He silenced more than 20 enemy soldiers. Hoorah.

This decorated Korean War vet in the Army's 40th Division earned a Medal of Honor for bashing heads, taking bullets, saving wounded soldiers, and killing enemy soldiers with his bare hands in the heat of battle.

Sgt. Leigh Ann Hester, a National Guard member of the 617th Military Police Company, played a critical role in wielding off a 50-insurgent attack 12 miles southeast of Baghdad on March 20, 2005. Thanks to her valorous marksmanship and leadership in battle, Hester earned an honorable position in military history books as the first Army woman awarded the Silver Star for valor since World War II. According to the Washington Post, the then-23-year-old retail store manager from Kentucky killed at least three attacking combatants in the fire fight.

This redcap porter from Albany was wounded 21 times in France while defending a trench against a German ambush with a bolo knife. Unfortunately, Henry Johnson died broke and alienated from his family in 1929 from battle lacerations without official recognition from Uncle Sam he received the Croix de Guerre from the French government in 1918. In 1996, President Clinton awarded Sgt. Johnson a posthumous Purple Heart for his service. He was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross in 2003.

I pity the fool who crossed paths with General Lewis B. "Chesty" Puller. You don't earn five Navy Crosses and become the most decorated United States Marine in history by pssyflaking around all day behind a desk pushing pencils. Known for having a chest the size of an eight wheeler, General Puller once claimed "Our Country won't go on forever, if we stay soft as we are now. There won't be any AMERICA because some foreign soldiery will invade us and take our women and breed a hardier race!" That's some bad-ass shit.

This decorated Army captain was a World War I legend with cojones the size of grapefruit. York became rock-star famous for his assault on a 32-gun German machine gun nest that was so batshit crazy that it actually worked.

I once swore an allegiance to Waffles that I would never speak ill of John Rambo. Allow me to backtrack on my word for a second: Rambo is a complete pssy compared to Staff Sergeant Seth E. Howard of the 3rd Battalion, 3rd Special Forces. During a daring mission in a remote village in Afghanistan's Shok Valley, this Green Baret kept insurgent fighters at bay thanks to his advanced sniper skills.

In 2007, Bruce Candall received the Medal of Honor for laughing in the face of danger and providing critical air support during Vietnam's Battle of Ia Drang.While medical evacuation was not his mission, he immediately sought volunteers and with complete disregard for his own personal safety, led the two aircraft to Landing Zone X-Ray. Despite the fact that the landing zone was still under relentless enemy fire, Major Crandall landed and proceeded to supervise the loading of seriously wounded soldiers aboard his aircraft.

Marcus Luttrell was the sole survivor a four-man Navy SEAL team ordered to carry out Operation Red Wing, a failed mission to kill or capture Ahmad Shah, a Taliban leader based in northeastern Afghanistan. After the team's position was ratted out by goat headers, 80 to 150 Taliban insurgents began an all-out assault on the SEALs. The mission further spiraled out of control when an enemy RPG struck the CH-47 rescue helicopter during the battle, killing all 16 American soldiers on board. Despite injuries sustained when an RPG blasted him off the side of a cliff, he managed to walk seven miles and kill seven more Taliban soldiers before finding shelter with a nearby tribesman.

The life-long Leatherneck -- who's often cited as the inspiration for G.I. Joe -- served 28 years in the Corps. However, he's best remembered for his heroism in the Solomon Islands during World War II, where he kicked ass with a machine gun and threw down the gloves to lead a bayonet charge against the Japanese. Paige was awarded the Medal of Honor for his fearlessness in combat.

Capt. Millett ordered the 3d Platoon forward, placed himself at the head of the 2 platoons, and, with fixed bayonet, led the assault up the fire-swept hill. In the fierce charge Capt. Millett bayoneted 2 enemy soldiers and boldly continued on, throwing grenades, clubbing and bayoneting the enemy, while urging his men forward by shouting encouragement. Despite vicious opposing fire, the whirlwind hand-to-hand assault carried to the crest of the hill. His dauntless leadership and personal courage so inspired his men that they stormed into the hostile position and used their bayonets with such lethal effect that the enemy fled in wild disorder.

If you've watched "The Pacfic" on HBO, you're probably familiar with John Basilone's heroics with a machine gun in the Solomon Islands. The Marine Gunnery Sergent was awarded the Medal of Honor for halting a Japanese assault during the Battle of Guadalcanal.

Do you know what's badass? Destroying attacking enemy tanks with a bazooka. You know what's even more badass? Voluntarily leaving the hospital after being wounded, hitchhiking across France to meet up with his company. You know what makes Urban one of the most badass war heroes in United States history? That he continued to lead a charge after sustaining a seemingly mortal bullet to the neck. In fact, he survived. President Jimmy Carter called Urban one of the "greatest soldiers in American history" when presenting him with the Medal of Honor.

U.S. Navy Seal Michael Monsoor was dispatched to Iraq in April 2006, where he was in charge of training Iraqi Army soldiers to police Ramadi. On September 29, 2006, after an insurgent chucked a grenade onto a rooftop where Monsoor and his Delta Platoon were set up, Monsoor jumped without hesitation on the grenade. The wounds Monsoor suffered would take his life, but the lives he saved were numerous. Monsoor posthumously received the Medal of Honor, and it was announced in October 2008 that the second ship in the Zuwalt class of destroyers would be named the "Michael Monsoor."

Army Ranger Sergeant Shughart and Gary Gordon never came home from their heroic mission to save the crew of two downed Black Hawk helicopters in Mogadishu, Somalia, during the summer of 1993. The Delta Force sniper teammates became the first Medal of Honor recipient since the Vietnam War.

Tibor Rubin spent 14 months of his childhood at the Nazi concentration camp in Mauthausen, Austria. When U.S. soldiers opened the camp, he promised himself that he would head to the land of green pastures in the U.S. and join the Army to show his gratitude, saying, "It was my wish to fight alongside them." Rubin would go on to use his survival skills helping his fellow soldiers in a Communist POW camp in the 1950s. The White House said that without his help, the soldiers would have died under the care of those "everyone-gets-the-same-thing" Communists. Rubin received a Medal of Honor during the Korean War because he went back to save a solider on the battlefield on his own while still maintaining fire against the enemy.

During his stay on the U-90 he obtained information of the movements of German submarines which was so important that he was determined to escape, with a view to making this information available to the U.S. and Allied Naval authorities. In attempting to carry out this plan, he jumped through the window of a rapidly moving train at the imminent risk of death, not only from the nature of the act itself but from the fire of the armed German soldiers who were guarding him. Having been recaptured and reconfined, Lt. Izac made a second and successful attempt to escape, breaking his way through barbed-wire fences and deliberately drawing the fire of the armed guards in the hope of permitting others to escape during the confusion.

This Marine sharpshooter known for wearing a white feather in his hat became a Vietnam War legend when he shot an enemy sniper through the barrel of his scope, entering his skull directly through his eye. Despite his 93 confirmed kills, he was awarded a Silver Star for valor for saving the lives of others under his command.

During a battle in South Vietnam on May 2, 1968, this Master Sergeant in the Military Assistance Command was wounded by bayonets, bullets, and shrapnel 37 times. In fact, at Benavidez's Medal of Honor reception, President Ronald Reagan reportedly told members of the White House press corps, "If the story of his heroism were a movie script, you would not believe it."