Submitted Photo Senior Master Sgt. Jeffrey J. Brown, center, is shown Dec. 1 when he learned he was selected for the Air Force Global Strike Command-level Lance P. Sijan SNCO (senior noncommissioned officer) Award at Minot Air Force Base and also the highest level of the award: Air Force-level. From the left are: Chief Master Sgt. Timothy Wieser, command chief for the 5th Bomb Wing; Col. Michael Walters, commander of the 5th Bomb Wing; Brown; Brown’s wife, Suzanne Brown, resource adviser with the 5th Civil Engineer Squadron; and Lt. Col. David Dammeier, 5th CE commander.

MINOT AIR FORCE BASE – Senior Master Sgt. Jeffrey Brown, of Minot Air Force Base, was surprised on Dec. 1 when he learned he is the recipient of the Air Force Global Strike Command-level Lance P. Sijan SNCO (senior noncommissioned officer) Award.

But more was in store for him. He has also been selected for the top award, the Air Force-level award.

Brown said he learned this week the award will be presented in Washington, D.C.

The Lance P. Sijan Leadership Award, one of the most prestigious awards in the U.S. Air Force, was created in 1981 to recognize individuals who have demonstrated the highest qualities of leadership and duty. Sijan, an Air Force captain and fighter pilot from Milwaukee, died while a prisoner of war in Vietnam. Before his capture, the 1965 U.S. Air Force Academy graduate and posthumous Medal of Honor recipient, evaded the North Vietnamese for six weeks after being shot down in November 1967.

Brown, originally from Cassatt, South Carolina, has been in the U.S. Air Force for 23 years, with three of those years at Minot AFB. With the Minot base’s 5th Civil Engineer Squadron he’s the operations flight superintendent.

As the operations flight superintendent, he’s in charge of daily operations of the civil engineer unit. “We’re known as the ‘WarBulls,” said Brown.

Of the award, he said, “It’s definitely an honor.”

“What a tremendous honor it is to represent a Medal of Honor recipient and an individual that sacrificed his life for our country. It’s the utmost respect for this man. He battled for 45 days without any support crawling over treacherous mountains – just an amazing man,” Brown said. “For me to be recognized with the award I just think about all the things that he sacrificed for us.”

To be recognized with this award, Brown added, “That’s just a tremendous honor for me.”

Brown was recognized as the senior noncommissioned officer award nominee at three levels – local wing (5th Bomb Wing), Eighth Air Force and Air Force Global Strike Command levels before going on to be named the recipient of the Air Force-level of the award.

He said there’s four recipients of the award each year: officer, senior noncommissioned officer, noncommissioned officer and airman.

The award covers the past year’s accomplishments. As for what accomplishments he has done to achieve the award, Brown said, “I just think it’s my job.”

When he learned he was selected as the recipient of the Air Force-level award, Brown said, “My first instinct was ‘wow.’ I really didn’t even know what to say. I didn’t have words.”

After he gathered his thoughts, he said he started to reflect on the ‘Marauder Bulls’ at the base in Kuwait where he was deployed to in 2020-2021, returning earlier this year.

“I thought about the sacrifices that my airmen just poured into that air base there like flood mitigation,” he said. He said the base is in a desert but torrential downpour of rain caused flooding at the base.

“The airmen – the ‘Marauder Bulls’ — sprung into action and I’ll tell you just cleaned up the base and saved that mission there,” Brown said.

“I just started reflecting on all the people… and sacrificing so much for the Air Force day in and day out – 12-hour days – and with little to no complaints. I can’t say enough about how airmen respond to adversity. We were in the fight and they were producing superior results,” he said.