General Service Medal (Canada)
Encyclopedia
The General Service Medal (GSM) is a service medal
of Canada established by Her Majesty The Queen in March 2004 and presented for the first time on 29 November 2004. It is presented to members of the Canadian Forces
, or members of allied forces for deployment outside of Canada with Canadian Forces, though not necessarily in a theater of operations, to provide direct support, on a full-time basis, to operations in the presence of an armed enemy.
were to be attached to denote the area or mission which qualified for recognition. These two bars were titled "ALLIED FORCE" and "ISAF+FIAS". In 2009, the GSM was modified to abolish the existing system of bars. These bars were replaced with ribbons denoting specific a theater or service. This allows the use of bars to recognize multiple rotations when appropriate. As a result, recipients of the original GSM with the ALLIED FORCE bar must remounted their medal without the bar and using the new ALLIED FORCE ribbon. Recipients of the medal with the ISAF+FIAS bar needed only to have the medal remounted without the bar on the same ribbon.
Service medal
A service medal is a military award generally of the lowest degree. A service medal is awarded to a member of the military who joins the military, or is already serving, during a designated time period...
of Canada established by Her Majesty The Queen in March 2004 and presented for the first time on 29 November 2004. It is presented to members of the Canadian Forces
Canadian Forces
The Canadian Forces , officially the Canadian Armed Forces , are the unified armed forces of Canada, as constituted by the National Defence Act, which states: "The Canadian Forces are the armed forces of Her Majesty raised by Canada and consist of one Service called the Canadian Armed Forces."...
, or members of allied forces for deployment outside of Canada with Canadian Forces, though not necessarily in a theater of operations, to provide direct support, on a full-time basis, to operations in the presence of an armed enemy.
History
The medal was initially only awarded with one ribbon. BarsMedal bar
A medal bar or medal clasp is a thin metal bar attached to the ribbon of a military decoration, civil decoration, or other medal. It is most commonly used to indicate the campaign or operation the recipient received the award for, and multiple bars on the same medal are used to indicate that the...
were to be attached to denote the area or mission which qualified for recognition. These two bars were titled "ALLIED FORCE" and "ISAF+FIAS". In 2009, the GSM was modified to abolish the existing system of bars. These bars were replaced with ribbons denoting specific a theater or service. This allows the use of bars to recognize multiple rotations when appropriate. As a result, recipients of the original GSM with the ALLIED FORCE bar must remounted their medal without the bar and using the new ALLIED FORCE ribbon. Recipients of the medal with the ISAF+FIAS bar needed only to have the medal remounted without the bar on the same ribbon.