Staff Sgt. Travis Atkins was killed June 1, 2007, by a suicide bomber southwest of Baghdad.
Atkins was 31.
For his actions, Atkins will be posthumously awarded the Distinguished Service Cross, second only to the Medal of Honor for recognition of valor in battle.
The award ceremony will be held at Fort Drum, N.Y., where Atkins was stationed with the Army's 10th Mountain Division.
"Right now, we are working to have it on Veterans Day, Nov. 11, but it isn't concrete at this point pending arrangements. This is an extraordinary award and we want to do it right," Julie Cupernall, a spokeswoman at Fort Drum, told The Associated Press on Tuesday.
Atkins was born in Great Falls and moved to Bozeman with his parents in 1981.
At the time of his death he was serving his second tour in Iraq. He was part of the invasion of Iraq in 2003. After attending the University of Montana, he re-enlisted in the Army and was deployed to Iraq in the summer of 2006.
Atkins' parents, Jack and Elaine Atkins, still live in Bozeman.
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