[1] He attended military training in high school, which led to a commission as a 2nd lieutenant in the infantry of the United States Army.

[citation needed] Speirs volunteered for the paratroopers after the United States entered World War II.

There he served as a platoon leader within Dog Company, 2nd Battalion of the 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment, which later became part of the 101st Airborne Division, at Camp Toccoa, Georgia, and was then shipped to England in late 1943.

His unit spent the night of 6 June being shuffled into position with other platoons of a company being arranged for battle early the next morning.

[3]: 186  During the early morning hours, upon accepting the surrender of three German soldiers, Speirs allegedly gave the order to execute them.

Come-du-Mont and to hold position while regimental headquarters coordinated a rolling barrage shelling 15 targets near St. Marie-du-Mont.

Before the battle, Speirs shot a sergeant in self-defense, according to Private First Class Art DiMarzio, the eyewitness who related the fullest account of the event.

An order to hold position was given and relayed down the line; the sergeant refused to obey, wanting to rush forward and engage the Germans.

[3]: 262 In January 1945, when Easy Company's initial attack on the German-occupied town of Foy bogged down, battalion executive officer Captain Richard Winters ordered Speirs to relieve 1st Lieutenant Norman Dike of command.

So Speirs ran through the town and German lines, linked up with Item Company soldiers, and relayed the order.

Decades after the war, in an interview with then-Pennsylvania state representative John D. Payne, Winters stated that the legal department for publisher Simon & Schuster was concerned that the allegations surrounding Speirs could lead to a lawsuit, leading Winters to directly confront him about the rumor.

The medal's citation read: The President of the United States of America, authorized by Act of Congress July 9, 1918, takes pleasure in presenting the Silver Star to First Lieutenant (Infantry) Ronald C. Speirs (ASN: 0-439465), United States Army, for gallantry in action while serving with the 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division.

Lieutenant Speirs was the first to cross the Neder Rijn River in this vicinity, and in so doing he paved the way for other patrols to make similar reconnaissance's.

[7] Following Korea, Speirs attended a Russian language course in 1956 and was assigned as a liaison officer to the Red Army in Potsdam, East Germany.

The 1992 Stephen E. Ambrose book Band of Brothers claimed Speirs' English wife had left him and returned to her first husband, whom she had believed died during the war.

In a 1992 letter to Winters, Speirs wrote that his first wife simply did not want to move to America with him and be away from her family in England.