The Sole Survivor Policy or United States Department of Defense Directive 1315.15 "Special Separation Policies for Survivorship" describes a set of regulations in the United States military, partially stipulated by law, that are designed to protect members of a family from the draft during peacetime or wartime if they have already lost family members to military service.
The issue that gave rise to the regulations first caught public attention after the five Sullivan brothers were all killed when the USS Juneau (CL-52) was sunk during World War II.
Sons were also exempt from being drafted in peacetime if a father, brother, or sister was in a prisoner of war or missing in action status.
In World War II, four brothers of the Borgstrom family, Elmer, Clyde, and twins Rolon and Rulon, were all killed within a few months of each other in 1944.
The eldest brother, Technical Sergeant Edward Niland, of the U.S. Army Air Forces, was later found to have been held in a prisoner of war camp in Burma.
The Academy Award–winning film Saving Private Ryan, directed by Steven Spielberg, was loosely based on the Niland brothers' story.
Beau was deployed in Afghanistan with the Marines at the time and was immediately relieved of combat duties and returned to the United States.