A Few Good Men has been on TV a lot lately. For the one or two people out there who haven’t seen it, the plot revolves around two marines who are charged with murder after following a direct order from their commanding officer to assault another marine (who died from his injuries).
Some questions:
-Was the order to assault Santiago illegal, as the movie suggests (with the arrests of Colonel Jessup and Lieutenant Kendrick)?
-If the order was illegal, could Dawson/Downey refuse to obey it without suffering any official consequences?
-If the order was illegal, what would the penalties be for Jessup and Kendrick for issuing that order?
Assault is a crime under the Uniform Code of Military Justice. Ordering someone to do an illegal act is an illegal order.
No official consequences. If it was a situation in which the legality of the order was not black and white they had better be able to back up their refusal with facts. In this case the order was clearly illegal. Any consequences would be unofficial.
Sorry don’t have time to look through the UCMJ right now.
I’m not a lawyer, or in the military, but military are required to refuse to follow illegal orders. Whether there would be unofficial consequences are another story, but by military law they are required to refuse that order if it is in fact illegal.
When I was in basic training in the Coast Guard, we were advised that if we were given an order that we thought might be illegal, the best policy was to carry it out and report it later to a higher authority
in the chain of command. But they didn’t mention anything like assaulting people, etc. Their idea of illegal orders was “An E-7 orders you, an E-2, to wash and clean his personal automobile.” Is that illegal? Under most circumstances, yes. But it could be the E-7 was supposed to pick up an admiral at the airport in two hours and no government vehicle was available.
I believe that it’s ‘unlawful’, not illegal, if memory serves. As noted, you’d better be damn sure you’re right about it. The first step is to ask for clarification of an order you think may be unlawful. This has zero consequences for all concerned, other than maybe getting yelled at. If carrying out an order you believe to be unlawful, documentation is important, as are witnesses. Carrying out an order that may bring harm to someone should be refused.
You are correct in separating unlawful and illegal.
To more fully answer #3 as far as I know there is no article in the UCMJ that makes giving an unlawful order a crime. As CG mentioned an unlawful order may not in fact be for an illegal act.
There are several articles that issuing such an order may fall under. Article 81 covers conspiracy. If several people were conspiring to commit a illegal act and the unlawful order was issued to further the conspiracy they could be guilty of that. Article 93 covers maltreatment of subordinates. It’s less likely but it would depend on other actions around the event.
Both Jessup and Kendrick made false statements in conjunction with the investigations leading up to the trial, and IIRC Kendrick, at least, perjured himself during the trial. Would their arrests at the end of the movie be related to that?
Kendrick was certainly guilty of perjury. But I don’t think you need anything fancy to charge with them. They were involved in a conspiracy to commit assault, which ended up being a murder.
I don’t recall whether or not the order itself was illegal. Certainly, all the post-incident cover-up was.
IIRC, LANTFLT or the CNO (I forget which) issued a memo discouraging code reds. I do not believe it said they were unlawful/illegal. If that’s correct, and all the officers did was tell the two corporals to do a code red, then I don’t think the officers did anything illegal (although I guess the corporals did something illegal in the execution of said order). Assuming this, and if the officers had done no subsequent cover-up, then they’d be responsible for the death and the corporals’ manner of execution of the order.
If the corporals had refused the order and code reds were not specifically prohibited, they’d be in trouble. If they were prohibited and they refused, there may not be any type of “on the record” aftershock, but it’s very likely that their evaluations would suffer and thus likely they would not promote along with their cohorts.
I hope this isn’t too much of a hijack, but are you obligated to follow stupid, but technically legal, orders?
Say I’m ordered by an officer to charge a machine gun nest directly.
Can I opt not to commit suicide? Even if the officer has a reason like “I wanted him to distract the gunner.” Would I be able to respectfully disagree and suggest other options?
Does the “not to question why, but to do or die” still apply in today’s military?
If a Soldier is ordered to directly assault a machine gun, he is obligated to do it. Who’s to say it’s a stupid idea? Soldier’s can’t disregard orders just because they are dangerous, or because it seems stupid.
By this standard, the most important part of a soldier’s job consists exactly in following “stupid orders”. If you wanted to stay safe, you shouldn’t have joined up.
While it is of course clear from the context what you mean by this, I couldn’t help but chuckle a bit.
Yes. All orders in war are stupid by this definition; as cold and horrible as it sounds and is people are expendable assets in war. Orders that officers give on the battlefield are going to result in the deaths of soldiers under their command, there is no way around it. Sometimes there is no way around a frontal assault, sometimes it’s the most expedient way of doing things, sometimes it is incredibly stupid. A military where soldiers are allowed to choose to disobey orders because they might get them killed is a military that is going to collapse the moment it sees battle.
Hijack of a hijack, but it can depend on the culture of the specific military. I remember Carlo D’Este explaining one of the problems the Allies encountered in combined commands in WW2 was different ideas of when it was acceptable to do just this. In the British Army it was acceptable for subordinates to do this after orders had been issued. If the superior said it wasn’t up for discussion, that was that. In the US Army it was acceptable for a subordinate to do this during planning before orders had been issued, but the issuing of orders meant it wasn’t up for discussion.
Maybe. But if I ever had someone balk at something I said and come up with “Sir, I’m not sure about that. Can I have it in writing?” Well, let’s just say it would not be received well. I’m not a shouter, but if I was in theater and the circumstances dictated it, I’d be in that puke’s face in a heartbeat, and that puke would forever regret pulling that little stunt.
For Hubzilla: respectfully disagreeing and offering alternatives are, as Dissonance pointed out, very much dependent upon not just the service culture, but the command culture. The respectfully disagreeing won’t happen. But the offering alternatives may well be acceptable in that local culture as long as there is zero discussion except “aye aye” once those alternatives are reviewed and a final decision reached by the guy in charge. Alternatives or not-well-thought-out ramifications may be broached by seasoned senior enlisted or seasoned junior officers–I’ve seen it happen plenty. Sometimes they get squashed, sometimes they don’t. But most of the guys making the decsions, IME, appreciate the feedback and would rather have trusted people speak up than keep their mouths shut.
There is usually no time for discussion in the heat of combat. Everyone knows their job, and you are trained to follow that type of order without question, or risk being shot as a traitor and a coward. The platoon (or company, etc) sergeant may argue the wisdom with a young officer, but as a snuffy your job is to charge and die (or not, if you’re lucky).