This is for a short story I’m writing. What would be the punishment for an Army soldier who led their squad into certain death despite warnings from superior officers? Assume that this takes place during the current Iraq war, and five other soldiers were killed. What would the charge be? And what is the lowest military ranking you can have to lead such a small group of soldiers on a mission?
Thanks in advance.
Realistically, the lowest rank you could have to lead a squad, which is about five soldiers, is seargent. Corporals maybe, and even lower ranks like private could lead a squad if some crazy WWII style catastrophe happened and everybody else died, but believe me, thats unlikely.
As to your real question, there are a million different punishments for disobeying orders, depending on the situation. Willfully disobeying direct orders in combat and getting five soldiers killed has got to be one of the worst. At the very least you’d be court martialed and sent to Leavenworth for a good chunk of the rest of your life, turning big rocks into little rocks.
If you lead your squad into certain death, wouldn’t punishment by the army be superfluous? After all, you’d be dead too, right?
And a US squad is usually about 8-10 soldiers…
Yeah, 8-10 is about normal, but I’ve seen plenty smaller squads. Also, the squad itself could have some smaller unofficial units, like ‘fire team A’ and ‘fire team B’ or something, each led by a seargent, or maybe a corporal. By the way, I thought the OP was assuming the guilty seargent survived, or else, exactly, what is there to punish?
Furthermore, I ought to say that while I was in the Army, I fixed missile systems, so I don’t have any real experience with the infantry… except of course, I fixed all their missile systems, but even so, they were all mechanized infantry.
Yes, the seargent survives. (I think I will make the leader a seargent.)
I thought there was an outside chance they might give them the death penalty, although since the leader did not actually murder the squad, maybe not. I know there have been cases where soldiers were executed for disobeying orders but I don’t think any are recent. Life imprisonment would work too, for the story I’m writing.
The small number in the group is because a few of them already died before the disobeying incident.
Warnings are not orders. And order to a squad leader would be something like - Take you squad to that stone wall and wait there. You are not to advance further than that under any circumstances without further instructions from me or my replacement.
On the battlefield if that order is disobeyed and disaster ensues the squad leader would doubtless be courtmartialed with serious consequences.
However if at the wall the squad leader sees an opportunity to get behind an enemy machine gun emplacement, does so and is successful thereby talomg an enemy strong point, he or she will probably get at least a commendation and one hell of a bawling out from the CO.
“talomg” os Klingon for “taking.” Or else your fingers weren’t on the home position and you didn’t preview because it was such a short post.
As an infantry squad leader, if I were given such an order to “not… advance further than that under any circumstances without further instructions from me or my replacement.” And then I saw an enemy machinegun position or something, I would be expected to advise my superiors of the situation and request permission to go in. At that point, maybe they would say “No, stay put”, and then that would be disobeying a direct order.
Just helping the story…
Also, if you want to not throw up any red flags in your story, make the squad leader an E-6 Staff Sergeant. One can make this rank with only 4 years in the Army, so he can be young if that’s what you want. His Squad should be two fireteams, each with 4 men and lead by an E-5 Sergeant “Team Leader”. That would look normal, even after the squad took some casualties. Maybe they had a couple extra when they started. That’s very common.
Punishment… It all depends on exactly how “direct” the order was, who gave the order, how ambiguous it might have been, whether there were any extraordinary circumstances causing the person to disoebey, and the consequences of the action.
The punishment could range from loss of rank, loss of pay, confinement, discharge or even a death sentence.
Can you give any more details about your story?
The radio is out of action, I can’t spare a runner to go back because two of them have already been killed by the machine gun crossing an open field on the way to the platoon leader. Sorry, the squad leader is on his own. 
As you say, what the consequences would be depend a lot on how the situation develops.
Has something changed in the military structure in the 16 years since I retired? A squad then was 13 persons (or fewer), comprised of a squad leader and three (or fewer) fire teams composed of four persons each, and often a grenadier. Nothing “unofficial” about it. The fire team was (usually) comprised of a fire team leader, an automatic rifleman and two riflemen. Now, the weaponry has changed significantly since then, so perhaps squads have been streamlined. A squad leader is normally an E-5 or E-6.
Taking your squad into harm’s way in direct contradiction of a superior’s orders, and having it result in the death of one’s troops would probably net a squad leader a charge of manslaughter or 2nd degree murder, just like in civilian life. There would also be lesser charges of disobeying a lawful order, etc.
13? That’s a Marine squad, right?
A Textbook US Army Infantry Squad is 9 people. One squad leader (E-6 or E-5), Two Team Leaders (E-5 or E-4 CPL), Two automatic riflemen (E-4 or E-3), Two Grenadiers (E-4 - E-1), and Two Riflemen (E-4 - E-1).
Because of manpower or mission specific needs, this can vary per unit and per mission.
Easy answer, per Table of Maximum Punishments, Manual for Courts-Martial, United States (1972 edition):
Wilful disobedience of the lawful order of superior commissioned officer, Article 90, Dishonorable discharge and up to 5 years confinement at hard labor;
Wilful disobedience of lawful order of superior warrant officer, Article 91, Dishonorable discharge and 2 years;
Wilful disobedience of lawful order of superior noncommissioned officer, Article 91, Bad conduct discharge and 6 months;
Failure to obey lawful general order, Article 92, Dishonorable discharge and 2 years;
Knowing failure to obey any other lawful order, Article 92, Bad conduct discharge and 6 months.
The real catcher is Article 99, misbehavior before the enemy, which provided (in 1972):
Any member of the armed forces who before or in the presence of the enemy … through disobedience, neglect or intentional misconduct endangers the safety of [any] command, unit, place or military property …shall be punished by death or such other punishment as a court-martial shall direct.
Basically, the leader marches the squad into this area which has been seeded with a new type of heat-seeking weapon (this is a near-future science fiction story), despite the fact that the CO radioed in and said their armor was faulty and that the enemy weapons were of a newer type that was even more deadly (I haven’t quite figured out the logistics of the weapon yet). The leader doesn’t have any good reason to go into this zone, since there is nothing of any importance there (and besides, the Iraqi’s weapons are as deadly to them as they are to the Americans), but is brought there for reasons most of us would call “insanity.” Some of the other squad members try to run away but they are killed by the weapons, so the core group heads on with the crazy leader out of fear. (Which reminds me, if they were to live, could they be charged with anything?) It was a direct order not to go into the zone, and the CO repeatedly radioes in to tell the leader that, but seeing as how her mind is fucked up and she is the point of view character she may not interpret it as a direct order. Basically, at the end of the story I need to have the leader either executed, in prison, or in a mental institution. I’d prefer prison at this point in the conception of the story.
Another thing: the squad leader is female, and leading a mixed-sex squad. Does that happen? I assume that it does.
Probably. I was a Seabee and we followed Marine protocols in a lot of areas.
No, it never happens. There are plenty of women in the army, but they are currently barred from serving in direct combat positions. If the story is taking place in the future, then we can imagine that such restrictions have been lifted. But even without an official ban on women in combat positions you aren’t going to see very many female infantry for a long time. So a squad that contains more than one of those female infantrymen would probably be extremely unusual even in the future.
No. How far in the future is this?
Is this possible for your story? She is a Military Police squad leader. She in charge of a squad whose responsibilities involve securing and patroling the perimeter of a Forward Operating Base. Normally she just makes sure her soldiers are in place on the towers and performing gate duty properly. She overseas the transfer of prisoners and occassional leads a short patrol around the perimeter to look for anything unusual. When she sees something far off that looks like a threat, she notifies the infantry to go clear it. If the base is attacked, her job is to make sure the post is secured and the infantry will go out and counterattack.
At some point, her insanity causes her to stray off with a small squad during one of her perimeter checks and she heads toward this area where she shouldn’t be. Her unit repeatedly calls her on the radio and orders her to return. She does not comply.
Her unit is just a bunch of scared privates and one lower ranking sergeant. By the time the privates realize the squad has strayed off unlawfully, they are committed because they dont even know how to get back. And they couldn’t possibly do so safely even if they knew the way. So they keep following their leader. The lower ranking sergeant can maybe be going along because he is trying to convince the female to turn around. Maybe he could be the voice of reason (besides the radio) who keeps reminding the squad leader. “We have to turn around now. This is wrong. This is illegal. You’ve disobeyed orders. You have to take us back”
The lower ranking sergeant has his/her own internal conflict. The “Warrior Ethos” has been engrained in this soldier since basic training. Part of the Warrior Ethos-the Prime Directive of a soldier- is “I will never leave a fallen comrad”. This soldier is debating whether to take charge and lead the soldiers back to base (effectively leaving a fallen comrad… “fallen” in the since that the leader is suffering from insanity) or staying with the soldier for a possible safe return of everyone, and thereby disobeying the higher leader.
But even if the SGT does try to take control of the squad and leave the squad leader to fend for herself, he’s worried that any such action would be looked at as mutiny in the eyes of the insane squad leader and they could end up killing each other. So he constantly debates when, if, and how he can take control and get the privates back to base without any friendly rounds exchanged or throats slit, etc.
That work for ya?
Perhaps another scenario might involve a junior engineer officer with a mission to clear a particular area of explosive devices who gets in over their head, perhaps? I think what you’re talking about is a bit like the perfect storm. Fog of war is a common enough thing, but willful disobedience that results in unit deaths despite repeated orders from a superior officer in the individual’s chain of command would very likely end up with a very long if not lifetime stint in Leavenworth.
As for a mixed force engineer unit, that might be possible within a few years IMHO.
But there are no female combat engineers. You’ll be hard pressed to put a female in combat for a story unless she gets lost in a convoy or crashes her helicopter.
Sorry, I dont know how I completely missed your last line. Yeah, maybe in a few years. . . I doubt it though. The more the public says they want more roles for females, the more Congress puts pressure on the military to keep those females away from danger.