The military would not function properly if people just refused or deserted because soldiers did not want to do certain things. If you do not want to be put into a situation where you may have to kill someone for whatever reason a commanding officer might give, then just don't join. Joining is voluntary.

Also, good luck getting a job if you get a dishonorable discharge because you deserted. It would probably ruin your entire life if you wanted to continue living in the United States.

SoldierHawk wrote:

Klimbatize wrote: Equating all orders a CO gives you as the same is asinine. This is the real world, and it's not black and white. Saying that ignoring an order to shoot unarmed, American civilians is equivalent to disobeying a CO's order in combat is completely stupid and illogical. People who just obey orders to commit war crimes go down as weak and evil in history, and deservedly so. And for the record, like I said, there are several soldiers being court martialed as we speak for obeying their COs orders in combat. Which is as it should be. Soldiers who kill innocents, even under orders, are not soldiers. They are murderers. That said, the reason I didn't get as upset as some of you at atom's comment is that simply because people are unarmed doesn't mean they can't be a threat. I assumed extenuating circumstances. (It also depends on your definition of "unarmed.") I don't think he'll disagree if I say he wasn't implying shooting blindly and without question into a peaceful crowd simply because someone told him to. There ARE a lot of gray areas, all around. (I'm saying this as someone who made up their mind to join the military not after 9/11, but after Abu Ghraib. I made a promise to myself that something like that would never be done again, at least by anyone under my command.) Now that said, my original statement that started all this in the first place is that I dread being called on to enforce the NDAA. And that's mostly because I wouldn't have a good reason not to. It's fairly easy to know right from wrong when your CO is telling you to shoot innocent people. It's another when you're being ordered to detain people indefinitely because they've fallen under the very, very wide umbrella of terrorism that the NDAA provides. Now, I really don't think it will come to that, but it's what I was thinking about as I read it.

I agree with everything SoldierHawk has stated here, except for the part that is in large bold letters.

When you have been under the command of someone you know and trust for years, who has never before asked you to do anything questionable, you would probably trust their judgment if they told you to take action against a group of civilians. You often do not get all of the information you would like to have when you are in such situations. It is very easy to look back and say, "Gee, those people were just being kind of rowdy, we probably shouldn't have done that."

Also, as a human being with free will, you should obviously question ANYTHING someone tells you to do if you have an issue with it. The military does allow you to do that, up to a certain point.

My view comes from personal experience with a commanding officer who listened to my questions when I had reservations and reassured me that the actions we were taking were reasonable. I chose to trust his judgments and looking back it made more sense after the fact than it did at the time, why he ordered us to do certain things.

It's a completely different scenario if you have just been put under someone's command and within a short period of time they are ordering you to do questionable things, and they ignore any questions or reservations their soldiers might bring up about it. In that scenario, I would not follow orders.

Additionally, I will concede that my original post came off as cold, lacking details and a bit sociopathic. I was probably tired when I typed it. I tend to type in threads like this only when I am tired. In the future I will just observe as I have done in the past.

Sorry for sidetracking this thread. Please continue with the original topic.