Quote:
Originally posted by Skunk:
quote:
Originally posted by Luvian:
I'd say every time a soldier refuse to carry out an order, the case should be brought before martial court, just to be sure. Otherwise if soldiers could do what they want it would be anarchy.
Let the court decide if the soldier was right or wrong.
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Now who has missed his true vocation as a politician, eh? That was a very diplomatic answer.
Let's have a scenario instead.
The year is 2020, Iraq is a fully democratic country and the last US trooper has long since left the country.
Two years previously, a war had broken out with Iran. In the course of the war, Iran had used mustard gas and your government, in retaliation quickly developed a similary nasty substance and used it on the Iranian positions. Thousands have died from the effects on both sides - and many of those were civilians.
You are the the presiding judge in a military tribunal and you have before you a helicopter pilot accused of refusing to obey a lawful order.
In brief, what happened was this:
The helicopter pilot was ordered to attack Iranian positions with a poison gas. He made the first attack run and swung round to the second target to make his run. He saw a line of *Iraqi* refugees near by the target and radioed back to base to inform them of their prescence. The ground commander acknowledged the information and told him to attack anyway - the advancing Iranian troops were closing in on a vital bridge crossing and it was essential to prevent them from capturing it.
The pilot refused, arguing that the Iraqi civilians (some 100 men, women and children) would be certainly be caught in the poison cloud. As a result of his refusal to obey the order, the Iranians capture the crossing. 800 Iraqi troops are later killed in the recapture of the bridge.
The pilot argues that as the new Iraq is a signatory to the Geneva Convention and the Chemical Weapons Convention, the order to drop the poison gas was contrary to international law and that he was therefore entitled to refuse.
The prosecution maintains that he wilfully disobeyed a lawful order in war time - one that cost the lives of an entire batallion of his own side and, given the strategic importance of the crossing, nearly cost Iraq the war. The prosecution further argues that since Iran was using chemical weapons, the Convention on Chemical Weapons was inapplicable - and that the potential death of the civilians was acceptable under the Geneva convention since it would be an untintential loss of life (ie they would not have been directly targeted).
Judgement time - guilty or not guilty?
Summary of Judgement please. [/QUOTE]A soldier is sworn to follow his country's order, not some international laws. The country might or might not have broken those international laws, but this has nothing to do with this soldier.
A lowly soldier does not have access to all the vital informations necessary to make an informed decision. By refusing to follow his orders, the opposing force was able to capture a vital point, and might have been able to do much more. That's soldier uninformed decision cost the life of many, and put the country and all it's people's security in jeopardy.
I think he would need to be discharged from the army, as he can't be trusted with following orders, and his action costed the lives of many.
That soldier's intentions might have been good, but you don't win wars with good intentions. While the soldier might have seen the few civilians hiding under the bridge, the commander might have seen the heavy tanks trying to cross it and get behind your lines.
He's guilty of disobeing orders. When you want to stand up for your convictions, you have to accept the consequences.