The One With Aldacron

Last October, I wrote a post titled All Enemies, Foreign and Domestic, in which I criticized the military for not doing their sworn duty of defending the Constitution of the United States. The basis of my argument was that George Bush is a domestic enemy. The fact that he sent his soldiers off to die under false pretenses against an enemy that didn’t exist makes him immoral. The fact that he invaded a sovereign nation as an act of aggression makes him an international war criminal. It is his repeated assaults upon the Constitution that make him a domestic enemy. No attack had been so blatant as the Military Commissions Act he signed into law and that inspired me write that post.

Now, a courageous American military officer is facing prison time for doing his sworn duty. Lieutenant Ehren Watada is up against a court martial after refusing to deploy to Iraq and speaking out against this illegal war. What I find appalling is the criticism he gets from people who should know better. Take, for example, retired Army Major General John Batiste.

Last year General Batiste, after commanding the 1st Infantry Division in Iraq, retired from active duty in opposition to the war. As a civilian, he became an outspoken critic of the Bush administration. He was one of several former generals calling for Rumsfeld’s resignation. His article in the Washington Times, from last April, is highly critical of how the war had been handled to that point. So I was rather surprised to see the following in the Guardian article linked above:

“He is wearing the uniform,” said General John Batiste, who left the
army in protest at Mr Rumsfeld’s leadership. Lt Watada’s criticism
falls into a different category because he was still on active duty.
“Discipline is fundamental in a military organization and officers
swear to support and defend the constitution of the United States
against all enemies, foreign and domestic, and obey the officers
appointed over them.”

I’m sorry to say, General Batiste, that your years of experience in the Army failed to impress upon you the meaning of the oath you refer to. It is not the duty of the soldier to blindly follow orders and shut up about it. There are lawful and unlawful orders. When I was a soldier, I was taught by my superiors that under no circumstances would I be expected to follow an order that was deemed unlawful. I always understood, of course, that my definition of unlawful may not always agree with that of those appointed over me. However, I never had to face that situation.

It has been established pretty well since the initial invasion that the entire war is based on an unlawful order. Any soldier who throws down his weapon and refuses to serve in Iraq would be doing exactly what he is supposed to do. Furthermore, the actions of the Bush administration since the attack on the World Trade Center to expand presidential power has eroded our Constitutional rights. His wiretapping program has been declared unconstitutional by a federal court. He has suspended the right of habeas corpus for anyone he deems a terrorist, an act the Constitution explicitly forbids. His administration has spirited prisoners off to other countries specifically so they could be tortured, in direct violation of the Geneva Conventions. He has held hundreds at Guantanamo Bay without any chance to defend themselves. He repeatedly refuses to hand documents over to Congress for proper oversight. His signing statements, which amount to line-item vetoes, effectively take away a crucial check in the system of checks and balances our Constitution defines: the right of Congress to overturn a presidential veto.

So how, then, General Batiste, is a man who refuses to fight an illegal war ordered by a president who has abused the power of his office and methodically crippled the Constitution, failing to do his duty? Far from it, he is doing exactly what he swore to do. It is not the duty of American soldiers to uphold tyranny. It is not the duty of American soldiers to break the law at their president’s command. It is the duty of American soldiers to act honorably within the law and to defend the Constitution of the United States of America against all enemies, foreign and domestic.

To show you, General Batiste, what separates a man like Lt. Watada, from hypocrites like you, I leave you with Lt. Watada’s own words:

A general can still resign in protest publicly, and not be subverting
civilian control. He can be sending a message, and I think it would be
a huge message if it was someone on active duty. But these guys wait
until they retire and their pension is secure.

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