If the Democrats in the 90-second video that has received so much attention this week had done their homework on the Uniform Code of Military Justice, they would have known that Article 92 prohibits the failure to obey any lawful general order or regulation as well as any other lawful order that a service member has a duty to obey (“Trump says Democrats’ video message to military is ‘seditious behavior’ punishable by death,” Nov. 20).
However, service members have a duty to disobey unlawful orders. The question is, what constitutes an unlawful order? “An order is considered unlawful if it is contrary to the Constitution, U.S. laws, or a lawful superior order, or if it directs the commission of a crime,” or at least so I have read online. The lawfulness of an order is a question of law to be determined ultimately by a military judge.
Another source states: “Article 92 also references subparagraph 16c of the UCMJ which states: ‘Inference of lawfulness. An order requiring the performance of a military duty or act may be inferred to be lawful, and it is disobeyed at the peril of the subordinate. This inference does not apply to a patently illegal order, such as one that directs the commission of a crime. The lawfulness of an order is a question of law to be determined by the military judge.’”
So the Democrats were repeating what was in the UCMJ, and both they and the White House should know these facts. Now, if they said members of the U.S. military should disobey lawful orders, that’s a different story. But as I read the article, they did not.
Everybody is making a mountain out of a molehill.
— Stas Chrzanowski, Baltimore
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