Most recently they were rapidly deployed to Kabul to shore up the airhead at HKIA during the military collapse in Afghanistan. For the most part these paratroopers behaved honorably during a difficult and sudden duty.
During the last hours of the evacuation, according to troops under his command and as documented by photographs and witness statements, Donahue ordered all of the passengers aboard a C-17 transport plane to disembark so he could have a souvenir loaded onto the plane. That souvenir, or “war trophy,” was an inoperable Taliban-owned Toyota Hilux with a fully operational Russian ZU-23 anti-aircraft autocannon mounted in the bed. Once the Hilux was loaded passengers were allowed back on the plane, but, of course, there wasn’t room for all of them. According to troops on the scene, at least 50 people and perhaps as many as 100 people were left at Kabul to make room for the Hilux.It is believed that many of those left behind have been or will be killed by the Taliban, in part because of information allegedly provided to Taliban commanders by Donahue himself....One military intelligence source, who requested anonymity, told RedState:“Some of those on the last planes out were key HUMINT assets. At least 50, likely as many as 100 were left behind after being removed from the flight. But the 50 were bonafide personnel that should have been evacuated. They will likely never be heard from again. The Taliban was given literally everything that would prevent any of those people from hiding or escape and evasion, and we know that there are a lot of ‘disappearings’ going on.”
Nor was that the only failure that the RedState report reveals. The commander did not apparently obey US laws governing war trophies.
He also failed to destroy sensitive equipment left behind, which can be reverse engineered by the Chinese military now operating in Afghanistan. Learning to defeat this counter-rocket-and-mortar technology endangers every ship in the US navy, should the Chinese go to war with us.
So far no accountability has occurred for senior leaders, though; only for the one guy brave enough to put his rank on the line and demand it. He's still in jail. Several Congressmen have demanded his release, so far fruitlessly.
12 comments:
Just another name on the fire. THe barby is getting long list, almost to the moon.
Do you see why I get pissed off in 2007?
That's mere peanuts compared to what is going to happen now.
The Divine FIre is coming. Get ready.
Humans watching media: every other wannabe profit said the same thing and it did not happen!
Ymar: I did not Speak back then, now did I. Some pattern biases going on. Even if the crier kept crying wolf was wrong, I was the one that made correct warnings.
LtCol Scheller is facing the following charges: Article 88 (contempt toward officials), Article 90 (willfully disobeying superior commissioned officer), Article 92 (failure to obey lawful general orders), Article 133 (conduct unbecoming an officer and a gentleman),”
This is absolutely correct because, regardless of what you think of the substance of his comments, that is what he did in his viral video. Furthermore, when given an order to cease making such statements he refused to do so and was, properly, confined because he wouldn’t stop breaking the law and a lesser form of confinement was inadequate to keep him from doing so.
Whether or not you agree with his position, his manner of communicating it was inexcusable. Unless you are willing to allow everyone from the lowest rank on up to publicly call out their chain of command whenever they disagree with their actions, you simply can’t make an exception for LtCol Scheller. To allow such behavior would destroy good order and discipline throughout the service. Whatever you may think of the state of accountability among the highest levels of our military, two wrongs didn’t magically begin making a right because one sympathizes with an opinion.
Hi, Joel. I was just thinking about you the other day, and wondering if you were still in, or if you had retired. You must be getting close, right?
Scheller was close too. He had three more years to retirement. He is throwing away the security of a pension he's served honorably for nearly two decades to earn in order to make this call for accountability. You know what it will cost him, even if these charges don't stick. It's a very expensive decision, but an honorable one. He is accepting the price for his actions, doubtless because he believes in them.
You know me well enough to know what I'm going to say, but I'll say it anyway. He's right: the Corps preaches accountability to junior Marines, and it enforces it upon them strictly. Good that it does; discipline is the soul of the army. Yet that very discipline rots when junior Marines can see their seniors getting away with flaunting the same standards.
If a Lance Corporal loses a rifle or night vision goggles, he's up a creek. These guys lost thousands of rifles, helicopters, drones, C-RAMs, MRAPs, and none of them will pay a price of any kind for it. They see that, and it will inculcate a cynicism in the ranks that will be crippling.
If a Sergeant's failure to obey the basic standards of military science caused him to issue orders that resulted in the deaths of Marines, he'd be eaten alive. Yet these generals conducted a retreat action in a manner so divorced from the well-known basics of military science that it will be studied for centuries as a bad example. Not one of them was relieved; not one of them will pay any kind of price. That's ruinous.
A unit I was with in Iraq had a female captain who was a military lawyer, conducting an affair with a married E-9. Everybody knew, and nothing was done for a long time. It was very harmful to morale, because those same two were imposing prosecutions or NJPs on the junior soldiers -- yet they were getting away with flaunting the rules. Fortunately the command finally did the right thing. I liked both of the two involved, but it had to be done.
The moral rot at the heart of our institutions arises because no one will stand up and speak out against it. They keep quiet and keep their careers, pensions, positions, but they are destroying our institutions and our nation. It's not just the Marines, as this post about the 82nd shows. Nor is it just the military: where is the FBI agent who has stood up and resigned in order to speak out against the corruption we are seeing almost daily in that institution?
Here's the one guy who did, and who threw his rank on the table to do it. Instead of respecting his message -- which is absolutely right -- they refused his resignation and placed a gag order on him so he wouldn't keep making the senior leaders uncomfortable.
That's not justice, it's pure power in pursuit of moral rot. I maintain that it is an illegal order because it shocks, or ought to shock, the conscience to use pure power to silence the only man who stood up and spoke the truth. Our nation like our institutions will rot and fail if men don't start standing up for what's right, even where it comes at steep personal cost.
Let’s not confuse the message LtCol Scheller delivered with the manner of its delivery. As I said, one can agree with what he said while recognizing the way he delivered it was inexcusable and dishonorable. It was dishonorable because he violated his oath as an officer in what he did and in violating orders he was duty bound to follow.
What could possibly excuse such an abandonment of one’s oath? Was it in LtCol Scheller’s position or office to hold the Joint Chiefs of Staff or the CENTCOM CG accountable? Of course not. That is the duty of the President. Then what could LtCol Scheller accomplish by “throwing his rank on the table?” The only thing he accomplished was making a futile statement about a situation he had no control or influence over while simultaneously setting a disastrous example for his Marines. He abandoned his oath for that??!!?
To quote the Sir Thomas More character from Robert Bolt’s play A Man for All Seasons, “What is an oath then, but words we say to God?” If that is true, how do we excuse the abandonment of an oath simply to make a public gesture that will not result in affecting any change? Is public posturing now more important than fidelity to the words we say to God?
What violation of his oath are you talking about? The enlisted swear to obey the orders of the president and the officers appointed over them, but that is not in the officer's oath (as you know, but if anyone else is following this conversation, here is an article from Quantico on the differences in the oaths: https://www.quantico.marines.mil/News/News-Article-Display/Article/611510/the-difference-between-oath-of-office-oath-of-enlistment/ ).
Officers swear to uphold the constitution and to "well and faithfully discharge the duties of [their] office."
Does not their office require standing up for what's right in the face of others who go along with doing wrong? Does not their faith require them to stand up for accountability for those in power? To defend the basic moral principles of the service, which are not blind obedience but loyalty to the constitution and to the American people?
It was not only rifles and war materiel that was abandoned in Afghanistan, after all. It was US citizens, too. American citizens were abandoned, and not even out of brute necessity, but because of a complete failure of military planning and execution.
Yes, it's the President's job to hold people accountable for that -- but he is not doing his duty. He has violated his oath nine ways to Sunday. He is foresworn if anyone is.
Yes, it's the job of the higher officers before it is the job of any LTCOL somewhere. They ought to faithfully discharge the duties of their office -- but they aren't. They are foresworn.
This guy, in my opinion, is doing his duty. Somebody has to stand up for what is right, and call out the truth that the Emperor has no clothes -- neither the Emperor nor any of his generals, it appears. If nobody does that, what happens?
Officers are allowed to resign their commissions in protest for a reason. This is the reason. It's not a violation of your oath to resign in protest nor to protest if you do so. It may well be the only way to "faithfully discharge the duties of my office" in hard circumstances like these.
What violation am I talking about???? How can you “well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office” when you are knowingly and intentionally violating the UCMJ. Even the article you linked to recognizes that article 90 (Willfully disobeying a Superior Commissioned Officer) applies to officers. By the way, so does Article 88 (contempt toward officials) and Article 89 (disrespecting superior commissioned officers). LtCol Scheller practically admits he is doing as much in the video he made. To what end? To call for the firing of superior officers over which he has no authority. We’re not talking about saving the lives of civilians during a massacre. LtCol Scheller accomplished nothing with that demonstration of misconduct except to set a horrible example for his Marines.
Lets tease this out. If you think it was permissible for LtCol Scheller to behave in this way are you willing to extend this permission to all ranks? Should the PFC be allowed to publicly call out his battalion leadership? Should Lts be allowed to make viral videos publicly criticizing the division CG? Such behavior, if extended throughout the ranks would destroy good order and discipline and erase the instant obedience to orders military units require in order to survive in combat. That way lies destruction.
If LtCol Scheller felt this statement needed to be made he should have resigned his commission FIRST, then make the video. There is NOTHING in his duties that required him to break the law with a Youtube video. NOTHING in his duties required him to publicly criticize superior officers under which he didn’t serve in commands to which he didn’t even belong. Blatantly violating the UCMJ in a publicly shared video is not a resignation in protest. It is simply breaking the law. And yes, his oath prohibited that.
I disagree, for reasons I've already laid out. The gag order he was disobeying shocks the conscience -- an attempt to use orders to silence the only officer speaking the truth, in the face of a chain of command all the way to the President that is breaking its oaths and violating their duties. Orders that shock the conscience are the standard for illegal orders, and it is one's duty as an officer (or indeed for any servicemember) to disobey illegal orders.
Bringing it to the public is the only option when your whole higher chain is broken. Once we might have expected an officer to go to Congress instead of the public directly in such a circumstance, but how many Congressmen keep their oaths?
I respect the point that discipline cannot be maintained if lower officers are free to publicly criticize their superiors. However, I question the value of maintaining discipline in service to illegal orders and base violations of oath and duty by Presidents or higher commanders. The nation would be better served not having a military that will obey blindly, punishing none of the failures but only those who dare to object.
It's a difficult moment. None of our institutions are functioning properly. If higher won't do what's right, and the President won't do what's right, and Congress won't do what's right, an appeal to the People may be the last hope.
You seem to concede that he might well have done so, if only he had first resigned and then made videos. Yet the Biden administration has made noises that they will be applying Article 88 to veterans as well. The issue here is not really maintaining discipline in the active force, it's silencing dissent -- again, an illegal order that ought to shock the conscience. It is the duty of good men to disobey illegal orders by corrupt officers and officials.
https://www.westernjournal.com/veterans-reportedly-open-mail-find-ordered-stop-disrespecting-biden-vp-harris-members-congress/
There has been some discussion of the UCMJ being applied to retirees. However, that is still very much only an academic point of discussion since, to my knowledge, the UCMJ hasn’t been used against retirees who committed no misconduct on active duty. At any rate, it would not have applied to LtCol Scheller had he resigned before making his video since he was not retirement eligible at that time.
What on earth shocks the conscience about the order he was given? Nothing about LtCol Scheller’s job or duties required him to make Youtube videos criticizing and insulting the chain of command. Doing so was a violation of the law. The order he was given was to keep him from continuing to break the law and, thereby, rack up more charges. I’m afraid my conscience isn’t shocked by that.
This isn’t a libel case in which truth is a defense. Even if you agree with him, it was not his place or duty to make such statements. As I pointed out before, it was a violation of his duty and oath to do so. Even if you think the highest levels of command are violating their oaths and being derelict in their duty that doesn’t excuse LtCol Scheller in doing the same. Two wrongs don’t make a right!
I'm sometimes given to forgiving outright lawbreaking in matters of conscience provided that the lawbreaker accepts responsibility and pays the freight, as you know; for example, I thought LTC West did well in saving his mens' lives even though it meant committing a war crime, which he immediately confessed and for which he immediately accepted full responsibility.
Here I do not think there was outright lawbreaking, as the American people needed to hear from an officer calling for accountability. The American people need to know that their military has standards far better than what we have seen, recently, in Afghanistan. I hardly need to rehearse to you, and shall not, all the ways in which this violated military science, military standards, and the moral duty especially to those American citizens abandoned by reckless execution of an obviously derelict plan for retreat.
I'll tell you, whatever ends up happening here with the UCMJ, those senior officers are likely going to end up answering to Scheller. He'll probably be a Senator before it's done, and they'll find themselves testifying before him to explain what they've done here. The American people will end up endorsing what he's done, and in our system that will legitimize his actions and give him the authority to do what he's set out to do -- and what very much needs to be done.
Heck, even West ended up in Congress.
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