A tweet states that National Guard or Active Duty military ordered to violate constitutional rights can call the GI Rights Hotline for support, with the number 1-877-447-4487 provided.
A tweet states that National Guard or Active Duty military ordered to violate constitutional rights can call the GI Rights Hotline for support, with the number 1-877-447-4487 provided.
I can tell you never served. They can refuse to follow illegal orders, and are specifically required to do so. The procedure normally requires you to place the offending officer under arrest, but there are circumstances that would allow for the delivery of a corpse instead. Fragging didn’t start in Doom and Quake.
What they absolutely cannot do, is quit. That’s called going AWOL and that shit carries years in Leavenworth.
My point is to plan an out now, so you don’t have to deal with those repercussions. This will not happen immediately because there will be great resistance, but Trump fully intendeds to strongarm every part of government under his control. The legislature will be the easiest(already rolling over), then the courts(multiple Supreme Court conservatives are hopelessly trying to maintain independence with the liberals), but the military is a different beast that’s designed to withstand a ton of shenanigans.
However, given the fact that he intends to disobey the constitution and stay for a 3rd term, he’ll want to sideline you by then. What I imagine he’ll do is push boundaries as hard as possible, purge top positions of non loyalists while pressuring rank and file who do take their oath seriously to put their money where their mouth is. I personally think this cannot lead to civil war, as the military is designed to not let that happen, but it will make civil war more likely in a post Trump world.
The military will be the last to fall, but it will be impossible for it to get out of this unscathed. This is what the end for American liberal democracy looks like. America is not exceptional enough to resist.
When the offending officer is the Commander-in-Chief, standard procedure breaks down. If the orders come down for Marines et al to march on U.S. soil, the unconstitutional order has gone from the very top to the very bottom. Disobedience can surely lead to Leavenworth as easily as going AWOL.
That being said, don’t obey, don’t quit, don’t go quietly either. If you have sworn an oath to support and defend the constitution against all enemies foreign and domestic, keep that oath above all else.