Why do it, then? I'm not trying to be inflammatory or ask loaded questions here, I'm genuinely curious (as someone who, as you note, has almost no connection to the Americans who fight in wars; I have friends who are vets, but have been out of the military for years), and I just don't understand.

I absolutely believe you when you say that none of y'all want to commit war crimes, fire on civilian infra, bomb schools, etc. And yet that's happening right now, in Iran, and the soldiers continue to follow orders and carry out this travesty. I get that refusing an order is not something any soldier will do lightly, but when a school gets hit in Iran, do the soldiers conducting that strike not know what they're attacking beforehand?

Even if they don't, do they never find out? Do they not see that some large N% of targets that have been hit have ended up being civilian targets? When they're ordered to fire on a new target, do they not question whether or not it's a civilian target, given past history?

I ask these questions from near-complete ignorance; I really do not know how this works, or what kind of information any officer or soldier has when they're about to follow the orders they've been given. But it just seems insane to me that people continue to follow these orders, assuming they know how many civilians have been killed through previous actions. I just cannot imagine being in their position, and actually trusting that my superior officers were ordering me to do things that will later turn out to be morally defensible. (If any of this war is morally defensible, which I don't think it is.)

It's My Lai, not Mai Lai FYI.

Thank you for expressing your humanistic thoughts, but do consider the history of the institution and the government.

What's different this time is that they haven't bothered with the PR.

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"No stupid rules of engagement, no nation-building quagmire, no democracy-building exercise, no politically-correct wars. We fight to win,” Hegseth said."

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politic...

> they have been getting letters from the DOJ office of legal counsel that say it's legal. This effectively immunizes them (the DOJ can't turn around and charge you with a crime, if they advised you beforehand it was not a crime).

This is not true.

OLC opinions are just that: opinions. They are non-binding and non-promissory. They are an important factor in any assessments as a norm, but definitely not dispositive and not legally binding.

The only real barrier is the pardon power, but I'm personally fine at this point with totally breaking the seal, trying and jailing every criminal in the administration(++), and consider the pardon power gone for good. Small price to pay.

> This effectively immunizes them (the DOJ can't turn around and charge you with a crime, if they advised you beforehand it was not a crime).

Where is the check or balance on this? The executive branch can apparently just launder itself wholesale of any crimes committed by its members.

Alas, the USA isn't signed up to the ICC.