U.S. deserters can stay in Canada: Commons

jetsetter said:
On the battlefield desertion can get you an execution. These criminals have abandoned their fellow soldiers and their country. They are in most cases the worst kind of scum.
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You know, they argued the same way about German soldiers who deserted in WW II... and they had to fight for decades for their reputation and to get the same pension as ex-Nazis...

Don't get me wrong, I don't want to compare the two wars or the two armies. All I?m saying is that it?s still too early for telling who?s acting right in a strictly moral sense. The decision to desert is not an easy one and there always has to be a heavy reason for it.

And who is the bigger criminal? The deserter who leaves because his conscience tells him so, or the soldier who blindly follows orders, maybe killing innocent civilians in the process?

I guess it's always a matter of perspective and there is never an easy answer.
 
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I will be the first one to call this war unjust in many ways. I still think though when you sign up for the army you do what your told. You're not there to think whether your superior is "right" or not. I think when you join the military you are now a tool of the country. Yes I think a perfect example is WWII with the Nazi's. I don't blame any German soldier for killing people. I blame the superiors of the Nazi army.
 
E34lover said:
I don't blame any German soldier for killing people. I blame the superiors of the Nazi army.
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The Nuremberg principles state otherwise.

Principle IV - The fact that a person acted pursuant to order of his Government or of a superior does not relieve him from responsibility under international law, provided a moral choice was in fact possible to him.
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If a soldier has an issue with an order, they should use the system to resolve that matter. Stand up for what you believe, don't run away.
 
Firecat said:
If a soldier has an issue with an order, they should use the system to resolve that matter. Stand up for what you believe, don't run away.
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Having known a marine who went mental after four tours in Iraq, let me just be the first to say that's much easier said than done. Do you really think the military cares what you think about an order? That's why they call them "orders", y'know.
 
Dogbert said:
Do you really think the military cares what you think about an order?
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Probably not, but that should be your first avenue of dissent. You can try your hand with the legal system (non-military) as well. And if all else fails, do your time in jail. If you don't want to follow an order...dont, but be prepared to face the consequences.

It's a volunteer army, nobody is being persecuted. And I think it's pretty selfish to flee and potentially ruin relations with another nation .
 
Oh I know. At this point, you have nobody but yourself to blame if you sign up for military service and then don't like it... but you have to admit, if you think we the public were lied to about the war, think about how much service grunts were lied to (and are probably still being lied to).

Take, for example, the Iraq war in it's infancy. If you were inspired to join up when we were still just talking about it, you rallied around the "90 day surgical strike" and "greeted as liberators" talk that was being thrown around... and instead, you were dumped into a hostile, bomb-laden war zone with little protection and even less direction for what must seem like an endless amount of years. Or 9/11: If you signed up to fight the terrorists that hit us on our own soil, you got dumped in Afghanistan and were eventually forgotten about in favor of the Next Big War.

There has to be a general understanding going in that you're probably not going to like some of your orders, but I mean, there's clearly both a tolerance threshold that's being violated for a large number of individuals, and an obscene amount of lying and blind faith for the rest.
 
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I'm venturing into territory that i'm not all too familiar with. I don't know what most soldiers think. I'm going to assume that most of them still agree with what they are doing in Iraq & Afghanistan (maybe not the wars in general, but certain aspects at least). If not, they really have no business being there. Free will still exists, and nobody can force you to do something you don't want to.

On the other hand, some still believe the "reasons" for the Iraq war or that Saddam Hussein was behind 9/11. If people are that uninformed, I'm not sure what to do.

I still think that during the run up to the Iraq war there was plenty of information out there to counter the administrations arguments, people just chose to ignore it.

I do agree that the soldiers got more than they bargained for.
 
Ugh, I had a well thought-out post that apparently got eaten when the site went down. Now I'm disenchanted and can't be arsed to type it all again. :sad:

Knowing several people in the military, and considering joining the Air Force in both regular and National Guard flavors, I spend a little time on this subject.

Basically, the grunts that run into obviously "morally questionable" orders have three options, once they reach their breaking point... which usually happens between the first time they see a civilian death they acknowledge was needless and their third tour.

1. Ignore or disobey the order. Not only will this accomplish nothing, as they'll just find someone else to carry out the order as your replacement, but you'll be shipped off to jail. And not the good kind of jail, either. Fort Leavenworth jail. If you thought the orders you were being forced to follow were horrible, you're mistaken. I've seen some of those "corrections specialists" that come from/aspire to go to Fort Leonard Wood; you don't want to meet them, let alone be at their mercy.

2. Put your blinders on and your head down, and do whatever your CO says. Most of these people are the ones that still think Saddam had something to do with 9/11, rationalized unjust things happening to them (see: dropped into a war zone with no body armor), and generally just eagerly take any order given to them for any reason they're given. These are the same people that either fall apart when they get out of the service and don't have an immediate authoritative figure dictating their lives anymore ("Brooks was here"), or end up being enlisted for thirty years because they don't know any different but can't give any orders.

3. Desert to another country, and hope they're nice to you.
 
Firecat said:
If a soldier has an issue with an order, they should use the system to resolve that matter. Stand up for what you believe, don't run away.
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Oh yes because everybody knows the Nazi Army was world renowned for its positive attitude on individualism. I mean come on! If you disobeyed an order you were most likely dead! No one can give up their own life just for what they "believe in" even if what they believe in is not killing innocent people. I'm not saying what they did was justifiable. I'm just saying look at it this way. You're living a nice little life in a German village when all of the sudden some Nazi's come to power and give you a choice. A. Have you and your whole family shot. B. Join the Nazi Army. Now you're faced with another 2 choices. A. Kill innocent people even though you hate it. B. Be shot and have your family wondering what the hell happened to you. I don't care if a law says different. I still think not all people in the Nazi military should be blamed.
 
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Of course they should be allowed to stay in Canada.
 
AiR said:
Of course they should be allowed to stay in Canada.
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They are criminals and as such they should not be allowed to stay in Canada.
 
Firecat said:
If a soldier has an issue with an order, they should use the system to resolve that matter. Stand up for what you believe, don't run away.
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I'm not familiar with military procedures, but if a soldier refuses to follow orders, doesn't he get dishonorably discharged and thus has zero chance of ever getting another job?
 
jetsetter said:
They are criminals and as such they should not be allowed to stay in Canada.
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By Sharia law George Bush should be killed. Why are we not deporting him to Iran?
 
E34lover said:
Oh yes because everybody knows the Nazi Army was world renowned for its positive attitude on individualism. I mean come on! If you disobeyed an order you were most likely dead! No one can give up their own life just for what they "believe in" even if what they believe in is not killing innocent people. I'm not saying what they did was justifiable. I'm just saying look at it this way. You're living a nice little life in a German village when all of the sudden some Nazi's come to power and give you a choice. A. Have you and your whole family shot. B. Join the Nazi Army. Now you're faced with another 2 choices. A. Kill innocent people even though you hate it. B. Be shot and have your family wondering what the hell happened to you. I don't care if a law says different. I still think not all people in the Nazi military should be blamed.
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My comment wasn't really directed towards the Nazis, but it is what the Nuremberg trials established. And I agree. I don't think being forced to kill someone (against your will) is a legitimate reason to kill someone.

chaos386 said:
I'm not familiar with military procedures, but if a soldier refuses to follow orders, doesn't he get dishonorably discharged and thus has zero chance of ever getting another job?
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Probably not a government job. And the UCMJ speaks clearly about following orders (you have to obey lawful orders).
 
In my time in the Navy, I was taught in no uncertain terms not to obey unlawful orders. As to what constitutes an "unlawful order", that decision is obviously yours to make in the heat of the moment. As to whether your decision was deemed right or not, that is to be determined after the smoke has cleared. If a superior orders me to shoot some random fishing trolley way off in the distance that's one thing, but to try and rationalize orders over who to shoot on the battlefield? I honestly cannot imagine how life must be for those people.

And some sailors have volunteered and thus shipped off to Iraq too. Shows how desperate America had become at one point.
 
klankymen said:
By Sharia law George Bush should be killed. Why are we not deporting him to Iran?
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Because the he is the president and because the United States is not an ally of Iran.
 
E34lover said:
Oh yes because everybody knows the Nazi Army was world renowned for its positive attitude on individualism. I mean come on! If you disobeyed an order you were most likely dead! No one can give up their own life just for what they "believe in" even if what they believe in is not killing innocent people. I'm not saying what they did was justifiable. I'm just saying look at it this way. You're living a nice little life in a German village when all of the sudden some Nazi's come to power and give you a choice. A. Have you and your whole family shot. B. Join the Nazi Army. Now you're faced with another 2 choices. A. Kill innocent people even though you hate it. B. Be shot and have your family wondering what the hell happened to you. I don't care if a law says different. I still think not all people in the Nazi military should be blamed.
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:D Your picture of the Third Reich is kinda funny. Thats not really the choice people had ;) Still, I think you should be aware of what the job is when you are a soldier, but nobody can tell how war is before having it experienced themselves. I acknowledge the fact that people make wrong decision sometimes, and these wrong decisions should not always mean their life is fucked. I am sure everyone of you has made a wrong decision yourself sometime.
 
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