Nov. 20, 2025 5 AM PT
To the editor: Will army leaders arise in opposition to unlawful orders? It’s a conundrum involving a number of troublesome issues, every problematic and every belonging to a distinct class of concern (“Do our military leaders have the backbone to disobey illegal orders?,” Nov. 17). We’re a nation ruled by legal guidelines, and punishment can come solely after a good trial. The killing of potential drug sellers doesn’t meet that criterion. But, on this case, is it cheap to imagine that such a trial couldn’t happen in a well timed method to guard our safety?
Orders given to the army must be clear, authorized and perceived as ethical by these charged with executing them. However would we have now a viable army if each soldier acted in response to a private ethical compass or, because the creator suggests, determined to “problem the system”?
Our personal particular person worldviews — formed by expertise, ethics and, in the end, our instincts for survival (on this case, the survival of the nation) — information us when confronted with multilayered and significant choices. It’s not scientific, nor essentially proper, nor assured to supply good outcomes.
The high-minded and well-articulated op-ed is however misguided. Personally, I can’t imagine that anybody sane (besides maybe a motivated drug trafficker) would gratuitously journey in a small boat within the space at such a time. Furthermore, I really feel that the immense harm performed to our society by medicine outweighs, on this occasion, the questionable nature of our actions.
Jack Kaczorowski, Los Angeles
..
To the editor: Don’t simply learn visitor contributor Jon Duffy’s extraordinarily well-written commentary on how army leaders swore an “oath to defend the Structure, to not obey a person.” This op-ed ought to really be studied. If we fear about the way forward for our nation, every thing he says right here is necessary.
H. Yates Satterlee, Santa Barbara
..
To the editor: I say this as a retired intelligence analyst who, in 1972 in Pleiku, Vietnam, focused the B-52 bombings in Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam: You can not count on your army to do the job the American folks ought to do on the polls.
These are profession staff of our flesh pressers; they don’t seem to be our ethical guides. We as a folks determine who will lead us and to what finish. President Trump has insisted on calling the Division of Protection the Division of Battle — so be it. If we as a nation have an ethical duty, it should be mirrored in who we elect.
Earl Adams, Granada Hills
..
To the editor: Former Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has been charged by the Worldwide Prison Courtroom with three counts of crimes in opposition to humanity for his marketing campaign in opposition to suspected drug sellers that prosecutors say led to hundreds of deaths. He’s at present in ICC custody in The Hague, Netherlands.
Since early September, the U.S. army has conducted 21 strikes on suspected drug-smuggling boats within the Caribbean Sea and Japanese Pacific Ocean, killing at the very least 83 folks.
The Obama White Home explicitly condemned Duterte’s extrajudicial killings, whereas Trump repeatedly praised Duterte for doing an “unbelievable job on the drug problem.”
When can we count on Trump to be extradited to The Hague to hitch Duterte in ICC detention?
Bob Lentz, Sylmar
..
To the editor: Duffy’s op-ed paints a darkish and painful image of our army leaders. If questioned, these leaders could nicely say they have been simply following orders. Nonetheless, because the Nuremberg trials confirmed, the precept of “simply following orders” shouldn’t be a legitimate protection, be it wartime or peace.
Army leaders should study from the Nazis of the implications of simply following the orders of a tyrant.
Steve Saeta, Santa Rosa Valley
..
To the editor: The army’s grant of immunity for the Venezuelan killings makes me shudder on the considered how they may react when Trump asks for the nuclear codes.
Ann Weinman, Los Angeles
