Cont: The Trump Presidency: Part 26

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Horatius said:
Well, I think that's the key.

Orders to kill someone in a foreign war zone can probably be "ambiguous" in a lot of different ways. You're in a war zone, with a different culture, and possibly combatants who may or may not be following the laws of war as western nations generally understand them. I have some sympathy for people making mistakes under such circumstances.

But this? An order to overrule a US election, held on US soil, by US citizens, certified as legitimate by multiple US State Governments from both parties, certified as legitimate by Federal Officials tasked with overseeing election security, certified as legitimate by rulings by several courts at both State and Federal levels, and now, the US Attorney General saying unambiguously that there's no evidence of fraud? There's no way an order like this is in any way ambiguous. Anyone who follows it follows it because they want to overturn American democracy.

If there's enough members of the US armed forces who want that to make this scenario even remotely possible, the US has already lost.
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I would think it possible that the military might even just sit on the sidelines.

Imagine if some of Trump's department heads just don't leave in January, keep showing up and giving orders. Like what has already been going on at the Bureau of Land Management. Trump stays in the White House, after appointing loyal toadies at DHS and Secret Service. DHS then claims that it considers Trump to still be President, orders Secret Service not to evict him. Secret Service boss (also a Trump appointee) obeys the order. Secret Service staff and other govvie employees find themselves getting contradictory orders, each claiming to be representing the "real" President.

Judges make their rulings and Trump, along with his cabinet and department heads ignores them and claim the rulings to be illegal, with lots of mumbo jumbo white papers and depositions and filings and such. Endless crappy legal blabbery about why Trump is still President.

What role would "the military" even have in such a scenario? They would just be on the sidelines, waiting for things to settle out - with the Joint Chiefs and, Sec. Defence and Department heads all Trump appointees. Add to that the (pseudo)Commander-In-Chief calling out loyal officers, even specific members of the service to come to his side - some would, even if most knew better.

None of that will happen - but I really do think that in the event of a pseudo-legal coup attempt (not just this one, any hypothetical), the military might just sit on its thumbs and wait for the issue to be resolved some other way.
 
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crescent said:
I would think it possible that the military might even just sit on the sidelines.

Imagine if some of Trump's department heads just don't leave in January, keep showing up and giving orders. Like what has already been going on at the Bureau of Land Management. Trump stays in the White House, after appointing loyal toadies at DHS and Secret Service. DHS then claims that it considers Trump to still be President, orders Secret Service not to evict him. Secret Service boss (also a Trump appointee) obeys the order. Secret Service staff and other govvie employees find themselves getting contradictory orders, each claiming to be representing the "real" President.

Judges make their rulings and Trump, along with his cabinet and department heads ignores them and claim the rulings to be illegal, with lots of mumbo jumbo white papers and depositions and filings and such. Endless crappy legal blabbery about why Trump is still President.

What role would "the military" even have in such a scenario? They would just be on the sidelines, waiting for things to settle out - with the Joint Chiefs and, Sec. Defence and Department heads all Trump appointees. Add to that the (pseudo)Commander-In-Chief calling out loyal officers, even specific members of the service to come to his side - some would, even if most knew better.

None of that will happen - but I really do think that in the event of a pseudo-legal coup attempt (not just this one, any hypothetical), the military might just sit on its thumbs and wait for the issue to be resolved some other way.
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You don't know the US Military very well.
As of Jan 21st Biden will become the POTUS and if ordered to remove Trump and his croneis from their offices, the Military will obey BIden.
 
Stacyhs said:
Germany had a many centuries old history of autocratic rule supported by a military that answered directly to that autocrat. They knew virtually nothing else. We do not.
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When you join the US Military the oath you take is every specdic,your primary duty is to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States;evenything else is secondary. The obligation to obey you superiors officer is secondary, and applies only to lawful orders. And suspending constituion and ordering a new election..for which there is NO Provision anywhere in US Law is about as unlawful as you can get.
These is no oath to a specific person a la the Fuehrer oath the German Military took.
 
dudalb said:
You don't know the US Military very well.
As of Jan 21st Biden will become the POTUS and if ordered to remove Trump and his croneis from their offices, the Military will obey BIden.
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I believe very much that military will fall behind Biden. But as a student of history I know all too well how a democracy can and has devolved into an authoritarian dictatorship. I know how Hitler and others used assassinations and arrests of military leaders to take full control of the country. How self interests can destroy principles.
 
acbytesla said:
I believe very much that military will fall behind Biden. But as a student of history I know all too well how a democracy can and has devolved into an authoritarian dictatorship. I know how Hitler and others used assassinations and arrests of military leaders to take full control of the country. How self interests can destroy principles.
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Germany did not have a strong tradition of democratic rule that the Unites States does.
 
dudalb said:
Germany did not have a strong tradition of democratic rule that the Unites States does.
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So you say.

I mostly agree with you. But so many things have happened already that I remain concerned. 50 more days of the unhinged and spineless Republican leaders going along with Trump's delusions.
 
dudalb said:
When you join the US Military the oath you take is every specdic,your primary duty is to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States;evenything else is secondary. The obligation to obey you superiors officer is secondary, and applies only to lawful orders. And suspending constituion and ordering a new election..for which there is NO Provision anywhere in US Law is about as unlawful as you can get.
These is no oath to a specific person a la the Fuehrer oath the German Military took.
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you're so certain of this, but i think there's plenty of people, some with a lot of influence, that would see that as a lawful order, both in and out of the military. i think they'd feel like they did nothing wrong. who and how many, that i don't know, but you know i'm right about that much.
 
dudalb said:
When you join the US Military the oath you take is every specdic,your primary duty is to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States;evenything else is secondary. The obligation to obey you superiors officer is secondary, and applies only to lawful orders. And suspending constituion and ordering a new election..for which there is NO Provision anywhere in US Law is about as unlawful as you can get.
These is no oath to a specific person a la the Fuehrer oath the German Military took.
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Yes...which is exactly my point. The German/Austrian soldier swore an oath directly to the Emperor/Kaiser before WW1 and, as you said, to Hitler after the short-lived Weimar Republic. Almost anywhere in the "Old World" the military and the ruler had a symbiotic relationship. One could not survive without the personal loyalty and support of other. Czar Nicholas II found that out the hard way.
 
dudalb said:
When you join the US Military the oath you take is every specdic,your primary duty is to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States;evenything else is secondary.
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Trump is claiming, at every possible opportunity, that his actions are in defence of the Constitution of the United States. If he were to order the US Military to do anything, it seems to me more or less certain that he would do so on the pretext that the election he knows to have been rigged presents an immediate threat to the operation of the Constitution, and that by preventing it from being implemented the military would be acting in its defence. And there are tens of millions of people who steadfastly believe him. Some of them are military; at least one of them is ex-military and is calling for the overturning of the election results.

I'm not saying the majority of the military would side with Trump, but given that at least one ex-military officer has done so, it's not reasonable to say that none would or could.

Dave
 
dirtywick said:
you're so certain of this, but i think there's plenty of people, some with a lot of influence, that would see that as a lawful order, both in and out of the military. i think they'd feel like they did nothing wrong. who and how many, that i don't know, but you know i'm right about that much.
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As food for thought, how many rank-and-file soldiers get their news from OANN or Breitbart or other right-wing source? And so might see it as their duty to cancel out a stolen election? My guess is the percentage at least reflects the population at large, and is not insignificant. And how many General Flynn’s fill the higher ranks?

As an aside, in the Police Academy we were taught improper orders were to be questioned, but then followed, with concerns being reported up the chain-of-command. But it was clearly spelled out that illegal orders were not to be obeyed - “I was only following orders” was not a defense, especially after Nuremberg.
 
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dudalb said:
I see we have a number of "Progressives" here who really have not idea about how the US Military operates.
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Yes yes yes, and they would never violate the UCMJ and torture detainees either, the military is clear that they would never follow illegal orders like that. Unless of course someone actually issues them then they follow the orders just fine. But hypothetical illegal orders never get followed. Real illegal orders of course get followed all the time.

So as long as this remains hypothetical we have nothing to worry about.
 
Fast Eddie B said:
As food for thought, how many rank-and-file soldiers get their news from OANN or Breitbart or other right-wing source? And so might see it as their duty to cancel out a stolen election? My guess is the percentage at least reflects the population at large, and is not insignificant. And how many General Flynn’s fill the higher ranks?

As an aside, in the Police Academy we were taught improper orders were to be questioned, but then followed, with concerns being reported up the chain-of-command. But it was clearly spelled out that illegal orders were not to be obeyed - “I was only following orders” was not a defense, especially after Nuremberg.
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Bah that is only not a defense when you lose, when you win, you are not going to lock up our boys for only following orders after all. This covers the military and the police.
 
dudalb said:
It can't legally be done. Trump can declare martial law, but there is NO provision for suspending the Constituion and having a new election in the COnstituon or law. None.
I would go beyond sedition and call what Flynn proposes "Treason" as blatent and clear as Bebnedict Arnold trying to sell West Point to the British.
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I thought treason had to involve a foreign power?
 
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