{"id":81960,"date":"2018-09-24T07:22:35","date_gmt":"2018-09-24T11:22:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/valorguardians.com\/blog\/?p=81960"},"modified":"2022-01-13T20:33:36","modified_gmt":"2022-01-14T01:33:36","slug":"when-killing-the-enemy-a-crime","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/?p=81960","title":{"rendered":"When killing the enemy is a crime."},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/Iraq-Jihadist-flag_2947305b.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-large wp-image-81961\" src=\"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/Iraq-Jihadist-flag_2947305b-500x312.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"500\" height=\"312\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/Iraq-Jihadist-flag_2947305b-500x312.jpg 500w, https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/Iraq-Jihadist-flag_2947305b-300x187.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/Iraq-Jihadist-flag_2947305b.jpg 620w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 500px) 100vw, 500px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>There are too many cases of warriors being sent to prison for killing people in a war zone.\u00a0 In the most <a href=\"http:\/\/www.cbs8.com\/story\/39152191\/navy-times-navy-seal-detained-in-isis-death-probe\">recent report<\/a>, a Navy SEAL is being detained.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>A Navy SEAL is being held in a military brig while authorities investigate the stabbing death of an Islamic State combatant while he was subdued in Iraq last year.<\/p>\n<p>The Navy Times\u00a0reported\u00a0Friday the unidentified SEAL based in California was being held in the brig at Marine Corps Air Station Miramar in San Diego, though he has not been charged with a crime. Such confinement is allowed in the military justice system.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>One of the cases I have followed for years is\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/FreeDerrickMiller\/\">Sgt. Derrick Miller&#8217;s.<\/a>\u00a0 \u00a0I find his story so disturbing because I can envision\u00a0myself doing exactly what he and multiple\u00a0witnesses testified that he did.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>During a combat mission in a hostile area of Afghanistan in September 2010, Sgt. Derrick Miller\u2019s attention was drawn to an Afghan national who had penetrated the defense perimeter set up by the US Army. The Afghan man was positively identified by another soldier under Sgt. Miller\u2019s command who recognized him from a detainment the previous day. The man in question was the driver of a truck reported by military intelligence as transporting members of the opposition to a nearby combat firefight. US military intelligence let the trucks pass. Sgt. Miller was sent to question the Afghan national after observing the suspicious behavior of the man as he reconnoitered their defense perimeter. It appeared that the man was gathering information, and since he was already identified as an enemy combatant, Sgt. Miller was acting instinctively to protect his unit by detaining this man. During the questioning, which took place in an open area with another US soldier and an Afghan interpreter present, Sgt. Miller asked the man why he was within the perimeter. The man initially claimed to be an electrician who was responding to a downed power line, but later claimed to be there to fix a water pump. He had no tools with him, and no apparent means of carrying out the repairs he was supposedly there to address. The man was originally observed accompanied by two men whom he claimed were his sons and helpers. Both of those men had returned to the village without having performed any electrical work, and both in separate directions. They were not present during Sgt. Miller\u2019s questioning. During the harsh questioning, the Afghan insurgent attempted to grab Sgt. Miller\u2019s weapon, and was shot and killed in the struggle. Within 45 minutes, SGT Miller&#8217;s unit was attacked on three sides by Afghan insurgents. During Sgt. Miller\u2019s trial, all the soldiers who appeared from his unit testified that the enemy had to have reconnoitered their position closely in order to attack in the manner they did. There was also testimony that the incident with Sgt. Miller forced the entire unit into full alert \/ 100% security, which prepared the soldiers for the attack. Because of Sgt. Miller\u2019s actions, no American lives were lost due to the level of their preparation. As the details of the events of that day came to light, the US soldiers were suspicious of the Afghan man and the two other young men with him that he claimed were his sons and helpers. Yet at different times during the few hours that the Afghan was inside the perimeter, each of these men were sent back to the village by different routes. The Afghan interpreter testified that this happened. It is believed by the soldiers present at the time that these two men were carrying information to the insurgents detailing the most effective targets for the ensuing attack. Sgt. Miller believes, despite his conviction and sentence of life in prison for the murder of this Afghan insurgent, that he was acting solely in self-defense and with sound judgment.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Another link on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.law.uchicago.edu\/clinics\/mandel\/mental\/combat\/miller\">Miller is HERE.\u00a0<\/a>\u00a0 We are not alone in dealing with these cases,\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.ottawacitizen.com\/news\/appeal+soldier+convicted+shooting+wounded+taliban+fighter\/4048320\/story.html\">Canadian\u00a0Robert Semrau<\/a>\u00a0and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.express.co.uk\/news\/uk\/615304\/free-Sergeant-Alexander-Blackman-protest-London-Royal-Marine-Taliban-fighter-jailed\">British Sergeant Alexander Blackman<\/a>\u00a0are just two more examples.\u00a0 \u00a0I am not suggesting that crimes are not committed during a time of war, I am suggesting that we no longer engage in war.\u00a0 What we do is deploy Americans into places where we expect them to only kill people that don&#8217;t offend our social pallet.<\/p>\n<p>Conducting operations\u00a0that require warriors to seek permission from people who are at times not even in the same hemisphere should not be classified as a &#8220;War&#8221;.\u00a0 The\u00a0\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Oise-Aisne_American_Cemetery_Plot_E\">Oise-Aisne American Cemetery Plot E<\/a>\u00a0holds the remains of many thousands of service members.\u00a0 We now know that too many of them should have never been buried among the dishonored.\u00a0 This is not a new problem, we have just not learned to deal with it very well.<\/p>\n<p>Too often the enemy of a warrior is a peaceful citizen with offended sensibilities.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>There are too many cases of warriors being sent to prison for killing people in a &hellip; <a title=\"When killing the enemy is a crime.\" class=\"hm-read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/?p=81960\"><span class=\"screen-reader-text\">When killing the enemy is a crime.<\/span>Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":667,"featured_media":81961,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,84,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-81960","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-antiwar-crowd","category-military-issues","category-terror-war"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81960","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/667"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=81960"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81960\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/81961"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=81960"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=81960"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=81960"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}