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I don't have a good answer for you. I expected the upper and middle officer corps to conduct themselves with honor and they aren't.

I'm going to bet that pilots aren't briefed to hit a school, they get a target package that says this is a legit target, an IRGC command post or something. There are multiple layers of detachment between the person picking coordinates, entering them into a JDAM, and the pilot releasing that weapon so who is ultimately responsible (and this is by design, everyone can tell themselves a story right now to sleep at night.)

But you do know what you hit, in the version of the military that I was in there would have been a detailed investigation into the chain of failures that led to striking a school with children in it. I'm sure it weighs heavily on the every person involved in that decision. Cold comfort for the parents of those kids, but something like that leaves a life long scar on the people responsible.

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And they have DOD lawyers (with backup from the DOJ) saying the whole thing, and specific targets, are legal. Along with that, much of the most Sr leadership (of both combat forces, and legal) have been fired and replaced with MAGA loyalists.
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There have been so many crimes and zero accountability. I frankly wouldn't know where to start, but maybe a good example is "collateral murder", which Assange has been persecuted for revealing for the better part of the past two decades.

At least we're not pretending anymore.

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> the soldiers continue to follow orders

We want them to. At the same time that we sit at our keyboards and philosophize about how soldiers should refuse to carry out unlawful orders, we [collectively] do not really want them spending all that much time pondering it. The most obvious cases, sure, but in general we want them to do what they are told, and do it quickly. That is why there are lawyers in the field to make fast judgements.

The better solution is to try and not routinely find ourselves in the position of the country being led by criminals.

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