Would you do whatever the Federal Government says, no matter what?

okay so to be clear I have never just done as ordered by the federal government, even while I served active duty Army. There are such things as unlawful orders and I was more than aware I was not required to follow such. Now having said that I am about to become quite unpopular I am sure.

This "dramatization" while graphic and frightening is really not a fair represention of what would happen if austirity measures where put in place and what could be had with welfare money and food stamps was decreased significantly.

What the people did during the LA riots after the King verdict was handed down was about nothing more than pure race hate. And while statistics varry most find there are fairly equal numbers of whites, blacks and hispanics as well as several other ethnisities using government substadies who would create in their minds justification for simply going out and taking what they feel they need.

These people are not of the same mentality as the OWS crowd, not even the same mentality as the general "liberal" crowd of today (20 years later). Those people had a "cause" and right or wrong they did make their case well enough the laws changed. the liberals and the OWS has no cause say but to complaine they want more and tehy want it without earning it.

But want and need are two different things and when needs are not meet people become different creatures accross the board, accross race, political sides, socio-economic means, religions you name it.

And while in the USA austirity measure may mean that government has less for roads and bridges, schools and vets, infrastructure and defense the very last thing government will let be cut is their vote buying, stay in power methods. They will fund abortion untill someone can not get basic health care under a government program, they will fund low cost housing until the ghettos are so crowded that communicable desease starts decreasing the populations and they will allow drugs, alcohol and tabaco to be bought with "foodstamps" (they are actually debit cards now) until someone actually starves to death and the entire time they will point at people who conserve are self sufficent and have never relied on government to get buy as the "evil" group who wants all these things to happen to them and people will continue to buy it until there is little choice but to reset this nation with a real and true civil war and then we will see which will prevail the government and their slave nation or the people with a free nation.

military "female" but niether here nor there...

I guess the best way to understand an unlawful order is to understand that the military operates on a different system of laws. The US Constitution doesn't apply to soldiers as it applies to civilians. A soldier can not just say he thinks the president sucks and then claim 1st amendment (although such things get said every minute I am sure as they did when I served). The US Military is government over and above the Constitution by a system known as the Uniformed Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) and these laws and rules are very clear and very plain.

But the US military is also governed by the Geneva Convention which lays out specifics on how to treat foreign "combatants" (aka the enemy).

Now every soldier knows they have a LEGAL obligation to uphold the Constitution UCMJ and the GC so if someone in command were to give an order which violates any of those docterines the soldiers recieving the orders are required to first inform the giver of the order of the violation and if the order is not retracted the soldier is required to refuse to obey.... so an extreme example...

While out on patrol a squad of soldiers comes accross a squad of enemy combantants the enemy is supprised and quickly throws down weapons and surrenders teh squad leader (usually a E-6 or higher even could be an officer) orders an "open fire" on the enemy. This is an unlawful order any soldier who pulls the trigger and follows the order is guilty of the crime of murder. If you ever saw the movie "A Few Good Men" that was the entire crux of teh story that a ranking officer (in this case it was a general) gave an order which ended with the death of another soldier. the soldier all claimed to be following orders yet they were all following an unlawful order so all guilty of the crime.

Now a real life case. I was working in a logistics unit the officer in charge (OIC) was a brand new shinny 1LT (butterbars we call them) he wanted to deploy a refuling convoy to a unit which was protrolling around a urban area his rendoux point would have been within 100 m of a medical facility. Occording to SOP (procedures) from headquarters we were not to move any military vehical within 500m of a "critical" civilan facility. I and 2 others informed him that we could not make the deployment as he wanted. He was very insistant. I pulled the SOP from HQ and showed it to him and then informed him that his directives would fall in the relm of unlawful actions. He actually called HQ and had to hold teh phone from his ear while he was dressed down for his stupidity.... very simple, could have been a honest mistake but if we had delivered fule and the enemy had fired on the cobvey and civilians had been hurt we all would have gone down.

Its hard to explain its like what Justice Potter Steward said about pronography... you know it when you see it or hear it in this case

What you are asking is a big question that is on the minds of a great many Americans. Its one we were asking back in the Clinton era as trainning was being directed towards "urban combat methods".

So here is all I can tell you. Consider these things and consider them seriously.

First every soldier while not protected by it has sworn an oath to the US Constituition. Their FIRST duty is to defend it from all enemies foreign and DOMESTIC. So even though they can not just say what they will and claim freedom of speech they will die to ensure you can.

Second every president has also sworn the same oath and while many people do not know this it IS a VIOLATION of the US Constitution to "deploy" troops on US Soil for any reason other than an "invation" of an enemy force (do you remember a movie called Red Dawn? That would be an example of when US troops could be deployed on US Soil by the president) Posse Comitatus Act 1878 (http://www.dojgov.net/posse_... ) [Training is exempt].

I give you those two facts first hoping you find some comfort in them but now I want to give you two more the same two that I considered when I was considering leaving the military.

NOTHING prevents a president of the US from calling UN Troops onto US soil. NOTHING. If the president was going to use troops to "supress" the citizens he would LIKELY call for action by the UN and the UN has not sworn an oath to the US Constitution. As well the president COULD choose which nation the UN Troops come from (China would be a likely candidate as they have adiquate numbers to restrain our large population)

And finially what actions US Military might take against its own citizens is really anyone's guess. They would clearly understand that any action taken against US citizens would be a violation of their oaths. They would clearly understand the orders to do so would be unlawful and they have a duty to refuse it. And they would also understand they would not just be going against civilians. They would have to face off against each state's national gaurd (trained as well as they are and with a more PERSONNEL stake), they would be going up against former military some with experence far greater than their own and they would be going up against citizen who will fight without restraint and without "rules of engagement" in the back of their minds.

I would like to state with confidence that our soldiers would NOT turn arms against us, I can't I have worked with too many who would. But I do believe that it would be a pretty even three way split.
1/3 of forces would take up arms against the citizens if ordered.
1/3 would refuse the orders as unlawful and be either killed or imprissioned (thus hurting moral for the first group and the last)
1/3 of the forces would break ranks and join the state's militia and citizens.

In other words we the PEOPLE would not only out number the troops sent to supress us we would likely have more skilled fighters on the side of the citizens than not and they would likely fight far harder and far dirtier than any government controlled troops.

If you look at history from the Revolution to the War of Secession (otherwise known as the civil war) those with more at state have always fought harder. We lost almost every battle of the Revolution yet we still won with infeiror numbers and fewer resources and even with the same issues teh Confederate Army won almost every battle (and "lost the war" not becasue they couldn't continue to fight but because politians decided enough was enough).

The short answer is that it is unlawful to order the military to take up arms against citizens.... but the short answer leaves out reality