The Silence of the Services’ The Judge Advocates General on COVID Injections

Famously in the early stages of the Global War on Terror, all of the uniformed services The Judge Advocates General (TJAGs) – the senior flag-ranked attorneys in uniform – stood before Congress and called out DoD and the Administration for what they believed to be unlawful practices concerning the detention and prosecution of suspected terrorists.??The press lionized these gentlemen, possibly rightly so.??As of September 2, 2021, healthy, young Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Marines are being ordered within 10 days to take an experimental, medically unnecessary and potentially harmful COVID injection.??Where are the voices of the TJAGs now?

Disingenuously, one day prior to a four-day Labor Day training holiday, DoD issues this order under the threat of criminal action under the UCMJ (Article 92: Failure to Obey a Lawful or General Order).??So, our young warriors have about four working days to see a physician to initiate this waiver process. Disregarding those who object on moral grounds, in order to obtain a medical waiver, not only must the treating physician approve the waiver, it will not be finally approved unless an O-6 level physician (read Colonel in the USAF, Marines or Army and Captain in the Navy) signs off on it. Try getting that done as a junior enlisted service member. Due process,??Yeah, right.

When I served as a uniformed Judge Advocate, in peacetime and wartime, my duty was to the force not the command. I worked for the commander, but I never considered myself as solely their counsel. In other words, if young warriors were getting screwed by a policy – especially if that command policy was legally questionable – it was my duty to say “No” to the command. I didn’t have to say it often and never when we were sincerely trying to kill the enemy, but I did say it. Especially when command was trying to institute some chickenshit policy like this COVID policy. It appears that all of the service TJAGs – three-star flag officers – have forgotten this simple rule.??

There are service men and women who have serious medical concerns about the efficacy and safety of these injections. Moreover, some of them have underlying illnesses – like preexisting?hypercoagulability,?history of pulmonary emboli or cancer – for which the injection is contraindicated. Yet, if they can’t jump through the procedural hoops in four work days they will be criminally charged??

Preferrably, the TJAGs would not have to intervene.??That is assuming our uniformed leaders grew a pair of balls and told SECEF and the Administration, “Not on my watch!”??But, we would more likely see the proverbial pigs fly before that happened in this generation.??Milley and his ilk have proven their moral cowardice enough.

Recently, twelve U.S. Air Force pilots submitted their resignations at Langley Air Force Base over this issue.??Fine, if they have the ability to resign in a timely fashion. The Air Force still loses a dozen hard to come by F-22 pilots for what reason? To prove a point and force its members to submit??And, what about those enlisted members of the force who can’t simply resign. Is the command and the JAG departments prepared to hand out tens of thousands of Article 15 UCMJ (Captain’s Mast in the Naval Services) for this???Again, where are the supposed “Conscience of the Corp” (as the TJAGs fancy themselves) on this matter??