Everyone serving in the U.S. military swears an oath as follows.
Enlisted men:
“I, _____, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God.”
Officers:
“I, _____ (SSAN), having been appointed an officer in the _____ (Military Branch) of the United States, as indicated above in the grade of _____ do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign or domestic, that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office upon which I am about to enter; So help me God.”
The oath probably has changed some over the years, but as far as I know, America’s soldiers have always taken an oath; and spying for the enemy or participating in insurrection violates it. Even when the South seceded from the Union, Robert E. Lee and other U.S. military officers who “went South” resigned their Army commissions and handed over their commands and facilities first.
The sole exception was Gen. David E. Twiggs (photo, left), 71, commander of the U.S. Army’s Department of Texas, who handed over his facilities, arms, and supplies not to the Army, but to the Confederacy, earning him the sobriquet “traitor.”
In poor health, he stayed in the Confederate Army only a few months, rendered no other service to the South, and did not survive the Civil War to be tried for his treason.
The point is, by taking the soldier’s oath, our military personnel swear their allegiance to the Constitution and promise to support and defend it, and there’s some other stuff about the obeying orders of their officers and the commander-in-chief in accordance with the UCMJ and military regulations, which have provisions about disobeying illegal orders.
Now enter Cadet Bone Spurs, who was shipped off to a military-style youth academy of the sort that rich parents send their delinquent children to, which aren’t real military organizations by any stretch, no matter what they call themselves.
His alleged bone spurs got him out of real military service. I’m about his age, and while he was trying to avoid military service, I was trying to get in. That took some doing, as I failed the physical, but despite that I was granted the privilege of serving in Vietnam alongside our heroes there. I don’t begrudge Trump evading the draft; I’m fine with it, and above all grateful that I didn’t have to be in a foxhole with him. He did us Vietnam veterans a big favor by staying the hell away from our battles and not trying to pretend being one of us.
This brings us to Gen. Mark Milley’s draft resignation letter. After the Bible-waving fiasco (photo, left), Milley wrote down on a piece of paper, “The events of the last couple weeks have caused me to do deep soul-searching, and I can no longer faithfully support and execute your orders ….” He knew when to quit, and that time came when Milley concluded Trump was making “a concerted effort … to politicize the United States military.” In the end, he decided he could do more good for the country by staying and being an obstacle to Trump’s scheming to use the military to stay in power. (See story here.)
Why would Trump, or any president, do that? Because, uniquely among all of our presidents, “Trump believed the military not to be an instrument of national power but an apparatus for personal use” that “was his to do with as he pleased” as “a tool of politics.” (See story here.) Never having taken a military oath, or having had to obey one, he also believed the military “swore an oath to him personally.”
There’s a lot of reason to think he got this idea by studying Hitler, whose soldiers were compelled to take the following oath (English translation):
“I swear to God this holy oath that I shall render unconditional obedience to the Leader of the German Reich and people, Adolf Hitler, supreme commander of the armed forces, and that as a brave soldier I shall at all times be prepared to give my life for this oath.”
You could argue that one’s the Mother of All Personal Loyalty Oaths (to read it in the original German, go here). So why do I suspect Trump purloined his ideas about soldiers’ oaths from the Nazis? Because of this:
TRUMP: “You f*cking generals, why can’t you be like the German generals?”
GEN. MARK KELLY: “Which generals?”
TRUMP: “The German generals in World War II.”
KELLY: “You do know that they tried to kill Hitler three times and almost pulled it off?”
TRUMP: “No, no, no, they were totally loyal to him.”
Trump’s ignorance of history is the least of the problems with this. At the higher end of the problem scale is the inexplicable fact that people calling themselves Americans still support this guy and would vote for him again. Let’s review: When you join the U.S. military and take an oath to serve, your loyalty is owed to country and its democratic institutions, not any politician, and certainly not the Fuhrer of a personality cult.
Anyone who doesn’t understand this has no business wearing a U.S. military uniform, and needs to be recycled through a basic civics course.