Word: mens
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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WHATEVER its ultimate impact on U.S. policy in Viet Nam, the My Lai massacre will profoundly test an evolving principle of U.S. law-that every wrong should have a remedy in court. How, for example, can the Army try the men (three so far) who openly admit that they killed women and children at My Lai-but who are now civilians...
Unless those men retain military links, such as reserve status, they may be immune from prosecution. In 1955, the Supreme Court ruled that civilians cannot be court-martialed for crimes they committed during military service. The court did suggest a remedy: new laws could provide for trial in federal courts of ex-servicemen charged with military crimes. So far, Congress has not enacted the necessary legislation. Nor can the Saigon government prosecute the discharged My Lai participants-even if it wanted to. An agreement signed by the U.S. and South Viet Nam prevents each country from trying nationals...
...world wars changed all that. The Nurnberg Trial of 22 Nazi leaders after World War II revived one of the great tenets of Western thought: that a higher law sometimes requires men to give their primary allegiance to humanity rather than the State. Although the Nazi defendants pleaded "state orders," 19 were convicted and ten were hanged. To skeptics, Nurnberg proved mainly that losing a war had become a crime under international law. Nevertheless, the supremacy of civilized rules of behavior was enunciated in a U.N. report: "The fact that a person acted pursuant to order of his government...
...this practice is nowhere authorized in the military code. A prominent U.S. general often recalls that as a platoon leader during the Normandy landing he shot to death a G.I. who had broken from the unit and run down the beach. Says he: "You can't have your men running under fire...
...given. If Medina is charged, his lawyers might try to pass the buck upward to Colonel Frank Barker, the task force commander, who was killed after the massacre. Some observers argue that the Army hopes to convict the lowest-ranking officer who is charged in the case. All the men under him might then try to get off by claiming that they were simply following his orders, which, at the time, seemed necessary and proper in a heavily Viet Cong area...