Unlawful Orders and Unaccountable Wars: Reforming Military Justice in the Shadow of Atrocity

The United States’ earliest codification of military discipline, the Articles of War of 1775, reflected a British-influenced model of command authority premised on strict obedience. For nearly two centuries, these articles governed military conduct with relatively minor modification, emphasizing discipline and hierarchy over individual legal judgment. Notably absent was any robust articulation of a duty to refuse unlawful orders. This white paper proposes a framework based in both domestic and international law to address this absence.