XO to be court martialed for urination video
Sam sends us a link to a Stars & Stripes article about how the Executive Officer of Kilo Company, 3rd Battalion, 2nd Marine Regiment, Capt. James V. Clement is being court martialed for dereliction of duty in the urination video case. A few months ago, SSG Edward W. Deptola pleaded guilty in his court martial, and last month Sgt. Robert Richards was charged.
The officer accused of failing to stop a group of his Marines from urinating on the bodies of dead Taliban fighters will be tried at a special court-martial, the Marine Corps announced Monday.
My thoughts on it is that charges are all chickenshit. If that’s the worst thing that happens in this war, the Marine Corps should be thankful. I don’t see it rising beyond the Non-Judicial Punishment (NJP) level. But I guess they have to please their political masters.
Category: Marine Corps
If he wasn’t present how could he stop it? and if we are going to Court-Martial him why stop at company level but not the commander ? something smells at 8th and I
The worst thing the US military can do is offend the sensibilities of 7th century cavemen while those same turds don’t abide by any laws.
They ought to read up on the things that occurred in the Pacific during WW II. No need to recount them here. It was war at its brutalist and our guys were not above reprisals, retribution, and behavior that is only understandable in the context in which it occurred.
Epic levels of weaksauce. Ok, so they pissed on some corpses. Meh. I’m trying to find a word or phrase to describe just how little I give a shit.
Ok. I give up. I can’t.
Yes, NJP is appropriate. They violated orders. Nobody died. Nobody was even put in danger.
You’d think those damn Libtards would be happy. Those Marines were recycling. They took some detritus and turned it into a perfectly serviceable latrine. Where’s the problem?
This is why you don’t let civilian politicians make military policy. At least three good Marines are going to have their careers shitcanned over this.
Meh. If the Lieutenant was there and did nothing to stop it, I don’t have much of a problem either way (SpCM or NJP). Officers and Senior NCOs are supposed to keep things from getting out of hand. This was technically “wrong” – very understandable and IMO in the great scheme of things a small wrong, but still a deliberate violation of policy and orders. If he was there, his duty was to prevent that.
If he wasn’t there at the time – IMO relief and a career-ender eval is probably more than enough. His career is done regardless after this.
What I still can’t figure out is how these idiots were dumb enough to video this escapade AFTER seeing how Abu Ghraib turned out.
Pretty weak, worse have been done. The Fighters were dead, who cares? I wonder who blew the whistle on this crap.
C2/2000AF: as I recall, they were dumb enough to video it. By doing that, they essentially blew the whistle on themselves. Photographing or videoing yourself doing stupid stuff is never a good idea.
Best rule of thumb I’ve ever heard: if you’re doing something you wouldn’t want your mom or your pastor to see, don’t photo/video it. ‘Cause if you do, thanks to the Internet one day they will see it – along with everyone else in the world.
Wait, why is the XO getting charged but none of the other officers are? This whole thing is horse shit!
reminecint of the MY LAI massacre and TAIL HOOK!
these scumbags hate the military.
Hondo, good point. I just saw that on the article that they posted the dumb sh*t on youtube. I thought maybe someone had told on them for doing it. But pretty stupid, but still an extreme punishment.
#8 Doc Bailey – You know why they are punishing the XO, someone has to take the fall and blame. Blame the lowest officer there I bet.
This incident happened just after these Marines survived a fierce firefight with these same dead Taliban. A few minutes earlier, those Taliban were trying their best to kill our Marines. Our guys were still full of adrenaline and happy to be alive so they engaged in a little stress relief. BFD. The only thing that they did wrong was to record the video. Good Luck to Captain Clement, I hope the charges get dropped.
watch them use this video as another excuse too kill another Ambassador in another embassy!
Punish the guilty, those that did the deed, those that were there and complicit. The others charged? Push for court martial and man up. Fight all the way. Granted, you are responsible for the actions of those in Your charge, good or bad. But sometimes your kids do dumb shit when they’re not under your thumb. In those cases, you slap the shit out of the guilty. Not every infraction is a “command failure”.
I’m sorry, but I think nothing more than a letter of commendation is in order.
#4, This is why you don’t let civilian politicians make military policy.
The decision to court-martial anybody is made by a commander, not a civilian. (Whether that commander is feeling some political pressure from the civilian world is a separate question.)
@14,,,good answer
P.S. – A special court-martial (which the article says this is) can’t dismiss an officer from the service. I don’t believe he can even resign for the good of the service to escape special (rather than general) court-martial, but I’m not sure about that part. (Otherwise I’d think this whole thing might be a ploy to get him to resign – that way no board or panel has to vote to get rid of him.)
If he’s convicted, it’s probably an administrative separation. If he’s acquitted, and the Navy works like the Army, he can’t then be separated for this.
It is the job of officers and senior NCOs to channel that adrenaline in a positive manner. In this day of instant electronic media, an incident such as this can and will have international implications.
As someone comfortable with the true concept of ‘total war’ and nuking opponents into big glass parking lots, I’m disgusted with the very idea that ANYONE got in trouble for this. It’s FUCKING WAR people, war is barbaric, not a god damned spectator sport, wtf!!!!!
Meanwhile…
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/may/9/report-muslim-cleric-invited-pray-over-fallen-seal/
“The families of Navy SEALs killed in an August 2011 shoot-down of a helicopter in Afghanistan spoke at a press conference Thursday morning, citing a number of grievances, including an allegation that the Pentagon invited a Muslim cleric who “disparaged in Arabic the memory of these servicemen.””
As far as I can tell they were just preparing the bodies for a clean muslim burial. No harm, no foul.
@15
Yah, I meant the whole touchy-feely crap going on, not the prosecution (or rather, persecution) of this group of Marines.
And I’m sure there were some civilians screaming for officer blood that precipitated the charges.
There is really no place for conduct like this in todays day and age. We are supposed to be the “better men” in this war, right? We should lowering our selves to the Talibans levels and saying “what’s the big deal? They are savages, let’s act like savages too and piss on them!”
But yeah, probably could have busted down the guys that did it and not Court Marshaled everyone in sight. Overreaction at its finest.
Shouldn’t be*
Jesus Christ, Marine Corps.
How exactly is the XO of 3/2 supposed to “stop” the actions of an attached STA PLT element from doing anything in the field? The XO isn’t solely there is be in the back pocket of every Marine under their command when they do out and do their job.
Might as well court martial the company commander. Why stop there? I hear the Corps like to hold battalion commanders responsible for actions regarding mortar firing.
This kind of reminds me of the time my LT in Iraq that did some dumb stuff and took pictures of it while I was in a hide site a klick away. He then put it on a storyboard that went to Brigade. Needless to say my CO was not too pleased and I had to edit all of my PL’s storyboards after that.
C2/2000AF: someone here at TAH (can’t remember who) coined a wonderful phrase: “Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.”
Sometimes the stupid prizes are seriously big ones.
Was it stupid to piss on the dead assholes? Probably. Was it stupid to film it? Probably. Should the Marines involved receive a slap on the wrist? Probably. But to court martial Marines for this is a goddamn joke. Who are we trying to placate here? The Taliban sure as fuck don’t care, they use women and children as bullet shields or worse. The American public forgot about this 2 days after it happened, except for a few whining pussies who figure to use it to promote whatever bleeding heart cause they are involved with. I can guarantee that the majority of the Marine Corps doesn’t give a fuck. So who or what are we doing this for?? Some belief that the American people demand this? The vast majority of the American people do not understand honor, courage and commitment as it is espoused by the military. This war is not impacting the average American one bit. The average American has no idea what it is like to carry a weapon in defense of this country. They do not understand infantry combat, the emotions, the fear, the exhilaration.
Are we doing this to let the Muslim world know we are good guys? They don’t give a shit. They hate us. We could cure Muslim cancer and house and feed every Muslim child and build a mosque in every city and town in Muslimville and they would still try to blow us up.
This was AT MOST an NJP offense. It could have been handled and forgotten about by now. Some times I do not understand my beloved Corps. This is one of those times…..
Spot on #7. Short answer I see is the mistake made was videoing the episode.
Rule #22 – Don’t do stupid things where people can see you.
Rule #23 – If you do stupid things, don’t record them.
Rule #24 – If you record yourself doing stupid things, DON’T POST THE PIX ON THE INTERNET, DUMBASS!
Lots of things happened in Vietnam that were worse than this. It’s hogwash, window dressing, a symbolic way to placate/appease a disgruntled neighbor.
MGySgtRet: no argument with most of what you wrote. And yes – the misconduct was IMO minor.
Unfortunately, it does qualify as misconduct. And even minor misconduct that (1) publicly embarrasses the US when it (2) was recorded for posterity and later (3) makes the front page of the NYT, WaPo, and every other major newspaper/newswire worldwide tends to get punished more severely than might otherwise be the case.
This is IMO a case of stupidity leading to extreme consequences. More than the guys involved deserve? Probably; personally, I’d lean that way. Predictable and foreseeable that they’d get “hammered”? Certainly.
“Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.” If you’re doing something stupid or “close to the edge” – put the freaking cameras away.
Hondo (#27), that phrase predates TAH. 😉
Al T.: I’ll take your word for it. First I saw it was here, and there was once some discussion of who here might have coined it.
Still a great phrase, no matter where/when it originated.
Hondo, agree it is misconduct. We do not do that to war dead. Got it. But like I said, they should have been NJP’d, slapped on the wrist and everyone should have gotten on with their lives. It would have been forgotten. It is now just a self inflicted wound that we keep tearing the band aid off of just when it looks like it has healed.
MGySgtRet: that sounds about right to me. If the idiots hadn’t made video of the incident and posted it to YouTube, that’s IMO likely all that would have happened.
We should be grinding their dead bodies into corn meal and feeding the pigs with it and filming that.
MGySgtRet is right no matter what we do for these folks they are not going to be our friends.
That’s the hardest thing in the world for American civilians to understand, they think that everyone in the world can be negotiated with and if treated correctly will be our friends….that’s not at all true with these people, we will never be right until we are dead as far as they are concerned…that’s a lesson it would be wise to remember in all our dealings. They understand overwhelming violence and not much else…
I’m with the Master Gunny on this one.
See, here’s the thing. They violated orders.
Now we don’t let Marines pick an choose what orders they follow. That is good and right. They either follow orders or they don’t.
However, the leadership can and should pick and choose how they handle violations of those orders.
This should be handled with NJP. To escalate this to the level of a Summary is just inappropriate. NJP is bad enough. NJP will low down promotions and such for a time. NJP may mean not getting the better duty assignments. That’s punishment enough.
Modern morality makes me laugh
Shoot taliban in the face – necessary and honorable
5 minutes later
Piss on dead taliban who 5 minutes before you were locked in a life and death struggle with – bad!
Air assault in a company of Infantry to assault an enemy compound in order to kill/capture a Taliban leader maybe even resulting in friendly casualties – good and worthy of praise
Use a drone to kill that same Taliban leader – horrendous and a “war crime”
etc, etc
@36, It’s people. Soylent Green is made out of people.
@20 I’m surprised one of the family members didn’t come unglued over that garbage.
Even had the Capt received a NJP, his career for all p ractical purposes would be finished. Just to hard to overcome…passed over for choice assigments, promotion boards would chuck his file, and folks at human resources would be sharpening the axe – its RIF time. SNCOs have it just as bad…the time for learning from mistakes is over.
If the Marines are like the Army and trying to give people the boot then NJP for anyone E-5 and up is a career ender.
@41, 42
Y’all are right. My question is, do you have to put down CM if a job application asks if you’ve been convicted of a crime in the last five years, or some other similar question?
@43
A Court Martial is a Federal Court and any conviction by a CM is a federal conviction
So yes
@44
That’s what I thought, which is why I think a CM is too harsh even though the actual punishments are roughly similar.
OK … This is the MCPO talking now:
They fucked up royally by:
1. The act.
2. Filming it.
The act should have been stopped and corrective action on the spot would have ended the incident.
Filming the incident provided evidence for the procecuter!
Essentially without cameras rolling the scene should have been like this:
“Men, we lost a good man today. We killed 11 enemy. Three of those enemy lie before us here and now. Water up and head call.”
A moment later …
“Private Dumbfuckskibergerwitz, what the hell are you doing? STOP that and don’t do it again today. I did not say piss on the bodies of the dead enemy. OK Marines … back to work!”