The court marshal of First Lieutenant Ehren Watada has been declared a mistrial. This man of honour and courage took on the US Military and consequently their masters the American Government when he refused to be apart of their illegal Iraq war.
By the use of some legal side stepping the military judge, Lt. Col. John Head, just prior to the lieutenant taking the stand in his own defense, swept the issue of the legality of the lieutenant’s orders under the carpet. Throughout this whole sorry mess the military court did its best to keep the legality of the war as far away from the issue as possible. But it couldn’t deny Watada his day in court and their it knew the illegality of the Iraq war would be writ large.
That I suspect will be the end of this saga, especially now that talk of double jeopardy is in the air. If that is the case and the court marshal of the brave lieutenant is left to languish by his military masters it would surely be an admission that the Iraq war is indeed an illegal war.
One wonders if the newly elected US Congress will pick up the cudgels? I suspect not as they, unlike the good lieutenant, are not people of honour and courage they are of a similar ilk to their president, they be politicians.
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