Army Right To Punish Lt. Col. West

Under the strain of command in a dangerous situation, Lt. Col. Allen West committed a serious error in judgment. And in a military environment, such errors by a commanding officer cannot go unpunished.

Informed on Aug. 20 that an Iraqi policeman might have information about potential attacks on West and his troops, the colonel invited soldiers under his command to beat the suspect as West looked on. When that did not produce the desired effect, West threatened the prisoner, first firing a pistol into the air, then holding the pistol to the policeman's head and firing a shot into the ground nearby.

Not surprisingly, the terrified suspect then began babbling information. As is often the case when such crude techniques are used, it later proved impossible to verify whether that information was accurate or whether it had been invented by the suspect in a desperate attempt to save his life.

Nor was it clear that the suspect was guilty. As U.S. intelligence officers testified in a preliminary hearing in the case, Iraqis will often finger an innocent person to American troops as a way to wreak personal revenge on each other.

Unfortunately for West, there is no question whatsoever about his own behavior in the case, or that it violated U.S. Army regulations. After complaints were filed by other soldiers, the colonel was relieved of command and is awaiting word whether he will be court-martialed on charges of aggravated assault and communicating a threat. If found guilty, the well-respected officer could be sentenced to up to eight years in prison.

It is hard not to feel sympathy for West, and almost impossible to sit in judgment of him from afar. "If it's the lives of my men and their safety," he said in his preliminary hearing, "I'd go through hell with a gasoline can." His case has even drawn congressional interest, with two U.S. senators suggesting that West deserves to be commended for his actions, not prosecuted. And certainly, a prison term does seem an unduly harsh punishment.

It is even more difficult to condemn West for violating the standards of the Geneva Convention for warfare and occupation when more senior U.S. officials are themselves treating those rules as inconvenient guidelines that can be ignored at will. The hundreds of prisoners captured in Afghanistan and held under harsh conditions by the United States in Guantanamo Bay, for example, have been ruled ineligible for protection under the Geneva Convention because they are supposedly "enemy combatants" rather than prisoners of war.

That effort to redefine the problem calls to mind the argument used by the North Vietnamese more than 30 years ago to justify their cruel treatment of captured American aviators. John McCain and others in the Hanoi Hilton were not prisoners of war, we were told, but war criminals who deserved what they got. In other words, it is always easy to find a justification if you want one badly enough.

It is also true that in Iraq, we are engaged in a bitter struggle with people who do not recognize such distinctions. As the West case illustrates, it is tempting to then fight the battle on their terms, and in rare cases it may indeed be necessary to do so.

But those and other distinctions are part of why we're fighting. We believe such rules are important to civilized life; our opponents do not. In the eyes of the Iraqis, it is hard to distinguish ourselves from the previous regime if we ourselves do not attempt to live by the rules we claim to uphold. The suspect threatened by West, for example, was a policeman, and hundreds of U.S. personnel are trying hard every day to convince Iraqi policemen that such tactics are simply unacceptable.

For military reasons, punishing West in some way is mandatory. The tactics that he used that day contradict the values this country is supposed to be defending. Allowing an officer of his rank to evade consequences for such behavior would send an unmistakable signal up and down the ranks and greatly erode the discipline our soldiers rely upon in tough situations.

Certainly, the pressures of combat help explain his mistake. They do not excuse it.

Sir,

The guy is ranting like he spent years in war. Armor units spent a max of 100 hours in combat in Gulf War 1.

My position is that I understand what LCT West did, and have said I applaud him. The fact remains that he violated the UCMJ and may pay a price for doing so. He knew the rules, I knew the rules and every other soldier knows the rules.

I didn't make them up, and goodness knows we all violate rules and laws, but we know there is a penalty if caught. I do not want the street cop making up his own law (I have two for brothers-in-law) nor low level bureaucrats at State making foreign policy or LTC's in the field deciding who they will pull off the street and under what rules they will be treated.

The UCMJ has been established by men who have fought our wars for many years (and no they weren't all REMF) and when I dodged they draft by enlisting I agreed to support them. LTC West did also. They may be wrong in this case, we shall see.

For my part I hope he walks and they kick the asses of those who let this get past Brigade level.

'Great news' for West in assault case

By Rowan Scarborough
THE WASHINGTON TIMES

http://www.washtimes.com/national/20031210-120854-8492r.htm

An Army hearing officer has recommended administrative punishment — but not a criminal court-martial — for Lt. Col. Allen B. West, who is charged with assault for firing a gun to scare a confession from an Iraqi detainee.

"It's extremely good news," said Neal Puckett, Col. West's attorney, who defended him at a pretrial hearing last month in one of Saddam Hussein's Tikrit palaces. "This is what we think the Army should have done from the very beginning."

Mr. Puckett quoted his client as saying, "Great news indeed."

The recommendation goes to Maj. Gen. Raymond Odierno, the 4th Infantry Division commander, who can accept it or reject it in favor of court-martialing Col. West or dismissing the charge.

Mr. Puckett said he was informed yesterday by the division's judge advocate that the hearing officer, Lt. Col. Jimmy Davis, recommended what is called Article 15 punishment, not a trial.

Under this procedure, Col. West would appear before Gen. Odierno. The general would be limited in his punishment options to a written reprimand, forfeiture of pay and confinement to quarters.

If court-martialed, Col. West would risk a military jury convicting him and dismissing him from the Army. A dismissal would mean losing a lifetime of retirement benefits for the married father of two children, who is based at Fort Hood, Texas.

Mr. Puckett said the staff judge advocate, who in practice is Gen. Odierno's chief legal adviser, told him the general would make a final decision as soon as possible. Mr. Puckett said he had not yet seen the hearing officer's written opinion.

The West case has been closely watched by pro-military groups and Army officers since its beginning.

Col. West worked in the Sunni Triangle, one of the most dangerous regions in Iraq, where soldiers face the daily threat of attacks from Saddam's followers.

Col. West admitted he broke Army rules Aug. 20, when he pulled an Iraqi detainee out of his cell, took him outside and fired two shots from his 9 mm pistol while threatening to kill him. Col. West had been told by an intelligence officer that the Iraqi, a police officer in the town of Saba al Boor, knew of an assassination plot against the colonel and his men.

After four others tried to get the Iraqi to talk, some hitting him, Col. West resorted to the threat out of desperation. Mr. Puckett said Col. West did not order the soldiers to hit the Iraqi, whom testimony showed was not badly hurt.

"I felt there was a threat to my soldiers. ... If it's about the life of my men, I'd go through hell with a gasoline can," Col. West testified at his Nov. 19 hearing in Tikrit.

"I love the Army," added the 20-year officer, as he sat erect on the witness stand, holding back tears.

"I know the method I used was not the right method," said the 42-year-old colonel. "If I had to err, I would err on the side of not losing my soldiers. ... There is not a man here I would not sacrifice my life for."

Col. West said from the start he was willing to subject himself to nonjudicial Article 15 punishment and then retire. Gen. Odierno has already relieved him of his command of an artillery battalion, a sure career killer.

Col. West has submitted a retirement request to the division commander. Ultimately, that decision rests with acting Army Secretary Les Brownlee. Mr. Brownlee may retire Col. West at his current rank, or determine he did not serve honorably and retire him at the reduced rank of major.

Mr. Puckett said the Tikrit hearing exposed a weakness in coalition interrogation techniques. He said released Iraqis promptly tell other Saddam loyalists that if taken into custody they do not have to talk.

"All of the intelligence witnesses regularly expressed the fact that detainees bragged they know they don't have to talk because we can't do anything to them," Mr. Puckett said. "The bad Iraqis are ID'd by human sources. The Iraqis who are ID'd as bad guys and questioned all know we can't touch them. We can't even so much as threaten them."

Maybe you should write the army and tell them that they understand as little about this as Andy Jackson and they should obey the law according to your dictates.

Your problem is that with your "the rules is the rules" mentality you are way out of your depth. First,you ignore context, i.e the application or applicability of a rule depends upon the facts. Second you ignore that there are a lot of other rules besides the rule that you are advocating at the moment, and perhaps some other rule prevails. Third, the rule is not as clear as you think the rule is. Forth, the duty of the senior commisioned officer presiding at the time is to try to decide amongst all of this what to do. He is not taking the law into his hands or acting outside the scope of his authority. Like it or not, he is the authority. The buck stops somewhere, and the weighty responsibility of accepting an officer's commission is that you have accepted that when the wheel stops spinning it may stop pointing at you.

To dodge clear responsibilities and point to a set of rules as an excuse for not doing your duty to protect your men or execute the mission is also a violation of the UCMJ, is inconsistent with conduct becoming an officer and is an action that reflects discredit upon the service.

But not holding an officer's commissions you would understand little about an officers responsibilities.

This is also political. Sadly the CG can kiss his next star good-bye. He won't be recommended because the senate will ask too many questions at the confirmation hearing.

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