The main complaint that may have traction is the length of the sentence, but, again, not being privy to the real meat of the case info, I can’t say for sure.
Twenty years is pretty stiff, but, despite what many FReepers think, we in the modern military don’t generally tend to completely railroad our own. A military judge/jury is only going to do this if this guy was guilty as hell.
Sounds to me like a new platoon leader comes in and is a bad ass with his own troops and the locals at the outset based on the idea of come on strong and then back off. Apparently, he was very new, and his predecessor had his face blown up by the local terrorists.
So, he’s going to be Patton and whip everybody into shape. Didn’t work. Bad stuff happened before he also got to show his endearing side.
You are correct that JAG doesn’t prosecute anything unless they’re sure they have a conviction. That’s either a plus or a minus depending on how you look at it.
However, just assuming that he DID know via 6th sense that these were bad guys and his call was right, how does that change the trial if that info about those actually being terrorists gets shown in court? That the Lieutenant did not make a bad call, just a call not according to Hoyle?