The Steady State

#holdfast. The question of whether or not current disobeying unlawful order is foundational to how our military is organized and trained is not an open question

And as we’ve seen, Trump et al. seem to like to use the threat of prosecution to rig the game before anyone even steps up to the plate. #holdfast

Authoritarians don’t just target opponents. They discipline their own side when blind loyalty isn’t given. Patel’s team threatened Massie’s staff with a criminal investigation if they didn’t “straighten up and play ball.”

Flynn is not in prison because he was pardoned by Donald Trump; to the extent the others have or are committing crimes, the Department of Justice is no longer an apolitical organization, and is unlikely to investigate/prosecute friends/allies of Donald Trump.

Vance’s framing quietly smuggles in a false premise. He suggests that if an order has a “clear mission,” “is something hard,” or is “for a very good reason,” that makes it legal. But legality is not determined by clarity, difficulty, or claimed necessity. Only by law.

As TSS’s Bruce Breton stated, “If the plan seems suspiciously aligned with Russia’s strategic goals, it’s because Trump’s foreign policy almost always mirrors the preferences of the last strongman he spoke to.”

steadystate1.substack.com/p/trumps-ukr...

7/
Call it what it is: a desperate attempt to criminalize lawful oversight and to bully the officer corps into blind obedience.
That will not succeed.
The law isn’t on their side.
History isn’t on their side.
And the Constitution certainly isn’t on their side.
#HoldFast

6/
So they need a villain.
A plot.
A shadowy “CIA coup.”
Anything to distract from the truth:
Obedience to the Constitution is not sedition.
Intimidating Congress for repeating the law is authoritarian.

5/
If that basic legal principle feels threatening to them, the real question is why.

And yes, part of the panic is political.
They know their majority is unstable.
They know support inside the military isn’t what they claim.
They know officers take their constitutional obligations seriously.

4/
What’s driving this?
The simple fact that the Members’ message was correct:
Military members must follow lawful orders.
They must refuse unlawful ones.
This has been true for generations.
It’s in the oaths, statutes, and training manuals.

3/
This escalation isn’t organic. It has the exact pattern of coordinated propaganda:
• Invent a hidden conspiracy
• Assign “handlers”
• Blame the IC
• Frame oversight as sedition
• Demand punishment of political opponents
textbook authoritarian narrative-building.

2/
It is not analysis. It is panic.

YouTube video by Alex Jones TV Alex Jones & General Flynn: Deep State Plotting To Overthrow Trump in Violent Revolution

1/🧵
We’re now watching the entire right-wing media ecosystem from Fox to Newsmax to Michael Flynn to Alex Jones unifying around the same baseless conspiracy: that a group of Members reminding troops to follow the law is a CIA “color revolution.”

www.youtube.com/watch?v=NIRV...

This is a good weekend to #holdfast

This isn’t confidence. It’s insecurity. It’s the emperor with no clothes demanding applause. The frantic attacks on the press and claims of “perfect” everything are exactly how authoritarian leaders behave when they feel control and support slipping away.

Open questions remain as to DOJ’s interpretation of the law the administration is using in carrying out its destruction of alleged narco-trafficking boats and executing crews. Yet lethal maritime strikes continue, and concern is mounting about an impending conflict with Venezuela.

Tennessee public libraries close for Trump-inspired book purge One hundred and eighty-one public libraries in Tennessee are reviewing their children’s collections after Tennessee Secretary of State Tre Hargett (R) ordered them to remove books with LGBTQ themes or...

Public libraries shutting down to remove books “in secret” because of ideological pressure is not democracy at work. Using grants and administrative leverage to force political conformity in a public institution meant to serve everyone is an intimidation tactic. 

popular.info/p/tennessee-...

What the “Department of War” posted today is not normal. Publicizing an internal referral memo on social media before any review has occurred undercuts the neutrality expected in military justice and risks unlawful command influence. That should alarm anyone who cares about due process. #holdfast

They deserve better, and so does the country. But if we all continue to resist these abuses, the Agency will someday return to values that once defined it: integrity, service, and nonpartisanship. #holdfast #SteadyState

The most troubling part is seeing an official CIA account deployed for political messaging and attacks, even as so many Agency professionals continue to uphold their oath with integrity.

they’re working overtime to delegitimize a single video that said nothing more than a basic legal fact — service members have a duty not to follow unlawful orders. If that simple truth feels so threatening to them, the real question is: why? #holdfast #SteadyState

In a continued attempt to criminalize obedience to the Constitution, Miller now claims the Members’ statement was part of an orchestrated CIA plot. What’s particularly revealing is the desperation behind it:

So, you would say "No"?

Glad you like the example. And yes it did bother me. But a different situation, with very different legal authorities. But how about answering the original question?

No, we don't "all know that." Many people do not know the role of Congress, and many certainly do no know what the UCMJ is, or why it exists. Educating each other is critical. Great that you know it. Many do not.

When you say "militants" do you mean armed people actively threatening you or your troops?

Drones do not eliminate the issue -- although they do make it less clear in practice. But assume the order, whether to a drone operator or a sailor is -- "execute the civilians on the boat"?

A question for discussion (and for Gen. Marks) — especially for vets:
If you were ordered to stop a ship in the Caribbean believed to be carrying drugs, board it and execute its crew — purely as a hypothetical raised by recent DoD interdiction videos — would you follow that order?

In real life it is stand-off. But in the hypothetical it is a boarding.

That is the hypothetical -- no harm's way. Board and execute is the order.