113
Short Answer
Applicants are required by military regulation to have a percentile score on a standardized test called the ASVAB that is 31 or more, which is roughly comparable to an IQ score on the Stanford-Binet scale of a little bit less than 92, for high school graduates seeking to enter the Army or Navy (other services have more strict requirements and ...
21
Eddie Slovik was executed by firing squad for desertion during World War II (the only U.S. solider to have the death sentence carried out for desertion during the war). He requested from his commander an assignment behind the front lines, was denied, and took it upon himself to leave his post, walk to the rear and presented a note to a cook there confessing ...
17
By describing the situation with:
This seems like an absolutely horrific and barbaric way to punish soldiers who, for whatever reason, felt compelled to leave their post (in this particular case, apart from suffering from a mental disorder, Bergdahl seemingly wanted to reveal some bad things happening in his unit).
You've demonstrated a ...
9
The use of the active duty military in a law enforcement role is not unconstitutional but it is prohibited by the posse comitatus act. 18 U.S.C. § 1385 (adopted 1878).
The text of the relevant legislation is as follows:
18 U.S.C. § 1385. Use of Army and Air Force as posse comitatus
Whoever, except in cases and under circumstances expressly authorized
...
9
Under the Geneva Convention a prisoner-of-war may lawfully resume fighting once they have successfully escaped. Under Article 91:
The escape of a prisoner of war shall be deemed to have succeeded when:
He has joined the armed forces of the Power on which he depends, or those of an allied Power;
He has left the territory under the control of the ...
8
What Is Treason?
Treason is the only crime defined in the U.S. Constitution, at Article III, Section 3 which says:
Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying war
against them, or in adhering to their enemies, giving them aid and
comfort. No person shall be convicted of treason unless on the
testimony of two witnesses to the ...
7
There is no such law. The US Constitution provides that:
The President shall be Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the Militia of the several States, when called into the actual Service of the United States; (Article II section 2)
The congress shall have the power (Article I section 8)
...
To declare War, ...
6
The Commander-in-chief powers are quite broad. The War Powers Resolution limits his ability to engage unilaterally in military action, by requiring him to report to Congress within 48 hours, and if Congress disapproves, troops must be removed after 60 days. However, this law pertains to armed forces, and would not apply to remotely-launched missiles. ...
6
It's probably not a good idea to take action movies as authoritative sources on the law. The law that you're referring to is presumably the Posse Comitatus Act (18 USC 1385) which says
Whoever, except in cases and under circumstances expressly authorized
by the Constitution or Act of Congress, willfully uses any part of the
Army or the Air Force as a ...
6
It is not true for a few reasons. First, the number is 81, sort of. 10 USC 520 specifies a minimum 31st percentile on the Armed Forces Qualification Test; see this Q&A for an analysis of the relationship between IQ and AFQT. The law is not stated in terms of IQ, it's based on a different test.
However, this addresses enlistment, not civilian employment ...
6
united-states
Under US law, any citizen may hold a person caught in the process of committing a felony (which kidnapping surely is) for the police. A soldier has no special authority. Indeed under the Posse Comititas Act, the military has more restricted authority in such matters than citizens in general. However note that the book doesn't say the soldier ...
5
Can law enforcement/military shoot to kill for merely making a phone call that is deemed treasonous?
Treason, per se, is probably not a valid reason to shoot someone on the spot given how that crime is defined in the U.S. Constitution.
But, keep in mind that in Arrival the situation has been defined as a military operation. As a result, the relevant body of law would be the law pertaining to actions that a military officer may take to carry out a mission ...
5
The documents do not belong to you or your granddad: they belong to his former employer. Contact them and ask what they want them do with them.
5
You're misreading the Posse Comitatus Act. The law does not say "the military may not be used for law enforcement." It says "the military may not be used for law enforcement, except in cases and under circumstances expressly authorized by the Constitution or Act of Congress." The Posse Comitatus Act was never about banning military use in law enforcement. It ...
5
The US Marshals (now the US Marshals Service) was -- as described in the Wikipedia article -- created by the Judiciary Act of 1789 during the fist term of the US Congress (and also during the first term of office of George Washington as President of the United States). See also this page from the US Marshals Service web site.
The Marshals have never been ...
4
Some parts of his personnel file are improper to disclosure, although mere data on his history of promotions is probably not among those private parts of the file, as his rank would be widely available information displayed on his uniform every single day and probably publicized in every public communication he had with anyone. Every promotion is a ...
4
Can law enforcement/military shoot to kill for merely making a phone call that is deemed treasonous?
The answer to the titular question is, "Yes, and it need not even be a treasonous phone call."
In the United States anyone can be justified in using lethal force if they can establish that, in the moment, it was reasonably necessary to prevent imminent, grievous, and unlawful bodily harm to themselves or to another person. (The italicized terms may vary by ...
4
It is a vanishingly small possibility.
First, someone would need to bring a case that an appropriation for the Air Force was unconstitutional.
A Federal court is unlikely to find that it is because:
The constitution would be interpreted broadly where the thing being considered did not exist when it was ratified. That is, the court would consider if, had ...
4
Presidential power of that type might arise from congressional authorization, where Congress authorizes action when POTUS deems that such-and-such is the case. An example is 8 USC 1182(f), which says
Whenever the President finds that the entry of any aliens or of any
class of aliens into the United States would be detrimental to the
interests of the ...
3
One answer is that you should say "yes", because it is a federal felony (5 years prison term) to say "no", because it is untrue, and you know it is untrue. This assumes that the question simply asks "Have you ever been convicted or arrested; please explain", with no qualifiers like "as an adult".
If you are absolutely positive that the record was sealed, an ...
3
The fact that an explosive device is improvised is irrelevant to any law of war with which I am familiar.
"Legal in war" is more a matter of deciding which treaty, convention, or custom you care to respect.
3
Unequivocally yes.
An Australian judgement asserted this by (happily) adopting the reasoning of the US courts:
The matter also came up for discussion in the Communist Party case where Justice Dixon adopted the U.S. view that:
... it is within the necessary power of the Federal government to protect its own existence and the unhindered play of its ...
3
There's no question about what was done or who did it, but there
appears to be a jurisdictional mess: the host country won't prosecute
because everyone involved, on both the victim and perpetrator sides,
is a US citizen and it took place on a US military base, and the
military can't prosecute because the perpetrator is a civilian who is
not subject ...
3
In the U.S., at least through the end of the twentieth century, there were SCI clearances for which personnel were required to notify the relevant program agency in advance of any foreign travel. I think this may still apply to people in the PRP. (More than once I heard a joke was that this was so that if a transport they were on was hijacked the U.S. ...
3
The question conflates two issues that only sometimes overlap - emergency powers on one hand, and the authority of the President v. Congress on issues of foreign affairs and national security on the other.
Some of the big cases involving the emergency powers of the President are entirely domestic: FDR's bank holidays, a case involving the President ...
3
This question is addressed in "Viewpoint Discrimination in the Military's Filmmaker Assistance Program and the First Amendment", Communication Law and Policy 19:3 (paywall). Support of media is enabled under a DoD policy "Assistance to Non-Government, Entertainment-Oriented Picture, Television, and Video Productions" (version available in the wild here), ...
2
Its complete crap.
Enemy agents (spies) were executed by a state executioner after they were convicted by a court or court martial. The law governing espionage is the Official Secrets Acts of 1911 and 1920 as amended.
However, the vast majority of German agents in Britain were never prosecuted: they were turned, that is, they were forced to work as double ...
2
While your question is primarily directed towards the use of legal autonomous weapons systems by military forces, I will address one tangential point (I may provide a separate answer on the military issues later).
There is a long standing (i.e. many hundreds of years old) common law rule of premises liability in Britain, which has now been incorporated by ...
2
Yes.
According to Ukraine Law #2232, a.17-18 (Ukrainian version,English version(paywalled)), if one pursues a scientific career (i.e. aims to achieve a doctorate) - university students get their draft postponed for the whole time of education, and doctorate holders are exempt from draft for as long as they work in their field of expertise. Also, during ...
2
There is no way to actually know what would happen (primarily because we cannot know whether someone will actually sue), and a law might be broken with impunity (the violation could be ignored). We can at least say (somewhat) what the legal situation is, esp. what would constitute a violation of the law. To get to the bottom line, if there is any legal ...
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