The Blog of Harald

My (quick) thoughts on the incident.

I have to commend the pilots’ defense lawyer for digging up all sorts of interesting information about the case: the use of “Go pills”; the lack of information given to the pilots; and so on. The US military has a history of ignoring systemic issues in these cases, and punishing the poor shmucks at the bottom of the chain of command. (The problems identified in the investigation after the 1999 Italian gondola case still haven’t been addressed.)

However, one thing remains clear; the pilot in question disobeyed a direct order not to fire, and four soldiers (from a foreign ally) lost their lives. The case needs to go to trial, if only to get all of the facts out in the open. I personally would be happy to have all of this interesting, mitigating testimony affect their sentencing, but it should not affect the case going to trial.