If we're going to punish troops for
disobeying stupid orders, then we should punish them for
breaching the laws of war. Supporting the troops has nothing to do with it.
It's funny. In almost no country in the world is there a cult of "the troops" that has so fully displaced rational thinking about why and how we (the US) make war. Perhaps the Soviets -- or, more distantly, the Germans -- deliberately cultivated troop worship as a means of deflecting critical analysis of military policy, but I can think of no other country currently where public debate about war powers has been so debased by knee-jerk sentimentality about "the troops."
More below.
Yes, I admire those who are put in harm's way and do their job under incredibly difficult and dangerous circumstances. Police, fire fighters and soldiers deserve respect for that. In the end, however, they are all human -- they have the same character flaws, virtues and ambiguities as anyone else. Some of them are unthinking killers, racists and yahoos; some of them are noble, humane and selfless. Most of them are probably like you and me: generally decent folk who can do bad things under particular circumstances of stress, pressure and fear.
Having said all that, I do think there is something unique about US soldiers that you don't see in other nations' armed forces. The US follows a military policy of using overwhelming force. For all the talk about taking great care to spare civilian populations, we have witnessed in war after war, from Vietnam to Panama to Kosovo to Afghanistan to Iraq (1 and 2), this policy play out on the ground in the form of massive bombing campaigns and, where boots get put on the ground, an aggressive hostility to everything that moves in the battlefield, whether it's families trying to cross a river to escape a battle, a van load of civilians misreading signals at a checkpoint or detainees suspected of being one of "them."
Does anyone remember the complaints -- published only in the British press -- of UK soldiers about the needlessly aggressive and brutal tactics of their US counterparts when dealing with civilian populations? Has anyone heard the worldwide attitude that US soldiers are singularly ill-equipped for peacekeeping missions? There's a reason for this. It starts with the training, is part of the military culture and gets reinforced by tolerance of brutal and, sometimes, criminal behavior.
I admire people who salute and do difficult jobs, no questions asked. But I admire even more those who realize that, to truly act humanely on the battlefield, you have to be willing to expose yourself to more risk of personal harm, just as international peacekeepers are trained, and willing, to do.
In the end, our "troops" are a reflection of our culture, because they are products of it. In general, we are an insular people who believe, without much interest in looking at the evidence, that we are superior to other nations, that everything we do is motivated by a moral purpose, and that our survival is more important than the survival of others. Why should we be surprised that these attitudes accompany us to the battlefield? But, then again, why shrug it off, either?
"Support our troops." It's a nice slogan, but it's pretty empty. If it means not bothering to criticize inhuman or illegal behavior, no thanks. If it means appreciating the sacrifice it entails, I'm there. But there's nothing incompatible with appreciating the sacrifice a group makes to serve us, on the one hand, and, on the other, singling out and condemning, and demanding punishment of, those who do not soldier according to the principles we believe we represent. Unfortunately, "support our troops" is often used as another way of saying "shut up, no criticism allowed." Like most slogans, it has very limited meaning and usefulness. I vote to banish it from our lexicon.