#internationallaws — Public Fediverse posts
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UCMJ Article 92 & The Duty to Disobey Illegal Orders – 2025
Editor’s Note: This text (edited) was created by Gemini, November 20, 2025. The image is provided as CC0 1.0 public domain for use by anyone as needed. UCMJ Article 92 by Michael McCulley is marked CC0 1.0 Universal
The Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) does not explicitly have a section titled “constitutional duty to disobey illegal orders,” but its provisions clearly establish that military personnel are required to obey only lawful orders. Illegal orders—those that violate the Constitution, U.S. laws, or international laws—do not require compliance and must be disobeyed.
Relevant UCMJ Articles and Provisions
Article 92 (10 U.S.C. § 892) – Failure to Obey an Order or RegulationThis article makes it a punishable offense to disobey lawful orders or regulations. It applies only to lawful orders, implying that unlawful orders are not to be obeyed. Orders are presumed lawful unless they clearly violate laws or constitutional rights.
This article also emphasizes the obedience of lawful orders, with punishment for willful disobedience. It implicitly excludes unlawful orders from what must be obeyed.
Legal experts interpret this as underscoring that orders lacking valid military purpose or that violate the Constitution are illegal and must not be followed.
Legal and Constitutional Duty to Disobey Illegal Orders
Military personnel swear an oath to uphold the U.S. Constitution, placing constitutional duty above obedience to unlawful commands. They are legally and morally obligated to refuse orders that require criminal acts, torture, harming civilians, or violate treaties such as the Geneva Conventions.
The law and military legal commentary affirm that obeying illegal orders is not a defense for committing illegal acts (the “Nuremberg defense” is invalid). Service members have a responsibility to seek clarification, document, report, and refuse unlawful commands.
Illegal orders include any commands that contradict the Constitution, U.S. laws, lawful superior orders, or fall beyond the issuing official’s authority. The legality of an order can ultimately be decided by a military judge.
Summary
The UCMJ Article 92 governs obedience, but its text and interpretation make clear only lawful orders must be obeyed.
The constitutional duty to disobey illegal orders arises from the oath to defend the Constitution and the principle that illegal orders are void.
Military law supports refusal of orders that require crimes or violations of constitutional and international law, with protections for service members who do so lawfully.
This relationship is grounded in UCMJ Articles 90 and 92, intertwined with constitutional principles and military legal interpretations, providing a clear framework that service members must disobey illegal orders.
MLA Bibliography
- United States Code, Title 10, Section 892, Article 92. Office of the Law Revision Counsel. https://uscode.house.gov/view.xhtml?req=granuleid%3AUSC-prelim-title10-section892&num=0&edition=prelim. Accessed 21 Nov. 2025.
- Daniel Conway and Associates. “Article 92 Failure to Obey an Order.” Military Defense Law Offices. https://www.mcmilitarylaw.com/articles-of-ucmj/article-92-failure-to-obey-an-order/. Accessed 21 Nov. 2025.
- Cornell Law School. “10 U.S. Code § 892 – Art. 92. Failure to obey order or regulation.” Legal Information Institute. https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/10/892. Accessed 21 Nov. 2025.
- ABC News. “What the military oath of enlistment says about legal and illegal orders.” https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/military-oath-enlistment-legal-illegal-orders/story?id=127725085. Accessed 21 Nov. 2025.
- PBS NewsHour. “Trump says Democrats’ video message to military is ‘seditious behavior’ punishable by death.” https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/trump-says-democrats-video-message-to-military-is-seditious-behavior-punishable-by-death. Accessed 21 Nov. 2025.
- Law Offices of David P. Sheldon. “Unlawful Military Orders.” https://www.militarydefense.com/tag/unlawful-military-orders/. Accessed 21 Nov. 2025.
- Reddit. “Refusing an Unlawful Military Order: Your Legal Rights.” r/navy, https://www.reddit.com/r/navy/comments/1l8zbwp/refusing_an_unlawful_military_order_your_legal/. Accessed 21 Nov. 2025.
- Military Times. “4 in 5 US troops surveyed understand duty to disobey illegal orders.” https://www.militarytimes.com/opinion/commentary/2025/08/14/4-in-5-us-troops-surveyed-understand-duty-to-disobey-illegal-orders/. Accessed 21 Nov. 2025.
- Newsweek. “What US law says about sedition and troops defying illegal orders.” https://www.newsweek.com/what-us-law-says-sedition-troops-defying-illegal-orders-11084527. Accessed 21 Nov. 2025.
- CNN Politics. “Democratic lawmakers urge troops to disobey illegal orders.” https://www.cnn.com/2025/11/19/politics/democratic-lawmakers-urge-troops-to-disobey-illegal-orders. Accessed 21 Nov. 2025.
- Al Jazeera. “‘Punishable by DEATH’: Trump threatens Democrats with sedition charges.” https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/11/20/punishable-by-death-trump-threatens-democrats-with-sedition-charges. Accessed 21 Nov. 2025.
- Reddit. “Uncomfortable with the members of Congress who messaged to not…” r/AirForce, https://www.reddit.com/r/AirForce/comments/1p1b7d4/uncomfortable_with_the_members_of_congress_who/. Accessed 21 Nov. 2025.
- Facebook Group Post. “Military members obligation to disobey illegal orders.” https://www.facebook.com/groups/servicewhenwomencomemarchinghome/posts/24580730314894966/. Accessed 21 Nov. 2025.
- Military Law Task Force. “FAQ on Refusing Illegal Orders.” https://nlgmltf.org/military-law/2025/faq-on-refusing-illegal-orders/. Accessed 21 Nov. 2025.
- U.S. Army Courts of Criminal Appeals. “Core Criminal Law Subjects: Crimes: Article 91.” https://www.armfor.uscourts.gov/digest/IIIA15.htm. Accessed 21 Nov. 2025.
- Facebook Post. “President Trump called for lawmakers from the video to be arrested…” https://www.facebook.com/armytimes/posts/1245362770958632/. Accessed 21 Nov. 2025.
- United States. Uniform Code of Military Justice. Title 10, U.S. Code, §§ 890–933 (2025), Articles 90 and 92. United States Government Publishing Office, 2025.
- United States. Uniform Code of Military Justice. Title 10, U.S. Code, §§ 890–933 (2025), Articles 90 and 92. United States Government Publishing Office, 2025. https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/10/subtitle-A/part-II/chapter-47. Accessed 20 Nov. 2025.
#2025 #bibliography #constitutionalDuty #dutyToDisobeyIllegalOrders #gemini #geminiAi #googleGemini #internationalLaws #legalExperts #militaryJudges #mla #uSConstitution #uSLaws #ucmj #ucmjArticle90 #ucmjArticle92 #uniformCodeOfMilitaryJustice
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#Yemeni #cartoonist - Kamal Sharaf is unapologetic about his bold #political beliefs & #ArtActivism to illustrate his support for the resistance against past & present #ColonialViolence #genocide. He had been targeted, arrested & jailed for his resistance art activism before.
Most of his strongest #PoliticalArt pieces are targeted at illustrating the collaborative colonial land grabs driven #terrorism from #Israel & #Zionists in #USgovernment - both who blatantly violate #InternationalLaws. Both are guilty of multiple #WarCrimes & both aren't to be trusted. Bigoted buddies in ethnic cleansing genocide of Arab peoples. Best friends in pathological pitiful lying.
See & purchase more of Kamal Sharaf's #artworks :
https://www.cartoonmovement.com/search?query=Kamal%20SharafRelated links:
https://www.memri.org/reports/memri-cartoon-initiatives-top-cartoons-2010https://www.hrw.org/news/2010/09/23/friends-yemen-tie-aid-human-rights
https://www.ecoi.net/en/document/1220921.html
https://www.amnestyusa.org/reports/annual-report-yemen-2011/
#ResistanceArt
#FreePalestine
#HumanRights
#ICC
#ICJ
#USrael
#IsraelIsATerroristState
#IsraelWarCrimes
#RacistIsrael
#IsraelRogueState
#ArmsEmbargoOnIsrael
#USAFundsGenocide
#BoycottIsrael
#BoycottUSA
#BDSMovement
#BoycottIsraeliApartheid
#StopGenocide
#ApartheidIsrael
#SanctionIsrael
#ZionismIsACult
#WarCriminals
#MiddleEast
#Art
#Cartoons
#Illustrations
#ArtThatSpeaksVolumes -
#Yemeni #cartoonist - Kamal Sharaf is unapologetic about his bold #political beliefs & #ArtActivism to illustrate his support for the resistance against past & present #ColonialViolence #genocide. He had been targeted, arrested & jailed for his resistance art activism before.
Most of his strongest #PoliticalArt pieces are targeted at illustrating the collaborative colonial land grabs driven #terrorism from #Israel & #Zionists in #USgovernment - both who blatantly violate #InternationalLaws. Both are guilty of multiple #WarCrimes & both aren't to be trusted. Bigoted buddies in ethnic cleansing genocide of Arab peoples. Best friends in pathological pitiful lying.
See & purchase more of Kamal Sharaf's #artworks :
https://www.cartoonmovement.com/search?query=Kamal%20SharafRelated links:
https://www.memri.org/reports/memri-cartoon-initiatives-top-cartoons-2010https://www.hrw.org/news/2010/09/23/friends-yemen-tie-aid-human-rights
https://www.ecoi.net/en/document/1220921.html
https://www.amnestyusa.org/reports/annual-report-yemen-2011/
#ResistanceArt
#FreePalestine
#HumanRights
#ICC
#ICJ
#USrael
#IsraelIsATerroristState
#IsraelWarCrimes
#RacistIsrael
#IsraelRogueState
#ArmsEmbargoOnIsrael
#USAFundsGenocide
#BoycottIsrael
#BoycottUSA
#BDSMovement
#BoycottIsraeliApartheid
#StopGenocide
#ApartheidIsrael
#SanctionIsrael
#ZionismIsACult
#WarCriminals
#MiddleEast
#Art
#Cartoons
#Illustrations
#ArtThatSpeaksVolumes -
#Yemeni #cartoonist - Kamal Sharaf is unapologetic about his bold #political beliefs & #ArtActivism to illustrate his support for the resistance against past & present #ColonialViolence #genocide. He had been targeted, arrested & jailed for his resistance art activism before.
Most of his strongest #PoliticalArt pieces are targeted at illustrating the collaborative colonial land grabs driven #terrorism from #Israel & #Zionists in #USgovernment - both who blatantly violate #InternationalLaws. Both are guilty of multiple #WarCrimes & both aren't to be trusted. Bigoted buddies in ethnic cleansing genocide of Arab peoples. Best friends in pathological pitiful lying.
See & purchase more of Kamal Sharaf's #artworks :
https://www.cartoonmovement.com/search?query=Kamal%20SharafRelated links:
https://www.memri.org/reports/memri-cartoon-initiatives-top-cartoons-2010https://www.hrw.org/news/2010/09/23/friends-yemen-tie-aid-human-rights
https://www.ecoi.net/en/document/1220921.html
https://www.amnestyusa.org/reports/annual-report-yemen-2011/
#ResistanceArt
#FreePalestine
#HumanRights
#ICC
#ICJ
#USrael
#IsraelIsATerroristState
#IsraelWarCrimes
#RacistIsrael
#IsraelRogueState
#ArmsEmbargoOnIsrael
#USAFundsGenocide
#BoycottIsrael
#BoycottUSA
#BDSMovement
#BoycottIsraeliApartheid
#StopGenocide
#ApartheidIsrael
#SanctionIsrael
#ZionismIsACult
#WarCriminals
#MiddleEast
#Art
#Cartoons
#Illustrations
#ArtThatSpeaksVolumes -
#Yemeni #cartoonist - Kamal Sharaf is unapologetic about his bold #political beliefs & #ArtActivism to illustrate his support for the resistance against past & present #ColonialViolence #genocide. He had been targeted, arrested & jailed for his resistance art activism before.
Most of his strongest #PoliticalArt pieces are targeted at illustrating the collaborative colonial land grabs driven #terrorism from #Israel & #Zionists in #USgovernment - both who blatantly violate #InternationalLaws. Both are guilty of multiple #WarCrimes & both aren't to be trusted. Bigoted buddies in ethnic cleansing genocide of Arab peoples. Best friends in pathological pitiful lying.
See & purchase more of Kamal Sharaf's #artworks :
https://www.cartoonmovement.com/search?query=Kamal%20SharafRelated links:
https://www.memri.org/reports/memri-cartoon-initiatives-top-cartoons-2010https://www.hrw.org/news/2010/09/23/friends-yemen-tie-aid-human-rights
https://www.ecoi.net/en/document/1220921.html
https://www.amnestyusa.org/reports/annual-report-yemen-2011/
#ResistanceArt
#FreePalestine
#HumanRights
#ICC
#ICJ
#USrael
#IsraelIsATerroristState
#IsraelWarCrimes
#RacistIsrael
#IsraelRogueState
#ArmsEmbargoOnIsrael
#USAFundsGenocide
#BoycottIsrael
#BoycottUSA
#BDSMovement
#BoycottIsraeliApartheid
#StopGenocide
#ApartheidIsrael
#SanctionIsrael
#ZionismIsACult
#WarCriminals
#MiddleEast
#Art
#Cartoons
#Illustrations
#ArtThatSpeaksVolumes -
#Yemeni #cartoonist - Kamal Sharaf is unapologetic about his bold #political beliefs & #ArtActivism to illustrate his support for the resistance against past & present #ColonialViolence #genocide. He had been targeted, arrested & jailed for his resistance art activism before.
Most of his strongest #PoliticalArt pieces are targeted at illustrating the collaborative colonial land grabs driven #terrorism from #Israel & #Zionists in #USgovernment - both who blatantly violate #InternationalLaws. Both are guilty of multiple #WarCrimes & both aren't to be trusted. Bigoted buddies in ethnic cleansing genocide of Arab peoples. Best friends in pathological pitiful lying.
See & purchase more of Kamal Sharaf's #artworks :
https://www.cartoonmovement.com/search?query=Kamal%20SharafRelated links:
https://www.memri.org/reports/memri-cartoon-initiatives-top-cartoons-2010https://www.hrw.org/news/2010/09/23/friends-yemen-tie-aid-human-rights
https://www.ecoi.net/en/document/1220921.html
https://www.amnestyusa.org/reports/annual-report-yemen-2011/
#ResistanceArt
#FreePalestine
#HumanRights
#ICC
#ICJ
#USrael
#IsraelIsATerroristState
#IsraelWarCrimes
#RacistIsrael
#IsraelRogueState
#ArmsEmbargoOnIsrael
#USAFundsGenocide
#BoycottIsrael
#BoycottUSA
#BDSMovement
#BoycottIsraeliApartheid
#StopGenocide
#ApartheidIsrael
#SanctionIsrael
#ZionismIsACult
#WarCriminals
#MiddleEast
#Art
#Cartoons
#Illustrations
#ArtThatSpeaksVolumes -
#Transcription of my #speech for #deaf folks - as it wasn't provided on vid.
Hi, everyone. Thank you for showing up with #community #solidarity, to call for a #PermanentCeasefire in support of #Palestinians who are suffering #famine & #genocidal violence under #Israeli occupational forces.
My name is Que & I'm a survivor of the #USinvasion #WarOnVietnam. I was a #WarChild conceived & born under active shelling & had #IntergenerationalTrauma pre & post birth.
We were #displaced from our homes & survived in a #RefugeeCamp in Indonesia for a year. We were sponsored to come to Canada in late 1979 as #WarRefugees, seeking #asylum.
My patriarch family lived in #Cholon the #Chinese District in #Saigon & my matriarch family lived in a tiny village near Can Tho near the Hau River in #SouthVietnam. Both sides of my family had already lived through multiple foreign invasions & foreign militarized imperialism & colonialism by the time the US invaded & occupied our lands.
Many of us living Vietnam war civilian survivors can relate so well to the many struggles, the suffering, the violent foreign occupation & also the passionate resilience & resistance of the Palestinian peoples.
Throughout the 1960s into the 1970s both areas that my family lived in were carpet bombed. My Matriarch family village was bombed out of existence by 1970. The rebuilding took 18 years. Cholon was #CarpetBombed twice & the scenes from those aftermaths are eerily similar to the scenes from #Gaza after #Israel carpet bombed the area.
The #USmilitary used #Vietnamese #civilians as involuntary guinea pigs. They tested out never used before #WarMunitions including #biochemical warfare like #AgentOrange & #NerveGasBombs on our peoples.
Our peoples, our lands, our waters - still suffer the toxic & deadly effects from the illegal - illegal #biowarfare chemical uses by the #USA to this day & our peoples & especially our children are still suffering from the many leftover war munitions, exploding, maiming & killing innocent civilians.
Israel is treating the Palestinian peoples very much like the USA had treated our Vietnamese peoples. Like we are not human. We do not deserve to live. The dehumanization of Palestinians is too similar to how the USA dehumanized our Vietnamese peoples. We're savages. We are vermin. We're stupid tunnel rats. We're gooks & we deserve to die.
The USA bombed our #schools, our #hospitals, our #temples, our #ResidentialAreas - just like Israel has bombed schools, hospitals, temples & residential areas in Palestine. The USA has more powerful weapons of mass destruction while fighting resistance forces with much less firepower. The Vietnamese #ResistanceForces also used #TunnelSystems & some of them are now part of an #educational #LivingMuseum.
Vietnam is now #SovereignNation because the occupational militarized US forces left which opened up our path to #DiplomaticNegotiations. Palestinians deserve their true path to diplomatic Solutions too. They deserve a sovereign state. That can not happen without a permanent - not a temporary - a permanent ceasefire - an end to #IllegalOccupation by Israel.
You cannot occupy & oppress a people & claim you are a #democracy. True #Democratic states do not occupy & oppress people for decades. True Democratic states do not jail, murder & deny #PressFreedom to #journalists. True democratic states do not arrest, vilify, nor illegally detain their own citizens with dissenting voices. True democratic states don't continue to violate multiple #InternationalLaws so openly & so disrespectfully.
Israel has become too #arrogant that's mainly due to the Western powers like the USA & #Canada continuing to put their #WarProfiteer interests over #humanitarian & global #PublicInterests.
At a time when we need an arms embargo on Israel, the US & Canada sent billions more in war munitions & funding to Israel. It is shameful.
Our politicians tell us there's not enough money to fund more essential health & medical service needs. There's not enough money to increase the pay scale of essential medical staff. There's not enough money to fund environmental protection & cleanups. There's not enough to help our seniors & disabled not live in poverty anxiety. There's not enough to fund safer, more inclusive, accessible education. There's not enough to provide more low income & some more support of housing for our most marginalized citizens. These are all citizen needs that our governments have told they cannot afford to fully fund but they can find billions to fund ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians. That is not okay & that is not in our public interest.
I urge everyone here to please keep contacting all of your local provincial & federal representatives in every way possible & ask them to please push Trudeau to call for both a permanent ceasefire & to initiate an arms embargo on Israel - NOW.
Please keep having the conversations with people you know & people you don't know about Palestine. The conversations are important. Please keep standing in solidarity with Gaza & all Palestinians.
The antidote to despair is action. This here is humanity in action & I thank all of you for showing your humanity & your ongoing support of Palestinians because remember, no democracy can exist without the freedom of citizens dissenting voices and I appreciate all of your voices dissenting, against our government who is still supporting genocide.
Free Palestine!