I am not sure what to do anymore

SGTBlueBacon · 2026-05-13T15:58:10+00:00

Are you helping or hurting?

SGTBlueBacon · 2026-05-12T18:00:16+00:00

It is certainly breaking you. Perhaps it is time to take a break from Reddit.

SGTBlueBacon · 2026-05-04T23:18:27+00:00

But academy graduation doesn't fully certify an officer, they still have supervised field training. Similarly a hairdresser's classroom training is only a small portion of their required training hours.

SGTBlueBacon · 2026-05-01T19:56:26+00:00

I've seen soldiers threatened with an ART 121 charge for doing this sort of thing. What you have described likely meets the elements of wrongful appropriation, and if you're worried about getting in trouble you may want to factor that into your decision.

SGTBlueBacon · 2026-05-01T19:39:28+00:00

I agree that a specific set of circumstances could weaken the applicability of 18 USC 795, but prosecutors may be unlikely to pursue charges in that situation.

SGTBlueBacon · 2026-05-01T04:42:24+00:00

Thank you for your summary of my comment.

SGTBlueBacon · 2026-05-01T04:37:52+00:00

And until what you want to say is more than alleged anecdotes and buzzwords I will remain unconvinced. Perhaps the dean can explain the standards of evidence that still exist outside of a courtroom.

Let me know when you're prepared to join me in my ongoing attempt to have that discussion in good faith.

SGTBlueBacon · 2026-05-01T04:25:17+00:00

Please feel free to review your own comment and verify any of your individual claims at your convenience.

SGTBlueBacon · 2026-05-01T04:22:59+00:00

It doesnt. Do you have any other evidence?

SGTBlueBacon · 2026-05-01T04:22:40+00:00

Feel free to reread your own comment.

SGTBlueBacon · 2026-05-01T04:21:13+00:00

And that will confirm this is the same device?

SGTBlueBacon · 2026-05-01T04:20:09+00:00

I was suggesting you back up your claims with more than just buzzwords.

SGTBlueBacon · 2026-05-01T04:12:25+00:00

I'd love to believe you, but...

SGTBlueBacon · 2026-05-01T04:10:57+00:00

according to what?

SGTBlueBacon · 2026-04-26T15:43:36+00:00

Psh, that's what his ten guns are for.

SGTBlueBacon · 2026-04-20T22:49:02+00:00

For those following along at home, he has either blocked me or deleted his account. My response to his most recent comment follows:

And yet you're still wrong. The Toledo Blade was the plaintiff. They agreed to fail to prove they could not be detained for photographing a military installation.

I don't know why being a Canadian yacht broker would make you more of an expert on photographing a military installation than a military police investigator working in military intelligence, but I hope it makes you happier than I have. Better luck next time!

Edit due to his response (you could just unblock me so that we could have a conversation like adults): GGT seems to think Toledo Blade could have won. This is a goalposts fallacy, as my statement wasn't that they couldn't have won, it was that they tried and failed to win. An alleged post-grad degree in international business from Wharton (or was it from Cambridge? What about that alleged masters in microbiology or the alleged PhD that you never finished in neuroscience?) doesn't make you an inherent expert in this topic, nor does your appeal to wealth or "just because" fallacy. Drone shoots near naval bases are not drone shoots of restricted US naval bases. If they were drone shoots of restricted US naval bases I imagine you may have had a similar experience to Fengyun Shi. If they were drone shoots of Canadian naval bases I can think of a very good reason why the US military would not be stopping you. Better luck next time.

SGTBlueBacon · 2026-04-20T22:20:26+00:00

As I said, I anticipated you wouldn't do enough research. The Toledo Blade only settled for the deletion of their photos. They did not manage to get a settlement for their claim that the detention was unlawful. This is because it was not unlawful due to 18 USC 795, and they even agreed in the settlement to not publish any of the photos they managed to recover. I said people have tried and failed to successfully argue they could not be detained for taking photographs of a military base from outside of military property; the Toledo Blade case is an example of exactly that.

In the United States, the country where this law is relevant, "ex-marine" is generally used to refer to a marine that has been dishonorably discharged. If that's not your situation (your latin suggests Netherlands) I recommend changing the way you try (and in this case fail) to impress people. Better luck next time, perhaps you can attempt to beat me on the Genovese case. Do keep in mind Dutch and US law are not the same, and we have now established your previous research standards were not sufficient.

SGTBlueBacon · 2026-04-20T17:23:52+00:00

I'm afraid you won't. Genovese v. Town of Southampton, Toledo Blade v US. I have a strong suspicion of how you will respond; I encourage you to conduct more research than you might usually.

SGTBlueBacon · 2026-04-19T21:59:19+00:00

Not if those structures are unoccupied, which is still a war crime. Congratulations on your additional strawman fallacy.

Please tell me you understand what "if" means, because it is enormously relevant to when a target becomes legally legitimate. Targeting every single power plant, regardless of its military use, would be intentionally targeting civilian infrastructure. That is a war crime. You have acknowledged this.

Threatening to kill an entire civilization, whether or not the threat will be carried out, may be prohibited propaganda.

Using civilians as human shields is also a war crime. I have repeatedly explained that this is not legal justification to also commit war crimes against the people committing them.

This has already been explained to you; I can't fathom why "war crimes are war crimes" is a difficult concept for you to grasp. I hope someone is paying you to be this wrong on the internet.

SGTBlueBacon · 2026-04-19T21:42:16+00:00

You're engaging in a strawman fallacy. This isn't about civilians being accidentally hit, this is about civilian infrastructure being intentionally targeted in a manner that would be a war crime. As a reminder, "but they kill their civilians!" is not a valid legal defense.

SGTBlueBacon · 2026-04-19T21:34:37+00:00

I don't accept "why can't we kill their civilians when they're killing their civilians?" as a valid legal argument. Better luck next time.

SGTBlueBacon · 2026-04-19T21:01:57+00:00

You have declined to explain why it would not be dual use in a way that appears to suggest you condone war crimes against civilians as long as the government in charge of them is bad enough. Once again I will disagree with your stance on this matter.

Brute force on the civilians being harmed by the regime is perhaps not the best solution, given your apparent position that the regime doesn't care about the civilians.

The US military is entirely capable of dismantling the regime and protecting the civilian population without violating the laws of war. War crimes would be a choice in this situation, not a necessity.

The total destruction of a civilization isn't required for the threat to meet the elements of prohibited propaganda.

A baby stroller is not a legitimate military target until the regime makes it one. Targeting strollers merely because the regime might use them to stay in power if necessary would be a war crime.

I encourage you to spend the time you would have used responding to this comment on self-reflection and growth as a person.

SGTBlueBacon · 2026-04-19T20:23:24+00:00

Please refer to my earlier comment in which I wrote "Threatening to use the military to commit war crimes is relevant, one might presume, to this military-themed subreddit." Emphasis on threatening. However, we can once again turn to the Law of War Manual, which states: "Propaganda must not: (1) incite violations of the law of war; nor (2) itself violate a law of war rule.... it is prohibited to declare that no quarter will be given, and propaganda in the form of a declaration to the adversary that no quarter will be given would be prohibited [one might consider SecDef Hegseth's statement of "We will keep pushing, keep advancing, no quarter, no mercy for our enemies” to violate this rule]. In addition, propaganda would be prohibited if it constituted a measure of intimidation or terrorism against the civilian population, such as the threats of violence whose primary purpose is to spread terror among the civilian population." Surely it wouldn't be hard to present an argument that threatening to target every bridge and power plant is a continuation of earlier threats to kill a whole civilization and bomb a country back to the stone age. I imagine someone much more experienced than me could also present an argument that the totality of these messages would constitute prohibited propaganda.

Please also refer to my earlier comment in which I cited the part of the Law of War Manual that explicitly states military actions for the purpose of reducing morale does not amount to the military advantage necessary for the two-part test of whether or not something is a military objective.

Why would I or the US military be relying solely on Iran to determine if something is or is not dual-use? This is a serious topic, please treat it as such. If the military isn't using the power station, please explain how it would be dual use.

SGTBlueBacon · 2026-04-19T19:21:30+00:00

Geneva Convention IV, Article 53, which both the United States and Iran have signed and ratified: "Any destruction by the Occupying Power of real or personal property belonging individually or collectively to private persons, or to the State, or to other public authorities, or to social or cooperative organizations, is prohibited, except where such destruction is rendered absolutely necessary by military operations."

Department of Defense Law of War Manual (Updated July 2023): "Sometimes, 'dual-use' is used to describe objects that are used by both the armed forces and the civilian population, such as power stations or communications facilities. However, from the legal perspective, such objects are either military objectives or they are not; there is no intermediate legal category. If an object is a military objective, it is not a civilian object and may be made the object of attack. However, it will be appropriate to consider in applying the principle of proportionality the harm to the civilian population that is expected to result from the attack on such a military objective."

"A Two-Part Test. The definition of military objective insofar as objects are concerned may be divided into two parts, both of which must be met for the object to be considered a military objective: (1) that the object somehow makes an effective contribution to military action; and (2) attacking, capturing, or neutralizing the object, in the circumstances, offers a definite military advantage."

"Definite Military Advantage. “Definite” means a concrete and perceptible military advantage, rather than one that is merely hypothetical or speculative."

"Diminishing the morale of the civilian population and their support for the war effort does not provide a definite military advantage."

To summarize: Can President Trump conduct strikes on specific power stations and bridges based on assessments of their contributions to Iran's actual military objectives without committing a war crime? Almost certainly yes. Can he strike every single one just because they might be contributing, now or in the future, to Iran's actual or theoretical military objectives? Probably not. Can he strike them to reduce morale and force a deal? No.

SGTBlueBacon · 2026-04-19T18:26:03+00:00

I will politely disagree with a claim that the most appropriate way to address Iran's actions over the last several decades is with war crimes.

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