PORTLAND – As a former Army officer who remains interested in current military endeavors, I am writing to offer my two cents about the video that appears to show Marines desecrating bodies of deceased Taliban fighters in Afghanistan.

I am weighing in because of reactions that I have witnessed from some Americans. Some people find this incident to be acceptable because the deceased are presumably members of the Taliban. The Taliban is an armed force that routinely resorts to despicable acts of torture and slaughtering innocent civilians. Thus, some people seem to think it is OK to desecrate Taliban bodies.

There are absolutes in this world. Desecrating human bodies out of vindictiveness is always wrong. Dismissing the desecration of a human body because of who that person was, or who is doing the desecrating, is a copout. It is immoral, illegal and inconsistent with the stated values of all branches of our military.

Almost all of our troops are better than this. They carry out their missions with professionalism. They sometimes need to kill adversaries. But the interaction remains professional.

If an individual poses an imminent deadly threat to a civilian or member of a friendly unit, then the threat is eliminated with an appropriate amount of force. Troops search the body for weapons and explosives, attempt to identify the deceased, gather intelligence and handle the remains according to unit procedures that are consistent with laws of armed conflict.

This is the carrying-out of a serious duty, not a moment to gloat. It can be very personal and emotional. But it is a mission on behalf of the American people, not a personal vendetta between the service member and the deceased. Most troops are mature enough to understand this.

Some people applaud the actions that this video appears to show, apparently because war requires toughness. Most of the people applauding seem to be men – mostly insecure men – trying to compensate for some shortcoming in their physique or character. They do not seem to recognize that undisciplined stupidity differs from toughness.

There is nothing “tough” about the inability or unwillingness to separate one’s emotions from one’s job. Professionals recognize this and get on with their mission. Amateurs and know-nothings do a victory dance and declare, “They would do the same to us!”

I have seen dozens of incidents in which enemy fighters were rightfully killed (in Iraq, not Afghanistan) and their remains recorded and turned over to locals for burial. Young men get excited and are prone to act or speak in haste, particularly when someone tries to kill them. But I have never witnessed the type of deliberate, immature or unlawful actions that appear to have occurred in this video.

Those who applaud what this video purports to show, frankly, need to shut up. Aside from being immoral and illegal, antics like this undermine order and discipline by creating an atmosphere where serious work becomes a vendetta or a game.

Service members are not deployed abroad to squeeze triggers because they dislike the people in the sights of their weapons. They are sent there to eliminate imminent deadly threats and people whom our chain of command deem to be hostile actors. That is it.

It is not a personal score. It is a mission. If an individual is an imminent deadly threat or hostile actor, shoot him. Process the remains in accordance with unit procedures. Then continue the mission.

It is pathetic that anything that I typed above needs to be said. Sadly, it does.

One more point needs to be made. Some people rightly condemn the actions that this video appears to show, but condemn the video for the wrong reasons.

Some lament that the video has propaganda value for our enemies. That may be true. But that is not what makes it wrong. What makes an atrocity wrong is that it is immoral.

Laws of armed conflict have evolved to try to demarcate right from wrong, and to reduce unnecessary wrongs. What sets the U.S. military apart from most other militaries is that we are a moral force with the capability to accomplish missions in compliance with laws of armed conflict, despite opponents who do not adhere to those constraints. We train to fight in accordance with laws of war and punish those who violate those laws.

I hope this video was staged or fabricated. But if it is authentic, then it needs to be condemned for one reason and one reason only: It is wrong.

– Special to The Press Herald