The Army Lawyer 2025 Issue 2

Court Is Assembled: The U.S. Army JAG Corps

Thu, 04 Sep 2025 18:14:00 GMT

The U.S. Army Judge Advocate General’s (JAG) Corps traces its establishment to 29 July 1775, when the Second Continental Congress appointed William Tudor as “Judge Advocate of the Army.” Over the next 250 years, the path to the modern JAG Corps saw vast changes in military justice, in the composition and training of the Army’s legal professionals, and in the Army’s legal missions. As one of the Army’s oldest branches, the JAG Corps’s story reflects many broader currents that have shaped our Army and our Nation’s history.

News & Notes: 82d Airborne Division Pairs with North Carolina A&T State University for Historic Staff Ride

Thu, 04 Sep 2025 18:00:00 GMT

In a unique blend of history and career exploration, the 82d Airborne Division’s Office of the Staff Judge Advocate (OSJA) embarked on a meaningful joint staff ride with North Carolina Agricultural & Technical State University’s (NCA&T) Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC) cadets last spring. Participants visited the Revolutionary War’s Guilford Courthouse battlegrounds. This staff ride served as more than just a historical excursion; it was a strategic effort to connect judge advocates (JAs) with potential future members of the Judge Advocate General’s (JAG) Corps.

News & Notes: Image Collage

Thu, 04 Sep 2025 17:58:00 GMT

What It's Like?: SVC: The Third Lawyer

Thu, 04 Sep 2025 17:50:00 GMT

The air in the courtroom is thin. After sitting in the same confined space for the past several days, spectators and litigants alike are achy and ready for the trial to end. The panel members, seated in all their regalia, maintain a stoic and serious expression, even though it appears their energy may be waning. The mood remains tense, both in front of and behind the bar. The accused, whom the panel has just found guilty of an Article 120 offense, is facing a potentially significant punishment for his crime. Though tired and sweaty, the Government and Defense are prepared and ready to plunge into the sentencing hearing that has just begun, hoping to obtain their desired outcome.

Book Review: Junk Science from Our Courts and Elsewhere

Thu, 04 Sep 2025 17:45:00 GMT

Junk Science and the American Criminal Justice System (Junk Science) outlines the history of pseudoscience’s beguiling of our courts. The book’s principal focus is “bite mark analysis, but it just as easily could have been shaken baby syndrome, arson investigation, hair microscopy, bullet lead analysis, polygraphs, voice spectrometry, handwriting, [or] bloodstain pattern analysis.” M. Chris Fabricant lays out a compelling case for why these techniques have been sufficiently discredited that they have no place in our justice system. At first blush, the bite mark analysis focus seems to limit his ability to speak more broadly to the book’s titular issue.

Lore of the Corps: The Articles of War and the American Revolution

Tue, 02 Sep 2025 18:00:00 GMT

The American Revolution has often been noted for its incongruities. The product of a highly ideological cause, the American republic was also “born in an act of violence,” in the words of one commentator. In other words, to secure the “new world” that Thomas Paine and other revolutionaries envisioned, the United States would have to man, train, and equip a military force capable of winning a bloody land conflict with the British Empire. The oftentimes countervailing forces of philosophical ideals and military necessity thus constituted one of the central tensions in the American War of Independence. The administration of military justice in the Continental Army is a prime example of this tension.

Practice Notes: A Brief Overview of Other Transactions Authority

Fri, 29 Aug 2025 19:41:00 GMT

On 9 April 2025, President Donald J. Trump published an executive order directing the Department of Defense (DoD) to submit a plan to reform the DoD acquisition process.1 The order directed the DoD to employ, among other mechanisms, “existing authorities to expedite acquisitions through the [DoD], including . . . a general preference for Other Transactions Authority [(OTA)].”2 On 30 April 2025, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth published a memorandum, titled Army Transformation and Acquisition Reform, directing the “[e]xpan[sion] [of] the use of [OTA] agreements to enable faster prototyping and fielding of critical technologies; this includes software and software-defined hardware.”³

Practice Notes: Sustainment Is the New Black

Fri, 29 Aug 2025 18:15:00 GMT

You will not find it difficult to prove that battles, campaigns, and even wars have been won or lost primarily because of logistics. – General Dwight D. Eisenhower1

Practice Notes: Even Tom Brady and Peyton Manning Had a Quarterback Coach

Fri, 29 Aug 2025 17:15:00 GMT

American Football fan or not, you have likely heard of Tom Brady and Peyton Manning. I will wager, however, that you have never heard of Clyde Christensen. At the time of his retirement in 2023, Coach Christensen had forty-four years of football coaching under his belt—twenty-seven of those in the National Football League (NFL).1 In that span, he was the quarterback coach for both Peyton Manning and Tom Brady—two of the greatest ever to play the position. Manning entered the NFL Hall of Fame in 2021 as a “first-ballot” select;2 that is, he was elected on his first attempt, which is an honor only eighty-nine of the 371 NFL Hall of Famers can claim.3 Brady will presumptively do the same upon his first eligibility in 2028.

Practice Notes: Cure Notices in Commercial Contract Terminations

Fri, 29 Aug 2025 16:31:00 GMT

From the infrastructure and systems that manage and support permanent changes of station1 to our homeland’s defense against the increasing threat of small unmanned aircraft systems,2 commercial contracts play a critical role in supporting Department of Defense (DoD) missions. When nonconformance, delays, or other issues arise, the attorneys who advise contracting officers must be confidently ready to advise on the Government’s options and the steps required to take certain actions.

Feature: A View from the Bench

Fri, 29 Aug 2025 15:00:00 GMT

You can’t always get what you want

But if you try sometimes

You just might find

You get what you need1

Closing Argument: Trust Is the Mission

Fri, 29 Aug 2025 14:39:00 GMT

I still remember what my commander said during the unit hail:

He stood up, looked around the room with an annoyed expression, glanced down at his index card, and said,

“I can’t believe we have one lawyer, let alone two.”

Then he sat down. No handshake. No welcome. Just a clear message: I was not trusted, and I was not needed.

I was the new deputy command judge advocate for a special operations unit. I had completed a successful first tour in the 82nd Airborne Division, but I was still new to the special operations community, and to them I was unproven.