On 10 September 2021, The Judge Advocate General’s Legal Center and School (TJAGLCS) held a joint and allied remembrance marking the twenty years since al-Qaeda’s attacks on New York City and the Pentagon. After introductory remarks from TJAGLCS Commanding General Brigadier General Alison Martin and Regimental Historian Mr. Fred Borch, representatives from the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps, and Coast Guard, along with their counterparts from the United Kingdom and Germany, talked briefly about how their respective services and countries responded in the days, weeks, and months after the terrorist attack.

In a world of constant competition and rapid change, the United States stands with its allies and partners across the globe on defense matters of all varieties. This steadfast commitment to our shared security and prosperity provides a critical strategic advantage over the oppressive authoritarian regimes of our most problematic strategic competitors.

News & Notes 2021 Issue 5

When I deployed to Afghanistan in October 2020, Department of Defense policy required fourteen days of Restriction of Movement (ROM) before most overseas travel due to the COVID-19 pandemic. For me, that meant two weeks in a hotel room. Realizing I would need a hobby to pass the time in ROM, I decided to watch every military justice movie I could find. This article lists my ranking of the top ten military justice movies, which I define as films featuring a court-martial or military tribunal as central to the plot. 

In 1967, Navy Lieutenant Nancy A. Hunter transferred from the Navy Supply Corps to the Army Judge Advocate General’s (JAG) Corps. This alone was a “first” in history, in that no female naval officer had ever entered our Corps through an inter-service transfer. But more “firsts” were to follow in Nancy Hunter’s career as an Army lawyer.

The time since February 2020 has been full of major surprises on the domestic operations front. After responding to the global pandemic last spring, the National Security Law Division (NSLD) spearheaded the Office of The Judge Advocate General’s (OTJAG) legal support to the Army for nation-wide civil disturbance operations (CDO) beginning in late May 2020 and continuing into the fall.

Prevention of, and response to, civilian casualties during an armed conflict has garnered significant attention in the past several years. This has ranged from negative public opinion surrounding civilian casualties caused during U.S. military operations, to academic discussion of the law surrounding protection of civilians—including whether, and how, Department of Defense (DoD) efforts fall short.

We will not tolerate actions that go against the fundamental principles of the oath we share, including actions associated with extremist or dissident ideologies. Service members, DoD civilian employees, and all those who support our mission, deserve an environment free of discrimination, hate, and harassment. It is incumbent upon each of us to ensure that actions associated with these corrosive behaviors are prevented. Commanders, supervisors, and all those who hold a leadership position within the Department have a special responsibility to guard against these behaviors and set the example for those they lead.

In Juliana v. United States, a group of plaintiffs sued the U.S. Government and several of its agencies—specifically including the Department of Defense (DoD)—asserting that it has continued to “permit, authorize, and subsidize” activities that produce greenhouse gases and cause climate change.

The purpose of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) is to safeguard the freedom and security of its Alliance members by political and military means. In the military domain, the Alliance accomplishes this purpose by maintaining and developing its individual and collective ability to deter and resist armed attack, by consulting together whenever the security of one of the Alliance nations is threatened, and by defending Alliance territory and population from armed attack, as set out in Articles 3, 4, and 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty.