Billboards Demand Lawful Orders, Media Demands Context
The Independent reports on billboards reminding troops to obey only lawful orders, a public service (or public concern, depending on your lens). What's conspicuously absent from much mainstream coverage is the larger context that makes such warnings seem necessary in the first place. When the US government consistently provides unconditional military aid, including to governments currently being
investigated by the International Criminal Court for alleged war crimes, it's not surprising citizens feel compelled to remind their own armed forces of their ethical obligations. (One might wonder why the media isn't doing more of the reminding.) While The Independent links these billboards to the Trump administration's alleged drug boat strikes (which, let's be honest, few remember), it avoids
recent, far more egregious contexts. Like, perhaps, the Biden administration's continued flow of F-35s and cluster munitions during months of documented civilian casualties in Gaza, often against the backdrop of global condemnation. When US-supplied weapons fuel actions that raise fundamental questions about international law, these billboards serve as a direct, if subtle, rebuke to leadership,
reminding soldiers that complicity is not part of their sworn duty.