The spider was gray and fuzzy, less than an inch long. He was nestled near the front door, resting quietly, oblivious to my presence. He would have been easy to kill, a quick crunch under my boot, a small life snuffed, one of the billions of deaths occurring among God’s earthly creatures on this cool December morning. After the deed was done, I could move on with my own more important life and not think of it again.
Except, I did what I usually do with harmless-looking bugs and spiders: I lightly pinched it with a Kleenex and deposited it outside, this time on the mulch surrounding a rhododendron. Godspeed, little critter, I thought. Go do spider stuff.
Some part of me believes it’s good karma to rescue a spider going innocently about its short life. Some part of me ignores the fact that I will kill a mosquito without an iota of regret, with relish even. When it comes to insects, I am the omnipotent decider of who’s worthy of life and who is not. Sometimes in these moments, I imagine that in some iteration of the universe, maybe on a distant planet inhabited by impossibly massive creatures, we humans are observed from afar and seen as tiny disposable inhabitants of a tiny planet, like ants on a peony bud.
We humans are taught to value the lives of our fellow humans. It’s a teaching put forth by all the world’s major religions. Christianity and Judaism believe that humans are created in the image of God and therefore life is sacred. Islam says God is the creator and that all of his creations are sacred. Buddhism and Hinduism teach against killing or harming any living thing.
“Thou shalt not kill” is a pretty definitive and universal scripture. Sadly, it’s one that humans throughout history have too often ignored, which is why we have laws to punish those who kill another person — unless it’s in self-defense or in wartime. And even in wartime, there are codes of conduct. They are officially known as international humanitarian law (IHL), set forth under the Geneva Conventions, which protect civilians from direct attack and declare that prisoners must be treated humanely.
Additionally, the United States military has its own rules for conduct under the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ). Among those is the rule that service members are required to disobey “manifestly illegal” orders, meaning those that direct the commission of a crime or violate the Constitution, U.S. law, or international law. These would include intentionally harming civilians, torturing prisoners, or killing wounded enemy combatants. “Just following orders” is not a defense, and hasn’t been since the Nuremberg Nazi trials after World War II.
The UCMJ has been much in the news lately, principally because six Democratic lawmakers posted a video reminding U.S. service members of the code’s prohibition against following illegal orders. This followed reporting from The Washington Post that Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth had given standing orders to “kill them all” in regard to the strikes on alleged drug boats. When an initial boat attack on September 2nd left two wounded men clinging to burning wreckage, Admiral Frank “Mitch” Bradley, then head of Joint Special Operations Command, watched them on the drone feed and then ordered a second strike. He was just following Hegseth’s illegal orders. The men in the water were blown apart.
The Trump administration’s rationale for bombing people in boats in international waters is that the United States is “at war” with drug cartels. It is an absurd claim, one that legal experts and members of Congress, including an increasing number of Republicans, are beginning to question. And even if we accept the ludicrous premise that we are “at war,” killing wounded enemy combatants is a war crime. So, at best, this administration is committing war crimes. At worst, it’s serially murdering people on the high seas — 80 of them, so far. There is no third option.
Think of it: A U.S. admiral was shown video of two men clinging to a shattered boat in the middle of the ocean. He could have sent someone to capture them and treat them as “prisoners of war,” as is required by the Universal Code of Military Justice. They posed no threat, unless it was the possibility that if it turned out they weren’t drug dealers, the entire rationale for this murderous clown show would fall apart. That couldn’t be allowed to happen, so he and Hegseth squashed them like bugs.
