A Letter to My Friends and Former Colleagues and in the Army, Navy, Marines, Air Force, and Coast Guard JAG Corps

[I sent the same letter below to a few trusted confidants, who encouraged me to publish here for a wider reach]

March 6, 2025

It may seem unusual for a recently retired lieutenant colonel – one who did not ascend to the Himalayan peaks of JAG Corps leadership and who self-consciously knows well his own flaws and gaps in legal knowledge – to address an audience of his former colleagues (many of whom he feels lucky to call “friend”), completely unsolicited. Unusual times call for unusual measures.

This is about as far from TJAG Sends as one can get. But as I learned of Secretary Hegseth’s firing of LTG Berger and the other TJAGs, accompanying the unprecedented simultaneous relief of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the Chief of Naval Operations, and Vice Chief of the Air Force, a discernible knot in my throat and pit in my stomach grew as I began to receive shocked texts and direct messages from some of you. I imagined for a moment what this must look like from inside the organization. I began to understand just how dismayed, angry, and trapped many of you felt. And I imagined that I would be an unhealthy mix of rage, fear, sadness, and confusion if in your boots. Frankly, I am that unhealthy mix even now out of uniform.

This distressing news was not, of course, the first shock to the system. Regardless of your political bent and partisan leanings (if any), the abnormality of Hegseth’s nomination seemed like a blow to the ideal of what a Defense Secretary ought to be (even if, in reality, they often fall far short). Then came his disparaging and obscene characterization of military legal advisors, spoken like someone who truly never actually encountered a JAG in the field nor witnessed JAGs at brigade, division, service component command, or corps headquarters, reviewing OPORDs and FRAGOs, drafting ROE, studying arcane doctrine terms of art to keep up with the -3, updating and revising slide decks, advising on and reviewing (and conducting) investigations, explaining LOAC principles, advising on discipline, teaching escalation of force, or wrestling with advice on the legality of a strike. Then came the transgender (re-)ban, and the new deployment to the border orders, and the justified suspicion that the military will be used in boundary-pushing ways to enforce immigration law under the Insurrection Act, then the prospect of attacking inside Mexico, or Panama, or Greenland… Then the DEI affinity group and event cancelations, and the general cancelation of DEI programs and policies, and the job insecurity for your colleagues and friends in the federal civilian workforce. Then the politically-sanctioned attacks on leadership, facts, judgment, experience, and professionalism – all in the name of efficiency and rebuilding the “warrior” brand assumed to be a White, Male, Macho, Christian, Trigger-Puller ideal. The list can go on. And it probably will.

For those who read this and dismiss it, inferring that I cloak myself in partisan, anti-Trump leftist “wokeism,” this letter is probably not for you. If you read this and disagree with my belief that the last month has been fundamentally different from any other questionable but lawful series of policy choices that the military might not agree with, this letter is probably not for you either. It is for the other professionals who – whether having served six months or sixteen years – find themselves at what might feel like a moral or professional crossroads. A place where they are wondering, perhaps for the first time, whether they should leave the Army or – if they decide to stay – whether they will be placed in a position where their personal conscience, moral compass, and professional duty as an officer and as lawyer will run headfirst into a conflict; where a policy, directive, or order destabilizes their sense of right and wrong, their inherent and learned trust in the JAG Corps or the Army’s leadership, and their commitment to a body of ethics and responsibilities fusing two distinct professions. This letter is for them, motivated by a feeling that “I can’t sit idly by,” a genuine empathy for my friends caught in the middle of something that seems beyond their power to control, and a heartbreaking realization that I would be in that same position and not know what I could do or what I should do.

By sending you this letter, I’m betting that some of you are in this category. Text messages and DMs from some of you, and conversations initiated by my current civilian law school students, reinforce my suspicion that the population concerned is probably larger than you think. Retirement has opened the door to writing this in the first place – an act we know that I probably couldn’t do, or wouldn’t do, if still on active duty. Perhaps not out of fear of actual punishment, but out of an ingrained respect for “not getting out in front of” the leadership on a controversial subject and a concern that my comments would be misinterpreted as patently political. As a student of civil-military relations, I am very sensitive to the imperative of an apolitical armed forces both in fact and in appearance. Most likely, we would be in your office, door closed, between meetings and emails trying to express what we felt, why we felt it, and what – if anything – we could do. That conversation is obviously harder to manage, but perhaps even more essential, when there is a rank differential between the participants. I suspect some of you are already having those conversations or struggling with whether to have them at all. Now that I’m going by “Dan” and “Professor Maurer,” I am disinclined to give those concerns any more credence and feel fortunate to be able to write this freely.

But I had the benefit of being in for over twenty years when I decided more than a year ago to retire. And I was in an admittedly privileged position where leaving the Army that had raised me was not going to pose significant financial hardship and I had the good fortune to know what I wanted to do next. But I am conscious of the fact that many of you do not have that luxury of choice. That if you decide that the only thing you can do now – in the face of political decisions that seem to rain down greater uncertainty and dismay every day – is to resign, for instance, you may be foreclosing a weighty amount financially, socially, and professionally. That decision is not lightly taken, whether you’re single or married with kids, and I do not intend to diminish that significant dilemma and potential trauma. And, certainly, I couldn’t – and I don’t think anyone would – interpret a contrary choice to remain in the Service as your implicit support or approval of the operational and personnel decisions that have been made above your paygrade.

I began to wonder what sort of advice I would consider helpful if I had not retired – or was too young to retire – and found myself stuck by the friction of the moment. What sort of counsel would help me wake up each morning and not dread going to serve in a climate of distrust, misinformation, anxiety, and questionable decisions – or worse, faced with advising commanders primed and trained to follow the “lawful but awful” order. The undeniable truth is that you now serve in an organization whose culture (the one you volunteered to join) and climate (the one you were taught to help enforce) are being strained or deliberately dismantled by the very leaders you are constitutionally obliged to follow. It feels different because it is different. The fundamental role you play and the expert service you provide have been panned nonsensically, but very publicly, by the very people entrusted with relying on you for that expertise, judgment, and professionalism. It would be reasonable for you to wonder whether the only thing you can do is “ride it out” and hope that cooler heads will prevail to impart wisdom or at least to impede the worst instincts and ill-informed impulses from dominating decisions.

In similarly fraught, but not identical, circumstances five years ago during the summer of 2020 riots and protests over George Floyd’s murder, two dozen retired GO/FOs – including former Chairmen and former Combatant Commanders, and even Colin Powell – took to social media. There, they expressed their dismay and criticism of the first Trump Administration’s management of the crisis, including the threats to shoot protestors, the deployment of the national guard into D.C., and the infamous walk in Lafayette Square Park next door to the White House with General Milley. Those retirees almost uniformly invoked fidelity to the Constitution and the officer’s oath as the guiding “lodestars” for one’s principled choices as a military officer faced with a controversial order or decision. Those retirees were not just speaking to the public and sharing their diagnosis of the problem; they were also communicating with their friends and former colleagues and subordinates who were still on active duty. Later, when General Milley publicly apologized for his actions that day, he too invoked the officer’s oath and fidelity to the Constitution as the motive to stay above politics and focus on rendering honest, informed, advice and executing with utmost professionalism.

I don’t know if that advice was then, or is now, quite enough. “To support and defend the Constitution against all enemies foreign and domestic” is not meant to be specific guidance, and under extreme circumstances, I am not sure it provides enough of an azimuth. In working on a writing project, and talking with my new colleagues, about the role that JAGs play in actual operations and what institutional roadblocks exist that make counseling against unlawful orders difficult in practice, I realized that there are some “handholds” on this cliff face that haven’t eroded and that are still strong enough to grip. In my mind, they provide firmer security and a more visible path up the cliffside than just your oath of office. At the very least, they might provide you with the necessary talking points in the face of short-sighted commanders who start to more freely marginalize you or question your value to the team because they believe that denigration is consistent with the culture, climate, and policy of the new Administration.

Six Handholds

I wrote about these six points for publication online first [here, on Lawfare] because I wanted to broadcast to a much wider and less-informed community that JAGs are not passive law-reciting automatons who would forgo commonsense, integrity, and professional duty in face of a problematic order or policy, even from the commander-in-chief or the defense secretary. If you’ve already read that piece online, then I apologize in advance for the repetition and self-plagiarism.

First, the law. 10 U.S.C. § 7037(e)(2) is Congress’s confirmation that your independence, expertise, judgment, and advice matter to the effective execution of all lawful military operations. (The other Services have their own nearly identical provision) While (e)(1) is directed at TJAG, (e)(2) is aimed pointedly at you: “judge advocates of the Army assigned or attached to, or performing duty with, military units.”

Second, nobody has rescinded the Law of War Manual or canceled the DoD Law of War Program. Together, they clearly highlight that military operations must always be in accordance with domestic and international rule of law. You are the command’s expert in this.

Third, neither has the Department removed JAGs from doctrine manuals like JP 1-04 and FM 3-84; these communicate to everybody else the critical support role you play in planning operations, advising on strikes, representing servicemembers’ interests, litigating in court, interpreting statutory and constitutional requirements, and providing ethics advice to leaders.

Fourth, you took more than just one oath. Besides your commissioning oath, you also swore an oath when you became a licensed attorney, and you are obliged to serve according to bar’s rules of professional conduct and the Army’s rules of professional conduct for lawyers. As the preamble to AR 27-26 says: you are “an officer of the legal system, an officer of the Federal Government, and a public citizen having special responsibility for the quality of justice and legal services provided to the Department of the Army and to individual clients.”

Fifth, as commissioned officers with inherent authority, and as advisors to commanders, you are bound to embody (and help commanders embody) the statutory “Requirement for Exemplary Conduct,” Congress’s expectation and reminder about your moral compass. 10 U.S.C. § 7233 tells you to be the “good example of virtue, honor, patriotism, and subordination . . . [and] to take all necessary and proper measures, under the laws, regulations, and customs of the Army, to promote and safeguard the morale, the physical well-being, and the general welfare of the officers and enlisted persons under their command or charge.” You are not free from this charge just because you are not a commander, and it is a charge I know many of you take seriously.

Finally, a previous Army TJAG repeatedly urged us to remember four cardinal “constants” in our practice, unique to our professional roles above simply being commissioned officers: principled counsel, mastery of the law, servant leadership, and stewardship of the profession. “Principled counsel” includes expectations that “appropriate candor and moral courage” can and will influence decisions. While this professional compass has since been removed from the Army JAG Corps’ public website, it is still found in FM 3-84.

I am the first to admit that none of these, alone, are direct retorts. None of them, alone, will keep you from being relieved. None of them, alone, will buttress your morale and build cohesion with your teams of other JAGs or with your commanders and fellow staff officers. But taken together I think they reflect the correct, professional, and pragmatic reasons why you – individually and as a community of JAGs – should remain obstinately proud, stubbornly diligent, and persistent advocates for yourself and your mission.

Three final unsolicited bits of advice:

Memorialize your advice in writing: if faced with having to counsel against a proposed course of action, be incontestably clear in your statement of the facts known to you and in your reasoning – both on the law and on policy considerations. Those that follow you – I mean future JAGs facing their own professional dilemmas – will need to know not only that you took a position, but how you took that position. The manner of your professionalism and display of your integrity matter just as much as the content of your argument.

If you haven’t yet found someone to whom you can openly express your concerns about these unusual times, your frustrations, or your options, please do so. I hope that you find such a mentor in the JAG Corps. Part of being in a profession is that its members hold themselves according to internal and external standards of excellence and expectations, and counsel one another about sustaining those standards – not browbeaten, bullied, or intimidated by a client, regardless of how powerful.

On the same point, be that person for someone else – especially the brand-new JAGs or your paralegals who may find themselves serving in an organization, and with a mission, uncomfortably different from the one they believed they were entering a short time ago.

****

Nobody has ever accused me of writing too little nor recommended that I should explain something just a wee bit more. I suspect that’s why I so enjoy being a law school professor now (nobody expects a BLUF). I hope you can forgive a personal letter that clearly does not benefit from a professional editor’s good judgment. I don’t know if any of this will help, but it would be what I would have wanted to hear, and what you and I would be talking through in your office with the door closed. If nothing else, I hope that this letter is proof that those of us safely out of uniform have not moved on from caring what happens with you and to you, and that we are doing what we can to speak out on subjects we still know a little about, without presuming to speak for you, when we know that the conditions are not favorable for doing so yourselves. Know that many of us out of uniform remain your teammates.

With respect,

Dan Maurer, LTC, U.S. Army JAG Corps (Ret.)