all you did was weaken a country today

I came upon the film A Few Good Men about an hour into it this morning and started watching. It reminded me of something that I had been thinking for awhile now about this movie. For anyone not familiar with what happens, a couple of soldiers are brought to trial for the murder of a fellow soldier. Their defense is they were simply following an order, administering a form of discipline known as 'Code Red.' I have watched this film countless times, at various points, whenever I happen to come across it (much like other films as mentioned in a previous entry).

The defendants believe that they did nothing wrong.

I realize that the tenor of the film is to have us agree that they were just doing what they were told to do by a superior officer. But the 'Code Red' in this case was to administer discipline, not to kill somebody. Earlier in the film during the trial, another soldier was put on the stand to testify about some of his experiences on the base. He was asked if he had ever been given a 'Code Red' and he responded yes, that a weapon had slipped out of his hands once and that several members of his unit had thrown a blanket over him, punched his arms, and then poured glue on his hands. And he never dropped his weapon again. He didn't accidentally die either. And if he had, would his fellow soldiers have insisted that they were simply following an order?

Although the end of film does allow for a slight measure of 'feeling bad' on the part of one of the defendants, I am still bothered by their lack of compassion for the deceased throughout the film, and the sloppiness in their carrying out of the 'code' in the first place. And surely the commanding officer wasn't intending for the victim to die when he originally ordered the 'Code Red'?