Legality of Military Actions conducted without Citizen-Sergeant

[Bustos]

Created this thread to continue a point I brought up since some people showed interest.

I don't do anything as the leader of the militia does nothing.  I, personally, find recent actions by our militia to be illegal.  But I digress and wait for new leadership.

By the Militia Act Article IV subsection 1, "The citizen-sergeant shall be able to order military actions...."

Seeing as the current citizen-sergeant has been absent, no orders have been given for recent military actions conducted by the Citizen-Militia.  The Act, as it currently stands, does not give power to any other member to order military actions.  And that's why I view recent military operations as illegal.  I decided to go inactive, keeping my head down, so to speak, because some people's reactions were predictable if I were to make a challenge.

But, as I continue to see other members conducting operations, I start to wonder why we have a Citizen-Sergeant in the first place, which lead to an earlier post.

wonders what the cit-sarge does

Which opened the floodgates and resulted in the predictable attacks, rather than explanations.

[Myroria]

The Citizen-Sergeant authorized this operation, as he authorizes all operations.

EDIT: We can't expect the Citizen-Sergeant to be around every update. This is why we have Corporals and Lancepesades - to lead operations when the Sergeant is unable to.

EDIT 2: Article III Section 1 states:

The Citizen-Sergeant shall delineate rank and responsibility within the Militia.

This explicitly allows for the Sergeant to delineate responsibility for operations to subordinates as they please.

[Funkadelia]

I have directly given orders to my Caporal and my Lancespesades when I am absent due to work.

Part of the reason no one took your post seriously is because you never do what you're ordered to anyways. Your TaiMil switcher is currently endotarting in TNP, and you have a history of making personal attacks on members for no reason whatsoever.

Your concern was recently brought up about Madrigal. Madrigal was undertaken on the Taijitu Militia side by Eluvatar at my express approval. I am including parts our skype conversation, with some bits taken out of the middle that described the operation itself and another participant whose permission for posting I could not get.

(click to show/hide)

[3/15/2015 10:29:49 PM] Eluvatar: The Grey Wardens (BT's new defender group) would like to entertain a combined operation with the Taijitu Citizens' Militia of a sensitive and unusual nature.
[3/15/2015 10:30:00 PM] (Funkadelia): Hi
[3/15/2015 10:30:38 PM] Eluvatar: This is a question mainly of authorization, which I cannot grant.
[3/15/2015 10:34:14 PM] (Funkadelia): Well it has my approval

As displayed, I gave my express permission for this. If I did not, don't you think I would have protested this before the Ecclesia?

The entire point of having Lancespesades and Caporals is because of the possibility of a Sergeant absence. That's why we legislated it that way. For someone who claims to love our vibrant and free democracy so much, your ignorance of its few laws and statutes is disturbing. Before you attempt to crucify me before the region again, I suggest you read up on the law. Either that, or stick to the personal attacks you opted for before you tried this stunt.

[Gulliver]

I do not view the recent operations as illegal, as they were all authorized by the Citizen-Sergeant, even though he was not able to serve in them personally.

[Khem]

Yea, no legal issue there.

[Delfos]

Maybe what you consider norm which isn't described in law ought to be described in law, because it isn't so, it's not "no legal issue there", it's just the absence of law.

"explicitly" allowing the citizen in charge of militia to do whatever he wants doesn't seem like a good excuse for a law, what it actually does is: all those high ranks in militia can do whatever they want, low ranks apparently cant. That issue is worth discussing.

[Bustos]

I've stated my grievances.  I expected more transparency.  I misunderstood the status quo.  I am sorry.

[Eluvatar]

Maybe what you consider norm which isn't described in law ought to be described in law, because it isn't so, it's not "no legal issue there", it's just the absence of law.

"explicitly" allowing the citizen in charge of militia to do whatever he wants doesn't seem like a good excuse for a law, what it actually does is: all those high ranks in militia can do whatever they want, low ranks apparently cant. That issue is worth discussing.

?

The Citizen-Sergeant (Funkadelia) explicitly (in his own words, directly) approved the operation.

I've stated my grievances.  I expected more transparency.  I misunderstood the status quo.  I am sorry.

I do not understand.

Your stated grievance was that the Citizen-Sergeant had not ordered the operation. This has been shown to be false. The Citizen-Sergeant told me to go ahead with the plan presented to him.

What transparency were you expecting that you're not getting?

When the Grey Wardens, including our own Citizen Cormac, asked the Taijitu Militia for assistance in giving this region a taste of its own medicine, Corporal Eluvatar and Lancepesade Pauline Bonaparte were happy to oblige, with Citizen-Sergeant Funkadelia’s permission.

No, it was not explicitly stated in #taimil that Funkadelia had ordered the mission. I don't think that's a lack of transparency, I think it's kind of fair to assume. Alternatively one could ask.

Was the lack of transparency you mean that Funkadelia's name was not invoked on IRC, that Funkadelia did not personally speak to you about the orders, or something else?

[Allama]

Maybe what you consider norm which isn't described in law ought to be described in law, because it isn't so, it's not "no legal issue there", it's just the absence of law.

There is no "absence of law" here: it's right in Article III, Section 1:

The Citizen-Sergeant shall delineate rank and responsibility within the Militia.

"explicitly" allowing the citizen in charge of militia to do whatever he wants doesn't seem like a good excuse for a law, what it actually does is: all those high ranks in militia can do whatever they want, low ranks apparently cant. That issue is worth discussing.

As stated above, we clearly agreed as a region that the Citizen-Sergeant should be able to command the militia. If you wished to require the Citizen-Sergeant's presence in IRC and in the mission itself, why didn't you bring this up during debate?

And if you have a problem with military ranks (which only exist to give some people power to command others), again: why did you not bring this up during the debate period?

[Myroria]

I don't think I can stress enough that the Militia cannot function without leaders. We have to give these leaders the ability to do something without a week-long Ecclesiastical process, otherwise the Militia is an incoherent mess.

The Sergeant cannot "do whatever he wants". As an elected official, they answer to the people. If you are unhappy with Funkadelia's leadership, motion for a recall. State your reasons and let the people decide.

As a direct democracy, you could motion that Eluvatar or myself be removed as an NCO and if the Ecclesia agrees that's that. The best thing about the Ecclesia is that it can make any law it wants and is accountable to nothing but the Bill of Rights.

Also regarding transparency:

In other regions members of the military routinely do not even know why they are being ordered to do something. In fact, sometimes members of the military do not even know what region they are liberating or invading until half an hour before update. Other regions certainly don't have their legislatures vote on military occupations. For NS, the Taijitu Militia is really a model of transparency and democracy.

[Delfos]

As stated above, we clearly agreed as a region that the Citizen-Sergeant should be able to command the militia. If you wished to require the Citizen-Sergeant's presence in IRC and in the mission itself, why didn't you bring this up during debate?

And if you have a problem with military ranks (which only exist to give some people power to command others), again: why did you not bring this up during the debate period?

Are you feeling that you should have had the opportunity during the debate to discuss this issue? Maybe you misread something I wrote back then I brought it up plenty of times.

I don't think I can stress enough that the Militia cannot function without leaders. We have to give these leaders the ability to do something without a week-long Ecclesiastical process, otherwise the Militia is an incoherent mess.

Thanks for explaining what I want.

[Eluvatar]

As stated above, we clearly agreed as a region that the Citizen-Sergeant should be able to command the militia. If you wished to require the Citizen-Sergeant's presence in IRC and in the mission itself, why didn't you bring this up during debate?

And if you have a problem with military ranks (which only exist to give some people power to command others), again: why did you not bring this up during the debate period?

Are you feeling that you should have had the opportunity during the debate to discuss this issue? Maybe you misread something I wrote back then I brought it up plenty of times.

I just read through the original debate and you never made any comment regarding military ranks or the ability of the Citizen-Sergeant to delegate authority. You argued that the Citizen-Sergeant should not have authority in the first place to authorize operations themselves, but that position was voted down and was not the position Bustos advanced.

[Bustos]

I do not understand.

Your stated grievance was that the Citizen-Sergeant had not ordered the operation. This has been shown to be false. The Citizen-Sergeant told me to go ahead with the plan presented to him.

What transparency were you expecting that you're not getting?

I think you misunderstood me.  I am trying to say that I said my piece, why I said it, acknowledged my error, and apologized for it.

[Eluvatar]

I do not understand.

Your stated grievance was that the Citizen-Sergeant had not ordered the operation. This has been shown to be false. The Citizen-Sergeant told me to go ahead with the plan presented to him.

What transparency were you expecting that you're not getting?

I think you misunderstood me.  I am trying to say that I said my piece, why I said it, acknowledged my error, and apologized for it.

Ah, yes, I see I did. Sorry about that.

[Allama]

As stated above, we clearly agreed as a region that the Citizen-Sergeant should be able to command the militia. If you wished to require the Citizen-Sergeant's presence in IRC and in the mission itself, why didn't you bring this up during debate?

And if you have a problem with military ranks (which only exist to give some people power to command others), again: why did you not bring this up during the debate period?

Are you feeling that you should have had the opportunity during the debate to discuss this issue? Maybe you misread something I wrote back then I brought it up plenty of times.

Ahh, my apologies. If you did bring it up when you were given the opportunity and the law was passed over your objections... then the region has spoken. You're just arguing now that the conclusion we came to democratically is wrong. If you feel attitudes towards this issue may have shifted since the debate, the only real way to address your grievances would be to propose a change to the law. Right now you're just arguing something that has already been decided, derailing the conversation.

To be constructive, formally propose the legal changes you'd like to see.

To increase drama, keep debating things we already finished debating without actually proposing a thing.