I respect your opinion and agree on many points, and in many cases. I will contend with your argument that the military acts monolithically and wordlessly executes illegal orders, however, particularly because in its wording you apply a blanket onto 3 million people while failing to acknowledge the counter.

The military in the US is beholden to not only the Constitution and the laws of the country, but also the UCMJ, under which we are explicitly and implicitly prohibited from taking part in any partisanism or taking any action which would even imply that the military and Executive are at odds. We can argue the necessity and limits of that policy but that's not the point here. The news will readily report on the sensational--"Navy Sailor arrested at protest," "Soldier participated in attempted coup on January 6th," but they can't get clicks from "NJP article 134," "Sentenced to Leavenworth 6 years following trial and holding in brig."

Neither one of us knows what orders those pilots received. If they were directed to, and chose to, execute an order they knew to be unlawful, they absolutely deserve to be investigated, tried, and sentenced. Is that more than the victims of this atrocious act were allowed? Yes, but two fascist acts don't cancel each other out. I can't stress the point enough that this should never have happened, and we should be doing what we can to rectify it, but retribution is not justice.

But if they were lied to, told to fly from one airport to another per today's schedule, and their listed cargo was just "personnel, materiel," it's not reasonable to lay blame on them like that. Likewise, it's illegal for them to talk about what happened to anyone outside need-to-know unless it's released in court, so we'll probably never hear what actually went down.

Have people executed unlawful orders? Yes. Have they been absolved of responsibility? Sometimes, yes. Should they be held accountable to their level of responsibility, and are they? Typically, yes. That's the biggest difference between police forces and the military, and my other point of contention with your argument.

I agree that when a Nazi sits at a table with nine people who don't tell him to leave, you just have ten Nazis. But whereas the police will band around the Nazi to protect him because he wears the same color clothes, the military will eventually jail the Nazis when they're found guilty of crimes. It's just past the sensationalized news cycle so you have to look for it rather than being presented.