Charles Erskine Scott Wood (C.E.S. Wood) was a graduate of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point who went on to serve with distinction as a U.S. Army officer. However, the mistreatment of Native Americans and the broken treaties caused him to resign his commission and give up his military career.
He moved to Portland, Oregon, and became a lawyer, always championing the underdog. He started writing articles for an anarchist magazine and defended freedom of speech, and the rights of women, gays, and all free people to be left the hell alone by meddling bureaucrats long before such positions became politically correct. He wrote from his experiences in dealing with U.S. federal government officials and their greed. lies, and wars.
WWI was billed by the government as "the war to end all wars". Mr. Wood lived long enough to see America enter WWII. He died in 1944 after noting that nothing had changed -- the federal government was (as it is to this day) still lying to the people, still breaking its word, and still getting America into wars.
Were I serving as a U.S. military officer today, I like to think that I would respond to orders to attack a country like Libya -- which poses no threat to the security or any vital interest of the United States -- by resigning my commission as Mr. Wood did when he saw how our country was dealing with our continent's native people. In most cases, however, I think personal integrity and honor is in short supply these days and the gumption to act thereon as Mr. Wood did is even more rare. In all likelihood few members of our current officer corps have any qualms at all about what they are doing; those who do are for the most part careerists who probably are taking and and will continue to take refuge in the Nazis' Nuremberg defense, telling themselves -- as they will tell others in the future if it becomes necessary or advisable to do so -- that they are (or were) "just following orders."
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