Get a better eye doctor.
West himself should have been offered an Article 15, but wasn't.
I have never heard of an officer getting Article 15'd. Offenses against military discipline by officers are much more serious that the same offenses committed by enlisted personnel. Officers are held to a higher standard of conduct for a reason.
He was offered resignation and the hell with 19 years and 51 weeks of service.
Sorry, if he's guilty of this offense, he doesn't belong in the uniform. They were offering him an out without a felony conviction. In the old days, they would've offered him a chance to "do the honorable thing."
What would you have done?
I wouldn't have violated the orders given to me regarding the handling of prisoners.
The situation was apparently not as urgent as West's spin has described.
It goes back to moral courage and the responsibility of command.
And, from the viewpoint of eight years of being one of the commanded, he lacks moral courage and is trying to duck responsibility.
If he can't command himself, he has no business commanding others.
He got his attention to the heartfelt thanks of those who were forewarned of certain death.
Bravo Sierra. Death--for anybody--was NOT certain in this case.
West chose to take the first step onto the slippery slope, in the name of expediency.
Expediency can justify ANY conduct if you simply plead that the situation is "urgent."
Do it often enough, and long enough, and you end up justifying behavior every bit as abominable as Saddam Hussein's was.
"Whoever battles with monsters had better see that it does not turn him into a monster. And if you gaze long into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you." -- Nietschze