Does § 540F go far enough?

Prof. Michel Paradis

Columbia Law School lecturer and Military Commissions Defense Organization attorney Michel Paradis, writing for Lawfare, comments here on the Shadow Advisory Report a group of experts sent to the House and Senate Armed Services Committees last month in response to § 540F of the FY20 National Defense Authorization Act. He suggests that Congress may wish to set its sights on bigger game:

     . . . The modern court-martial system, due both to procedural changes and to the considerable professionalism of those who implement it, has become much fairer and more regular than the drumhead courts that led to the enactment of the UCMJ. It may therefore be time to take the final step and fully commit to a model of military justice whose only purpose is justice. But if that is so, Congress is well advised to undertake a ground-up restructuring of the system as a whole rather than pretend that the reform to convening authority now under consideration is just an incremental fix.