Someone having served in the US marines would probably know best, but from my personal knowledge there are three types of orders
1) lawful order
2) forbidden order
3) dismissable order
Now the first type is the one that you will unconditionally have to fulfill.
The forbidden order is one that is either unlawful, that the subject does not have the authority to perform, puts him or others in danger and some other clauses. You have to perform a forbidden order, but you also have to report fulfilling a forbidden order to a superior afterwards. Eg. a superior officer commands you to use a weapon you are not trained to handle, sends you to retrieve a soldier from a minefield or something similar.
Dismissable order would be something that touches on the theme of the movie. Yes, a point was made of how the superior officer gave the marine an underwhelming performance report for not following a dismissable order, but still. A dismissable order is by definition something that would cause the subject to commit a felony, degrade the subject or third party, is non service related or there is no clear source for the order. You should not give or fulfill a dismissable order.
Now again, someone with first hand know-how would know best, but I presume most of NATO military doctrine and law is pretty much standardised, so from that prespective this whole court battle becomes rather moot as the two marines, while under pressure, still enacted a dismissable order and thus would still probably be held accountable (which the movie kind of touches upon with the imaginary charge).
Someone having served in the US marines would probably know best, but from my personal knowledge there are three types of orders 1) lawful order 2) forbidden order 3) dismissable order Now the first type is the one that you will unconditionally have to fulfill. The forbidden order is one that is either unlawful, that the subject does not have the authority to perform, puts him or others in danger and some other clauses. You have to perform a forbidden order, but you also have to report fulfilling a forbidden order to a superior afterwards. Eg. a superior officer commands you to use a weapon you are not trained to handle, sends you to retrieve a soldier from a minefield or something similar. Dismissable order would be something that touches on the theme of the movie. Yes, a point was made of how the superior officer gave the marine an underwhelming performance report for not following a dismissable order, but still. A dismissable order is by definition something that would cause the subject to commit a felony, degrade the subject or third party, is non service related or there is no clear source for the order. You should not give or fulfill a dismissable order.
Now again, someone with first hand know-how would know best, but I presume most of NATO military doctrine and law is pretty much standardised, so from that prespective this whole court battle becomes rather moot as the two marines, while under pressure, still enacted a dismissable order and thus would still probably be held accountable (which the movie kind of touches upon with the imaginary charge).