If you’re still not sure whether the United States is at risk of sliding into authoritarianism, talk to some Americans who know all about the proper and improper uses of violence. They are the men and women who are or were in the military’s so-called Judge Advocate General’s Corps.

Independent and apolitical lawyers in uniform, these so-called JAGs advise the commanders of the world’s mightiest war machine about how to comply with domestic and international law — everything from the Uniform Code of Military Justice to the Geneva Conventions — when deploying America’s awe-inspiring lethality.

“Lethality” is of course the favorite word of Pete Hegseth, the secretary of defense, or rather the secretary of “war.” But Rachel VanLandingham, who as a JAG used to advise generals including David

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