Decorated U.S. Navy SEAL Eddie Gallagher was arrested and accused of war crimes in 2018 for fatally stabbing a defenseless prisoner and taking lethal shots at civilians from his sniper’s post while deployed in Mosul, Iraq. New York Times correspondent David Philipps joined CERL’s Prof. Claire Finkelstein on Feb. 2 at a CERL-sponsored talk to discuss themes from his fast-paced new thriller, including the startling accusations raised by elite commandos of Gallagher’s Alpha platoon and the choices they faced while in the heat of combat, navigating loyalty to their unit and to their country.

According to Philipps:

“These guys from [Gallagher’s] platoon who had done something very difficult made a choice between should we be loyal to our culture, our organization, our brotherhood or should we be loyal to the rule of law. It sounds like it’s simple, but it’s not.”