Uncompromising Honor (Honor Harrington, #14)

by David Weber

He’d salved his conscience at the time by hoping his commanders in the field would recoil from killing innocent bystanders in job lots. Thinking about that now, he felt only scathing, richly deserved contempt for his own naivety. No, for his own deliberate self-delusion. It had been an act of moral cowardice to rely on his subordinates’ willingness to disobey the orders they should never have been given in the first place. Even if it hadn’t been an abdication of his own responsibilities, he should have known how having Parthian in his back pocket would affect the thinking of someone like Martin Gogunov. He’d expected better out of Hajdu Győző when he chose him to command TF 1030, but looking back with bleak honesty, he knew he’d been deluding himself there, too. But what could I do when civilian command authority made it a direct order, damn it? Maybe I should have resigned instead of smiling and accepting the directive, but who would the five of you have put into the CNO slot if I had? Another Crandall? Another Filareta? Another Byng? God, I hope there aren’t two of him in the Service! But whatever my thinking, I didn’t resign, did I? And now you want to turn the fact that somebody disobeyed your orders only because someone else had her pulser in his ear into our get out of jail free card?