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As Morale Sags, More Military Service Members Are Having a Crisis of Conscience

According to multiple GI rights organizations, service members are inquiring about seeking conscientious objector status in unprecedented numbers.

In April, demonstrators carrying anti-war signs gathered outside the White House, as a deadline set by President Donald Trump for Iran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz approached.

In spite of widespread public disapproval of the Iran war since the moment it began, we’ve seen surprisingly few displays of antiwar sentiment in the streets. Within the military, though, a quiet but staunch opposition to the war has been mounting. According to multiple GI rights organizations, service members are inquiring about their right to conscientious objector status—enabling them to leave the military honorably ahead of their contract’s end—in numbers those groups have never seen before. The Center on Conscience and War, which assists people seeking CO classification, has seen a dramatic influx of inquiries related to conscientious objection in recent months. Mike Prysner, the executive director of the Center on Conscience and War, which assists people seeking CO classification, told me in May that they had over 100 enlisted objector-hopefuls on their new client list since March, when typically a whole year would see roughly 50. In Lenore Yarger’s 25 years answering calls for Quaker House, through the GI Rights Hotline, a non-profit network offering military-related information and resources, this March and April were also entirely unprecedented. Their call volume doubled, with most service members dialing in about conscientious objection.

CCW reports that CO applicants span the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marines, and all components—active duty, reserve, and guard. “I don’t think we’ve ever seen anything quite like this ever,” Bill Galvin, outgoing counseling director of the CCW, told me in June. “All of a sudden we were getting multiple calls every day.” Galvin retired this summer after 26 years—since before the war on terror. Kelly Dougherty, counseling director of the Center on Conscience and War, has advised dozens of service members in recent months who are considering applying for CO status. “I’d say pro-war sentiment is a lot lower among people in the military than it was during the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan,” Dougherty told me in June, “because they’re just confused about why they’re even being asked to make the sacrifices that they’re being asked to make.”

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By and large, those reaching out to these organizations cite the February 28 bombing of the girls’ school in Minab as the moment their wartime opposition crystallized. For most of the dozens of objectors turning to Prysner’s organization, that action was an indefensible moment of no return. Those reaching out appear more plagued by moral quandaries than by fear for their safety. “I haven’t talked to any service member who said that they are scared of dying in a war that they don’t believe in,” Prysner said on Democracy Now in April. “They’re scared of killing in a war that they don’t believe in.”

The low morale right now is particularly stark among medical providers in the military, many of whom view their roles as healers as diametrically opposed to warfare they can’t justify. There has always been a latent tension inherent to practicing health in a military context, but for a number of medical professionals, the current war has made that tension impossible to live with. I spoke to one just-discharged and two commissioned physicians who sought or were seeking conscientious objector status from the Air Force, Army, and Navy, all three of whom requested anonymity for fear of retaliation. All three entered their fields with the aim of helping people, and sometime in the past couple years began to feel that their participation in the armed forces was no longer compatible with that mission. “The most important thing for the military is to ensure that they can get people back out to fight and be lethal,” said one person I spoke to who I’ll call Max, who got an honorable discharge in March 2026. “That cannot align with my being a physician.”

Another CO applicant, whom I’ll call Lydia, trained in primary care before falling in love with psychiatry. Helping her patients work through their struggles and toward a greater sense of stability felt like a calling. Lydia deployed multiple times, most recently treating patients involved in Operation Epic Fury, U.S. Central Command’s Iran offensive. When Lydia was treating patients who were not engaged in active warfare, it was easier for her to feel at peace. Her work during her deployments led to more doubt: it became hard to conceive of even something so personal as psychiatric treatment as distinct from the military machine.

That dissonance came to a head earlier this year, while Lydia was deployed. One of her patients, she told me, worked in ammunitions management, conducting oversight of the weaponry used for bombings and airstrikes aboard a vessel. After working together over several sessions, the patient told Lydia, “‘Ma’am, I don’t know if I could have done this without you. I can actually do my job now.’” It was a compliment gone awry. Lydia immediately thought about how vital this patient’s role was to the “civilian deaths and destruction” taking place. “It occurred to me that, well, the better I am at my job, the more people might die,” she told me. Lydia canceled the rest of her day’s appointments. She cried in her office and turned to her journal to reflect. “What motivation do I have to........

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