In addition to generating divisions within our own country, the allegations have left us open to hypocritical and cynical slurs from despotic and tyrannical regimes whose hands are all too often wet with the blood of their own and neighbouring peoples.

Monday's self-serving statement by Russia, and the outrageous tweet from China's foreign ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian, are clear examples of the pot calling the kettle black. They would not have happened if Australia had followed Russia's and China's lead by covering human rights abuses up rather than invoking due process.

But that's not who we are.

It is imperative the outrageous statements from China, Russia, and doubtless soon to be many others, do not become a distraction from how Australia presses ahead on important questions such as the call to revisit the apparently arbitrary revocation of the Special Operations Task Group's unit citation.

People are already asking who, in either the ADF or the government, has the mettle to tell, face-to-face, the families of the Special Operations Task Group members who died in Afghanistan that one of their loved one's hard-won honours will be taken away and that they would no longer be able to wear it on their behalf on Anzac Day?

Who has the stomach to say the same thing to those SOTG members who brought the alleged atrocious crimes into the light? The whistleblowers are being punished alongside those alleged to be the worst of the worse.

And how, if the unit citation for the SOTG is to be peremptorily and arbitrarily taken away, can senior commanders from the period covered by the Brereton Inquiry wear their own awards for meritorious or distinguished conduct with pride?

People are also asking, with good reason given the way the otherwise excellent Brereton report let the senior leadership group and the politicians who prosecuted the war off the hook, where does command responsibility begin and where does it end? "The buck stops here", a sign on President Truman's desk fiercely proclaimed. Where does the buck stop in the ADF? Where in the Prime Minister's office?

What is alleged to have happened in Afghanistan was predictable and preventable given more than a century has passed since Friedrich Nietzsche wrote: "Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster".

While General Campbell has been widely praised for the way in which he handled the Brereton Report release, there has been significant blowback against the unit citation decision. This has now reached the point where the Prime Minister has intervened, saying "decisions haven't been made yet on these things". The latest word from Defence is that "final decisions... will be a matter for government".

In truth the unit citation issue should not be decided by either generals or politicians, all of whom had their own part to play in this catastrophe.

Given the apparent divergence of views between the PM and the CDF there is a need for a "circuit-breaker" along the lines of the "expert panel" headed by Dr Brendan Nelson which resulted in the posthumous award of the Victoria Cross to Teddy Sheean. Such a panel could work with the Defence Honours and Awards Trubunal.

Unit citations, as with other honours and awards, are only ever made following often exhaustive due process. If justice is to be served then due process should also be followed when it is proposed that an award be revoked.