Active duty members can sue the military. The general rule is that under Feres v United States, a service member may not recover under the Federal Tort Claims A

Active duty members can sue the military. The general rule is that under Feres v United States, a service member may not recover under the Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA) for claims which arise out of or in the course of activity incident to their service. Courts often refer to this as the Feres Doctrine. So the claim has to fall outside of "in the course of activity incident to service" -- Feres is an interesting case that went to the supreme court in the 50s. He was an LT that died in a barracks fire. The cause of the fire was determined to be a faulty heater. His spouse sued -- the supreme court ruled she couldnt sue. One of the reasons that the Feres Doctrine has not changed, even though many service members have challenged the law, is that Congress has always had the power to change the law and has not done so. In 1985 and 1986 some members of Congress tried to pass a law that would have allowed active-duty service members to sue for medical malpractice. The law did not pass. In 2009 members of Congress introduced another bill that would have allowed service members to sue. It was called the Carmelo Rodriguez Military Medical Accountability Act of 2009. The proposed law was named for Carmelo Rodriguez, a marine sergeant whose military doctors never told him about potentially cancerous tumors on his body, even though the tumors were noted in his medical records over the course of 8 years. This bill never became law. (Dec, 2011)