WAR RULES

[IndyDave1776]

Any campaign is at its core a war of resources; the best use of and conservation of resources generally wins the military campaign. Minimizing your casualties (e.g. the number of troops who can contribute to the combat effort) while maximizing the enemy's casualties has as a small component of strategy, maximizing disabling injuries.

Many of the Laws of Warfare concern the treatment of prisoners as well; enemies who are disregarding of such POW treatment conventions while we follow them ourselves truly allow us to refer to them as "uncivilized barbarians".

Agreed. My mind was leaning toward the example of taking this to a preposterous extreme like not allowing the troops to return fire on hostiles hiding inside a mosque--after all, it is a house of worship! Then, there is always Lyndon Johnson's classic "They can't bomb an outhouse without my permission."

 

[Blackhawk2001]

Agreed. My mind was leaning toward the example of taking this to a preposterous extreme like not allowing the troops to return fire on hostiles hiding inside a mosque--after all, it is a house of worship! Then, there is always Lyndon Johnson's classic "They can't bomb an outhouse without my permission."

Yep, the Laws of Warfare bear little relation to our Rules of Engagement, except they are further restrictions on what our combatants can do. As such, they are far more "political" than the Laws of Warfare.

 

[halfmileharry]

Yep, the Laws of Warfare bear little relation to our Rules of Engagement, except they are further restrictions on what our combatants can do. As such, they are far more "political" than the Laws of Warfare.

I would say "keep politics out of war" but Politics is what starts them

 

[Blackhawk2001]

I would say "keep politics out of war" but Politics is what starts them

And in this country, it's the politicians who dictate when, where, and to a certain extent, how a war will be fought.

 

[Pocketman]

nvm

 

[XSVskill]

Following the rules of war gives the combatant the feeling of have the "moral highground".

militaries are much more willing to fight, and fight hard, when they believe they are doing the right thing. Its hard to feel that way when you are being inhumane to the enemy combatant.

 

[RockofStrength]

Following the rules of war gives the combatant the feeling of have the "moral highground".

militaries are much more willing to fight, and fight hard, when they believe they are doing the right thing. Its hard to feel that way when you are being inhumane to the enemy combatant.

This is true only to a certain extent. Hammer in enough hate for the enemy and they cease to be human. Which, incidentally, is the entire reason almost every government during war has endeavored to use their propaganda machine to dehumanize the enemy, regardless of the circumstances.

 

[IndyDave1776]

This is true only to a certain extent. Hammer in enough hate for the enemy and they cease to be human. Which, incidentally, is the entire reason almost every government during war has endeavored to use their propaganda machine to dehumanize the enemy, regardless of the circumstances.

The eventual problem with this is that when you do find an enemy lacking any discernible humanity, by that time the people have heard the boilerplate so many times they simply don't believe it even though that time it IS true.

 

[MilitaryArms]

I believe that war should be as brutal as possible. The more distasteful it is, the shorter wars will be and less likely people will want to fight them.

When we make the decision to go to war, we should commit ourselves to the concept of overwhelming force, using everything at our disposal to subdue those we have targeted. War should be, for the most part, "anything goes". I don't mean things such as attacking civilians, mistreating POWs or using nuclear weapons without good reason, but I do mean killing everything with a gun and uniform in sight by any means necessary.

The non-sense of not shooting until fired upon, not using certain weapons because they're "inhumane", etc. is absolutely silly. War is inhumane. There's no nice way to kill someone. The faster you can kill the enemy the better. Get it over with, and hopefully it will be so bad that no one will want to ever do it again.

If someone invaded the U.S., rest assured I would kill every one of them I saw using anything I found that could be used to dispatch them. I would burn them, shoot them, booby trap them, gas them, blow them up, you name it. That's how you make them leave.

 

[IndyDave1776]

I believe that war should be as brutal as possible. The more distasteful it is, the shorter wars will be and less likely people will want to fight them.

When we make the decision to go to war, we should commit ourselves to the concept of overwhelming force, using everything at our disposal to subdue those we have targeted. War should be, for the most part, "anything goes". I don't mean things such as attacking civilians or using nuclear weapons without good reason, but I do mean killing everything with a gun and uniform in sight by any means necessary.

The non-sense of not shooting until fired upon, not using certain weapons because they're "inhumane", etc. is absolutely silly. War is inhumane. There's no nice way to kill someone. The faster you can kill the enemy the better. Get it over with, and hopefully it will be so bad that no one will want to ever do it again.

If someone invaded the U.S., rest assured I would kill every one of them I saw using anything I found that could be used to dispatch them. I would burn them, shoot them, booby trap them, gas them, blow them up, you name it. That's how you make them leave.

Agreed. I would also note that Admiral Sir John Fisher would have agreed and said as much when he was assigned as the British delegate to the first Hague Convention.

 

[techres]

Ok, then who is the first to invite all the nations to start mass producing North Korean SM-87's so that we can blind everyone out to 3 miles with lasers just to burn out retinas?

The main reason for constraint, is constraint.

Sure there is a time when all the gloves come off and fire burns all, but that leads to the term pyrrhic victory. You not only want to win, but you also want to survive and win something worth having.

If we had no interest in constraint or in the end point then we simply would stock up on NBC's and fling them far enough down range to hope the wind does not bring them back. Or, maybe that does not matter either?

Oh, and BTW, restraint on military is not only for war, but for peace time as well.

 

[cobber]

I believe that war should be as brutal as possible. The more distasteful it is, the shorter wars will be and less likely people will want to fight them.

The Nazis were pretty brutal in fighting the Soviets. This seemed to strengthen, rather than weaken, Stalin's power, and led to large-scale partisan warfare. Then when the Germans were on the receiving end, they got back as well as they had put out.

If they had to do it all over again, one wonders if the Germans might not have toned down their campaign a bit?

Re the post-bellum phase, Japan brutalized China in WWII, and to this day the Chinese still despise Japan.

(And before anyone observes that the USSR and China were brutal to their own citizens, true, but when a foreign power does it in a war, it definitely leads to steel one's resolve to fight [or else be exterminated].)

 

[MilitaryArms]

Ok, then who is the first to invite all the nations to start mass producing North Korean SM-87's so that we can blind everyone out to 3 miles with lasers just to burn out retinas?

The main reason for constraint, is constraint.

Sure there is a time when all the gloves come off and fire burns all, but that leads to the term pyrrhic victory. You not only want to win, but you also want to survive and win something worth having.

If we had no interest in constraint or in the end point then we simply would stock up on NBC's and fling them far enough down range to hope the wind does not bring them back. Or, maybe that does not matter either?

Oh, and BTW, restraint on military is not only for war, but for peace time as well.

First, my assumption would be that we wouldn't invade another country. So having something worth having is a moot point. My assumption is that we would be defending ourselves. If we're going to war to take over other cities and resources, there's something wrong with our government and mindset.

If we're being attacked, we should use anything we deem necessary to defend ourselves. We should adopt the policy that if you kill one of ours, we'll kill 10,000 of yours. If you *****foot around and place nicey-nice with people that want to kill you, you'll only empower them. Most bullies and aggressors don't respond in kind when you show them compassion. They view your compassion as a weakness to be exploited which in turn costs lives that might not have otherwise been lost.

Take a look at how Chamberlain dealt with Hitler. He met with him and in essence appeased him by being so committed to peace that he made England and her allies look weak and fearful of a fight. It empowered him and set the stage for WWII. It could be argued that if England and her allies immediately went on the offensive at the first sign of aggression by Hitler, before he had a massive army and air force (which he didn't in the beginning), that WWII could have been averted or seriously reduced in scope.

If you're going to fight, fight to win. If you enter into a fight purposely hobbling yourself, you might as well stay home.

 

[IndyDave1776]

The Nazis were pretty brutal in fighting the Soviets. This seemed to strengthen, rather than weaken, Stalin's power, and led to large-scale partisan warfare. Then when the Germans were on the receiving end, they got back as well as they had put out.

If they had to do it all over again, one wonders if the Germans might not have toned down their campaign a bit?

Re the post-bellum phase, Japan brutalized China in WWII, and to this day the Chinese still despise Japan.

(And before anyone observes that the USSR and China were brutal to their own citizens, true, but when a foreign power does it in a war, it definitely leads to steel one's resolve to fight [or else be exterminated].)

Brutality worked extremely well for the Assyrians. In the more modern context, i would point out that a major issue is whether the brutality is applied to the opposing army or to everyone in the population. The nature of a given population also has an effect. In the case of Nazi brutality galvanizing the Russians, I would say that the bigger mistake was not stopping at the Russian border. Russians tend to do a Jeckle and Hyde type transformation in which they are pathetic as invaders but deadly foes when you invade their territory (even without factoring in the winter as their ally).

 

[MilitaryArms]

The Nazis were pretty brutal in fighting the Soviets. This seemed to strengthen, rather than weaken, Stalin's power, and led to large-scale partisan warfare. Then when the Germans were on the receiving end, they got back as well as they had put out.

If they had to do it all over again, one wonders if the Germans might not have toned down their campaign a bit?

Re the post-bellum phase, Japan brutalized China in WWII, and to this day the Chinese still despise Japan.

(And before anyone observes that the USSR and China were brutal to their own citizens, true, but when a foreign power does it in a war, it definitely leads to steel one's resolve to fight [or else be exterminated].)

The Soviets would have fought back just as viciously regardless of how nice the Germans played in their invasion.

Japan brutalized Americans and our allies too. But we're now allies.

Japan attacked us unprovoked. In response we ultimately dropped two nuclear weapons on their nation. No other nation has ever felt the wrath of nuclear weapons... yet the Japanese don't despise us. That's a testament to the culture more than it is to how people respond to past violence.

You can't fight a war and pull your punches thinking "I hope they don't hate me afterwards". That's crazy, IMHO.

 

[Pocketman]

I believe that war should be as brutal as possible. The more distasteful it is, the shorter wars will be and less likely people will want to fight them.

I believe Indiana's own Dr. Richard Gatling had a similar philosophy.

Oh, and BTW, restraint on military is not only for war, but for peace time as well.

Strategic Air Command motto - "Peace is our Profession"

 

[88GT]

The Nazis were pretty brutal in fighting the Soviets. This seemed to strengthen, rather than weaken, Stalin's power, and led to large-scale partisan warfare. Then when the Germans were on the receiving end, they got back as well as they had put out.

If they had to do it all over again, one wonders if the Germans might not have toned down their campaign a bit?

Re the post-bellum phase, Japan brutalized China in WWII, and to this day the Chinese still despise Japan.

(And before anyone observes that the USSR and China were brutal to their own citizens, true, but when a foreign power does it in a war, it definitely leads to steel one's resolve to fight [or else be exterminated].)

If they had to do it all over again, they would probably have utilized the same tactics, just a different strategy.

I also agree that the Soviets would have behaved towards the Germans one way regardless of how well-behaved the Germans had been. Doesn't take much to look at their "annexation" of what became satellite communist bloc nations (as well as the purges, gulags, etc) to know that gratuitous violence for violence's sake was their SOP.

I find the notion of Rules of War laughable. RoE less so, depending on what they are and the motivation for having them. But making an agreement with a current or future enemy that you'll give up a potential tactical advantage is just stupid.

 

[Blackhawk2001]

Following the rules of war gives the combatant the feeling of have the "moral highground".

militaries are much more willing to fight, and fight hard, when they believe they are doing the right thing. Its hard to feel that way when you are being inhumane to the enemy combatant.

This is true only to a certain extent. Hammer in enough hate for the enemy and they cease to be human. Which, incidentally, is the entire reason almost every government during war has endeavored to use their propaganda machine to dehumanize the enemy, regardless of the circumstances.

The eventual problem with this is that when you do find an enemy lacking any discernible humanity, by that time the people have heard the boilerplate so many times they simply don't believe it even though that time it IS true.

There are very good, practical reasons for all of this: First of all, it's very hard for most of us to deliberately kill another human being. I've read that only one-in-ten soldiers fired aimed rounds in combat during WWII (since that's the ratio of combat-to-support troops, I'm not sure what this statistic is supposed to mean). I do vividly remember watching videos of US troops poking their M-16s over their cover and emptying their 20 round magazines in the general direction of the bad guys in Vietnam.

The Army instituted pop-up "human shaped" targets along with standard targets in order to make it easier for soldiers to be able to squeeze the trigger on "enemy" targets in combat.

Efforts to dehumanize and/or demonize the enemy are also tactics to make it easier for newbies to engage the enemy.

Regardless, the point of preparing soldiers to engage the enemy while still retaining their own humanity is so that we don't change them so much that we wouldn't want them living next door to us when they get home. This is yet another reason why we don't fight wars "to the knife" as brutally as some would have us do it; the negative effects on our soldiers and our society would be nearly as bad as losing a war would be.

 

[halfmileharry]

There's also the train of thought that ROE and seeing your enemy as human leads to increased PTSD.
We were brought up it's wrong to kill and changing that mindset is difficult until you realize the enemy is an evil that cares little if any for human life.
I don't see fighting a humane enemy anytime soon but then again, what do I know?
It's usually not the populace that's inhumane but the diehard zealots.

 

[cobber]

The Soviets would have fought back just as viciously regardless of how nice the Germans played in their invasion.

Japan brutalized Americans and our allies too. But we're now allies.

Japan attacked us unprovoked. In response we ultimately dropped two nuclear weapons on their nation. No other nation has ever felt the wrath of nuclear weapons... yet the Japanese don't despise us. That's a testament to the culture more than it is to how people respond to past violence.

You can't fight a war and pull your punches thinking "I hope they don't hate me afterwards". That's crazy, IMHO.

We'll have to disagree about the Soviets. My reading is that most of the Soviet minorities, and even many Russians, would have been glad to see the commissars go even at the hands of a foreign invader. Had it not become apparent that the Nazis were going to annex the USSR in the quest for Lebensraum (a new order in which Slavs, Gypsies, Jews, etc., played no role), there would have been far more collaborators like Vlasov and fewer partisans.

A less brutal war would not have been in accord with the Nazis' long-term political goals, but had they waited until after the military victory until they imposed their race politics, resistance might have come too late to forestall their victory.

Same with the Japanese. I would question whether some form of Bushido isn't just lying dormant, waiting to surface again.

I don't think the Just War folks are concerned whether the enemy hates them after war, but rather whether by engaging in warfare without limits if we don't do violence to what it means to be American, or Christian, or human.