Posted by
Andrews on Wednesday, July 02, 2008 3:01:21 PM
I have for some time been particularly puzzled by the criticism of the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan.
One thing that troubles me is the obsession with civilian casualties. I can't recall any conflict where civilian casualties were as conscientiously tallied. Some will say this is because we are supposed to be liberating Iraq and Afghanistan, so civilian casualties are contrary to our purpose, but I beg to differ. Even in the liberation of Kossovo, not to mention the liberation of France or our fighting in Viet Nam, no one was keeping track of civilian casualties in the way they do in this war.
Then there is the obsession with every single casualty on our side. It becomes simply absurd. Some cities in the US have murder rates that approach the death toll in Iraq, yet we hear less about those peace time killings than we do about every single death in Iraq. Now, we did from time to time hear death tolls in other wars, but generally they were accompanied with a matching tally of enemy deaths. However, in this war there is nothing like that. We never hear how many enemy combatants were killed, unless they get rolled up into the tally of civilians, otherwise they pass uncounted.
Now, it is easy to write this off as a result of nothing but partisan politics. In order to embarrass the Bush administration, the left has decided to play up the civilian casualties and military deaths to make the war an election year issue. And in some ways that is true. But on the other hand, why is it possible to do so? In the 1940's telling anyone the number of German civilian fatalities would have elicited nothing but a question about why there weren't more. So, even if those publicizing these numbers are politically motivated, the question remains why such things resonate with the public.
And the reason is that the public has an unrealistic view of warfare.
It is understandable. We have had little experience of warfare in recent generations. Even in Viet Nam a majority of Americans did not serve in the military. Nor have they in any conflict since. And the wars we have had recently, starting from the first Gulf War and running through Clinton's actions in Kossovo have been presented on television as being fought by remote control. We see smart bombs blowing up bunkers from a distance, followed by wholesale surrender. It may not be accurate, but that is the public perception.
And then we have the changing public perception of our enemies, and the political environment. We no longer go to war with nations, instead we go to war with their governments, which means that we see civilian casualties as unacceptable. The public imagines that since we are only fighting Saddam we should only be killing those actively supporting him, anyone else should be off limits, no matter how impossible making that distinction may be. We think it shows that we are enlightened to fight not against civilians in another nation but only against their government.
Finally, we have somehow become convinced that warfare is something like police work. We can even see this in recent court rulings about prisoners of war. No longer do we imagine war as the conflict of two states. Instead we think our military should go into a country and carefully remove the enemy without causing any collateral damage.
It is a thoroughly unrealistic view of warfare and a terribly ineffective way to fight a war, but barring another attack on American soil, and the subsequent outrage, I doubt it is going to change. We have been told for too long that civilian casualties are unacceptable, that our soldiers should operate like police not soldiers, and I just don't see the public shaking off those beliefs any time soon.
POSTSCRIPT
It is interesting to listen to interviews with Iraqis in this regard. The Iraqis themselves are much more understanding about collateral damage than our own media and even the general public is. They seem to understand not only that the initial liberation required both damage and some casualties, but that the ongoing insurrection inevitably causes some harm as well.
It is strange to hear the people being liberated having a more realistic understanding than the people who are supposedly defending their interests.