Excessive use of force in war

Discussion in 'History' started by spacemansteve, Jun 20, 2006.

  1. spacemansteve Not enough brain space Registered Senior Member

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    It was a glorious Sunday afternoon when i got thinking, what defines excessive force in war? Technology has come a long way since the trusty bow and arrow used in the middle ages and times before that, but how does one kill another human humanely without the use of excessive force? and what defines humanely aswell?

    By now we're all used to seeing on the media, fictional and non fictional images of death and mayhem caused by war, vivid images of men being shot, vapourised or simply exploded (excuse ofcourse the bad grammar). One image in my mind is the use of an Apaches 30mm gun to shoot and kill suspected insurgents in Iraq. In a grainy black and white film you can easily see the destruction of man at its worse. Was the use of this gun at a distance of 2km necessary or excessive force?

    As a member of the Australian Defence Force it is doctrine to never use Artillery, CAS (Close Air Support) or Naval Gunfire when a rifle will suffice, a Machine Gun will do or a simple Grenade will get the job done. Do we have to put ourselves into a situation where by the possibility of harm grows exponentially when we could be sitting back having a brew and a smoko while bombs are raining in on the enemy?

    Ultimately my question, and i would like historical examples aswell as hypothetical ones, What defines the use of excessive force and how does one kill another humanely?
     
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  3. snake river rufus Registered Senior Member

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    I believe that dead is dead. hence there is no such of a thing as excessive force. There is brutal, graphic, etc. But not excessive.
    As far as killing humanely? I guess as long as the killing is over quickly that would be as close to "humanely" as possible. I would note that the human animal is not known for being "humane".
     
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  5. leopold Valued Senior Member

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    my best guess about excessive force would on how you treat POWs and civilian survivors of an attack.
     
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  7. thedevilsreject Registered Senior Abuser Registered Senior Member

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    i think it really accounts to unnecessary force ie, you have the chance to take a group of people out with a rocket, but just be sure use a missile which not only takes that group of people out but also a group of innocents
     
  8. Fraggle Rocker Staff Member

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    It isn't so much "excessive force" that is the issue, it's actually rather a poor use of words. It's excessive cruelty.

    Killing soldiers unnecessarily, when they could be captured, disarmed, or otherwise rendered incapable of effective fighting, for example by being cut off from supplies and reinforcements. Killing prisoners of war. Attacking civilians and civilian infrastructure with little or no military value. Torture. Leaving wounded enemy soldiers without medical care when such care is reasonably available.

    Almost every army in history has had its dishonorable moments and done a few of these things, including ours. But they are the standard techniques of terrorists, who do not often even attack truly military targets because they're too well defended.
     
  9. Buffalo Roam Registered Senior Member

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    If the force used keeps your people alive it isn't excessive, and you use the force that is available that you have when you have the enemy in your sights, and how do you use just the right amount of force, in war you use the force you have at the moment.
     
  10. AmishRakeFight Remember, remember. Registered Senior Member

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    I would have to say that calling in an airstrike on an insurgent holed up in his home when you've got fifteen or twenty of your fellow soldiers sitting next to you ready to fight might be considered overkill. Then again, who will be debating "overkill" when it's "kill over"? Either way, in the end, one of you must be dead, and if I was placed in that position, I would use what weapons I had at my disposal to ensure my safety, my teammates safety, and my country's safety.

    On humanity, whatever kills at least one civilian per two enemy soldiers is too much. If you have to fire a missile at four enemy fighters, but you know that there are two large families huddled in a building that would undoubtably be engulfed in flames, would it be humane to fire the missile or to seek other means?

    AmishRakeFight
     
  11. snake river rufus Registered Senior Member

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    Why risk the lives/safety of the 15-20 fellow soldiers to assault a fortified posistion?
     
  12. spacemansteve Not enough brain space Registered Senior Member

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    Personally i've never been in a combat situation, although i expect to find myself in one in the near future. I'm not infantry but i've trained in their tactics... i'll be one of the fly boys

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    But if i was on the ground i know personally i would prefer Bombs, Artillery and anything else that would get the job done, hey a tactical nuke wouldn't be too bad

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    But ultimately it is doctrine in the Aussie army to inflict the maximum amount of damage on an enemy, using means that aren't excessive. Should this be the case? its debatable, because "overkill" can be a waste of resources that could be emplyed else where on the battlefield.

    I heard an amusing story of a British Platoon in the Iraq war. They were patrolling along in the first few days when Bang! had contact with an Iraqi equivalent of a company in a well fortified position. They were denied any help but were told to take the position (incase you don't know the military works on a 3:1 ratio, 3 friendly forces vs 1 enemy force, in this case the poms were outnumbered 3:1, complete opposite). So the platoon commander works out a grand battle plan, and while conducting the attack, realises that his platoon is starting to get bogged down. To inspire his men, he grabs one of his grenades, chucks it into a trench and dives in after. The men were inspired and went on to win the battle with no casualties. The platoon commander would have been awarded a Victoria Cross (highest decoration for a soldier) if the trench he jumped into, wasn't the Latrine. Enjoy
     
  13. G. F. Schleebenhorst England != UK Registered Senior Member

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    Well anything's got to be better than waiting for your opponent (who is blind and in a wheelchair) to go to sleep and then shooting him in the back with a missile from a helicopter, which is pretty much how they're doing it these days.
     
  14. G. F. Schleebenhorst England != UK Registered Senior Member

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    Oh you mean like nuking 300,000 (unwilling, unpaid) women and children to save MAYBE that amount of (willing, paid) soldiers?
     
  15. spacemansteve Not enough brain space Registered Senior Member

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    Do a little research on Operation Olympic and Coronet, which was the planned invasion of Japan in WWII. (I'm assuming your referring to the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki). Based on the intelligence at the time, i would say that Nuking a city would be better than fighting civilians (including women and children) armed with pitch forks and outdated rifles. The japanese were preparing for an invasion and their plans for that invasion were to use the regular army as the fighting force, and the civilians as a "human shield". Looking back at how the japanese thought, with the emperor practically being worshiped as a god, its easy to see how this would be the case.

    In this case 300,000 were sacrificed so that 1 million US marines, and countless more Japanese soldiers and civilians could live. Ultimately, but hard to accept and swallow, a fair trade. The world would be a much different place if the US had gone ahead with Operation Olympic and Coronet.
     
  16. Buffalo Roam Registered Senior Member

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    And Hiroshima and Nagasaki both had military industrial complexes and comunication centers, wich made them legitamate targets, and weather you hit them with one bomber and one bomb, or a 1,000 plane raid dropping 100,000 fire bombs the casualities would have been similar, but the effect of one plane and one bomb per city finally forced the Emperor to act and over ride the Military/Industrial Complex that had lead Japan into WWII and to the situation of being willing to commit national suicide, when we demonstrated the ability to take out a city at a time with minum loss and that there was no more glory in dieing for the Emperor killing his foe's the war was over and millions of Allies, and Japanese were spared the maiming and death of the final battle for Japan.


     
  17. Buffalo Roam Registered Senior Member

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    A good explanation of Hiroshima as a military target,

    Hiroshima, Pacific War [New Window]
    Hiroshima military installations and heavy industries were rapidly developed ... Hiroshima bomb were unexpected ; radiation deaths from Nagasaki a few days ...
    http://www.ww2pacific.com/hiroshima.html


    Nagasaki was a major port with shipbuilding and marine repair facilities.

    This site has a good article on the end of the war and the Emperor's part in the decission to surrender.

    The Information War in the Pacific, 1945 [New Window]
    These cities contain military installations and workshops or factories which ... Not only Hiroshima and Nagasaki, but all of Japan’s major cities had been ...
    Verified by a Netscape Security Partner: Netscape Security Center, VeriSign http://www.cia.gov/csi/studies/vol46no3/article07.html
     
  18. G. F. Schleebenhorst England != UK Registered Senior Member

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    You can make all the excuses you want, you can say it was a military target all you want, but it was still home to 200,000 civilians, and then what about Nagasaki? Another 200,000 civilians living there.

    You also took part in Dresden and the other firebombings of German civilians. Those were completely and utterly unecessary and the British even apologised for those....I didn't hear any yank apology....for that or the A-Bombings.

    Pearl Harbour was a military target and you still take great offense when anyone mentions that. Go watch the film Pearl Harbour (They even put in a happy ending for you!) and it shows "Japs" mercilessly gunning down civilians. The difference between the way you yanks view Pearl Harbour (a sneaky underhanded attack on a civilian target, there weren't even any battleships there, hell they just machine-gunned a bunch of nurses or something) versus the way you view Hiroshima and Nagasaki (we heroically nuked 300,000 civilians in their sleep, we had absolutely no choice, they were going to attack us with pointy sticks) is a fucking joke.
     
  19. leopold Valued Senior Member

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    the japanese did sneakily attack pearl harbor.

    the truth about the civilian casualties is that most was from misdirected friendly fire.

    we did not bomb hiroshima and nagasaki unannounced. american forces dropped 10's of thousands of leaflets on japan that said we were about to unleash a new weapon if japan did not surrender.
     
  20. G. F. Schleebenhorst England != UK Registered Senior Member

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    Well that makes it OK then!

    Now that we've established that all those women, children and babies KNEW they were going to be nuked, everything is forgiven!

    Don't be stupid.
     
  21. leopold Valued Senior Member

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    i might be unedgecated on some things, ww2 isn't one of them.
     
  22. spacemansteve Not enough brain space Registered Senior Member

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    G. F. Schleebenhorst:

    You don't grasp the psyche of the japanese at the time and your trying to condem an action that killed 300,000 civilians when doing the opposite action would have resulted in much larger casualties.

    I believe the saying was, "A million will die so the emperor may live", I might have that a little wrong but the general gist of the comment is still valid. So all of a sudden killing 300,000 with the use of one bomb is alot worse than sending armed soldiers up against the same men, women and children armed with pitchforks and outdated rifles?

    Its not like the US didn't give them warning either, especially with Nagasaki who were able to witness the effect of a Nuke, but they still decided to stay when they knew its devastating power.

    The question of Orphans has appeared, with i believe the figure quoted was about 50,000... as opposed to the ammount of Orphans that would have been around after the US invaded Japan?

    Killing of innocents is always hard to justify, and this seems to be one of the few examples in history where you can justify it. The A-Bomb saved many more American and Japanese lives than it killed, so which is the greater evil?
     
  23. leopold Valued Senior Member

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    indeed he doesn't.
    the way the japanese fought on the outlying islands is a testament to the japanese psyche. the japanese did not surrender. less than 1% surrendered on the outlying islands and most of those were native inhabitants, not japanese. the rest had to be killed, or when the situation was hopeless they killed themselves rather than surrender. in the last days of the war the fanatical japanese was flying airplanes into our ships. and all of that was over the outlying islands. i shudder to think what would have happened if we invaded to home islands. if we hadn't used the bomb it is very likely that 10's of thousands would have died on the first 1 or 2 days.

    and why all the hoopla about 'the bomb' anyway? more people lost their lives in the firebombings of tokyo than at hiroshima or nagasaki.
     

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