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What good are Rules of Engagement if they lose the war for you?

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Now we try to avoid civilian populations and such, but we should have learned from Korea and Vietnam that civilians aren't always civilians, and can be human bombs, or even carry guns. As loath as I am to say it, I think we may need to examine our Rules of Engagement. Who agrees?

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  1. You are right to a degree. The Rules of Engagement can lose the war for you and we DID see that in Vietnam, I was there and we did have targets that were a tremendous threat to our troops that we were not permitted to bomb -I saw pictures of thousands of trucks lined up on the docks in Haiphong harbor that would be used to transport men and material into South Vietnam to fight our troops and we were not allowed to bomb them. According to the ROE, Haiphong Harbor was off-limits to our Air Force. The ROE said we couldn't attack North Vietnamese aircraft on the ground, we had to wait until they were in the air! The ROE said we couldn't bomb their airports! That said, you must have ROE, Someone has to have a hand on the controls and you would hope the person with that hand knew a little about fighting a war, not like the current occupant or his buddies. Aside from the humanitarian reasons for the ROE, you have to limit the damage to innocent civilians and their property or you make more enemies than you kill. And yes, the ROE is not something etched in stone, it needs to be constantly revised, again. by someone who knows the way wars are fought, not someone in an armchair back in Washington who managed to avoid the combat zone.


  2. I will have to agree with you on that and we have done so in the past ten years.

    Rules of Engagement is at the Commanders discretion when dealing with missions and can change daily depending on the situation.

    As you commented about civilians can also mean that they are used for human shields so that they will not be engaged.

    It is all based on quick decision making by the individual who is in command and based on the situation that is going on.

    If some innocent civilians are going to die and I have to save my unit or squad then I have done what is necessary to accomplish the mission.

    It is not an easy choice however I live with it!

  3. Winning and losing a war isn't always what you think.  Victory in a war may come from defeat in battle, because victory can't just be defined by body counts and hectares secured.

    Von Clausewitz said that War is politics by other means.  

    Someone else said that you don't want to inflict maximum injury on an opponent because he may later be your ally.

    But another popular saying is that "it is better to be tried by 12 than carried by 6".

    So you've got a tough balancing act to perform.  Your job is not only to win the war, but to win the peace.  On the other hand, winning won't do you much good if you are killed.  

    So you have to try to obey the rules, but if you're sure your life (or the life of an innocent third party) is in immediate danger, you must do what you've gotta do.  

    No 'rule' can tell you what that is.  You have only your conscience, instincts and common sense to guide you.  Lets pray that you always make the right decision.  But if you can always say that you did your level best to obey the SPIRIT of the rules, you should never have cause for regret.

  4. busting down doors and shooting unarmed civilians doesn't help.  

  5. I guessing you mean the United States. Well, the United States themself don't follow most of the rules of war or engagement too. But the question is, what are the rules of war? There is really no law of that the entire world follows. The closets I think is the Geneva Conventions.  

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