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Author: John Tirman
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199831491
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 418
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Book Description
Americans are greatly concerned about the number of our troops killed in battle--33,000 in the Korean War; 58,000 in Vietnam; 4,500 in Iraq--and rightly so. But why are we so indifferent, often oblivious, to the far greater number of casualties suffered by those we fight and those we fight for? This is the compelling, largely unasked question John Tirman answers in The Deaths of Others. Between six and seven million people died in Korea, Vietnam, and Iraq alone, the majority of them civilians. And yet Americans devote little attention to these deaths. Other countries, however, do pay attention, and Tirman argues that if we want to understand why there is so much anti-Americanism around the world, the first place to look is how we conduct war. We understandably strive to protect our own troops, but our rules of engagement with the enemy are another matter. From atomic weapons and carpet bombing in World War II to napalm and daisy cutters in Vietnam and beyond, our weapons have killed large numbers of civilians and enemy soldiers. Americans, however, are mostly ignorant of these methods, believing that American wars are essentially just, necessary, and "good." Trenchant and passionate, The Deaths of Others forces readers to consider the tragic consequences of American military action not just for Americans, but especially for those we fight against.
Author: John Tirman
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199831491
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 418
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Book Description
Americans are greatly concerned about the number of our troops killed in battle--33,000 in the Korean War; 58,000 in Vietnam; 4,500 in Iraq--and rightly so. But why are we so indifferent, often oblivious, to the far greater number of casualties suffered by those we fight and those we fight for? This is the compelling, largely unasked question John Tirman answers in The Deaths of Others. Between six and seven million people died in Korea, Vietnam, and Iraq alone, the majority of them civilians. And yet Americans devote little attention to these deaths. Other countries, however, do pay attention, and Tirman argues that if we want to understand why there is so much anti-Americanism around the world, the first place to look is how we conduct war. We understandably strive to protect our own troops, but our rules of engagement with the enemy are another matter. From atomic weapons and carpet bombing in World War II to napalm and daisy cutters in Vietnam and beyond, our weapons have killed large numbers of civilians and enemy soldiers. Americans, however, are mostly ignorant of these methods, believing that American wars are essentially just, necessary, and "good." Trenchant and passionate, The Deaths of Others forces readers to consider the tragic consequences of American military action not just for Americans, but especially for those we fight against.
Author: Taylor B. Seybolt
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199977305
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 331
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Book Description
Counting Civilian Casualties aims to promote open scientific dialogue by high lighting the strengths and weaknesses of the most commonly used casualty recording and estimation techniques in an understandable format.
Author: Alexander B. Downes
Publisher: Cornell University Press
ISBN: 0801457297
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 329
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Book Description
Accidental harm to civilians in warfare often becomes an occasion for public outrage, from citizens of both the victimized and the victimizing nation. In this vitally important book on a topic of acute concern for anyone interested in military strategy, international security, or human rights, Alexander B. Downes reminds readers that democratic and authoritarian governments alike will sometimes deliberately kill large numbers of civilians as a matter of military strategy. What leads governments to make such a choice? Downes examines several historical cases: British counterinsurgency tactics during the Boer War, the starvation blockade used by the Allies against Germany in World War I, Axis and Allied bombing campaigns in World War II, and ethnic cleansing in the Palestine War. He concludes that governments decide to target civilian populations for two main reasons—desperation to reduce their own military casualties or avert defeat, or a desire to seize and annex enemy territory. When a state's military fortunes take a turn for the worse, he finds, civilians are more likely to be declared legitimate targets to coerce the enemy state to give up. When territorial conquest and annexation are the aims of warfare, the population of the disputed land is viewed as a threat and the aggressor state may target those civilians to remove them. Democracies historically have proven especially likely to target civilians in desperate circumstances. In Targeting Civilians in War, Downes explores several major recent conflicts, including the 1991 Persian Gulf War and the American-led invasion of Iraq in 2003. Civilian casualties occurred in each campaign, but they were not the aim of military action. In these cases, Downes maintains, the achievement of quick and decisive victories against overmatched foes allowed democracies to win without abandoning their normative beliefs by intentionally targeting civilians. Whether such "restraint" can be guaranteed in future conflicts against more powerful adversaries is, however, uncertain. During times of war, democratic societies suffer tension between norms of humane conduct and pressures to win at the lowest possible costs. The painful lesson of Targeting Civilians in War is that when these two concerns clash, the latter usually prevails.
Author: Simon Webb
Publisher: Pen and Sword History
ISBN: 152674323X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 211
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Book Description
This study of friendly fire on civilians during the London Blitz and the attack on Pearl harbor exposes the unknown horror behind these iconic WWII events. The London Blitz and the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor have ascended to the level of myth for Britain and America. Yet both of these artfully constructed narratives of heroic resistance to aerial bombardment conceal the massacre of citizens by the very militaries charged with protecting them. In Britain, thousands of civilians were killed when the army shelled London and other cities to prevent residents from fleeing the German bombs. At Pearl Harbor, American warships fired their heavy guns at the city of Honolulu with devastating results. Simon Webb begins this volume with an overview of bombing and anti-aircraft guns from the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-1871 through to the First World War. He then reveals the casualties which friendly fire from heavy artillery inflicted upon British and American civilians during World War Two. In the case of the British, these deaths were a deliberate part of a shockingly cynical policy. There were times during the German bombing of London when more people were being killed by British shells than by enemy bombs.
Author: Nick McDonell
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 0735211574
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 305
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Book Description
Since the beginning of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, uncounted thousands of civilians have died in the fighting and as a result of the destruction. These are deaths for which no one assumes responsibility and which have been presented, historically, as fallout. No one knows their true number. In The Bodies in Person, Nick McDonell introduces us to some of the civilians who died, along with the rescue workers who tried to save them, U.S. soldiers grappling with their deaths, and everyone in between. He shows us how decent Americans, inside and outside the government and military, looked away from the mounting death toll, even as they claimed to do everything in their power to prevent civilian casualties. With a novelist's eye — and hundreds of hours of recorded interviews — McDonell brings us the untold story of the innocent dead in America's ongoing wars, from leveled cities to drone operation centers to Capitol back rooms. As we follow him around the world, The Bodies in Person raises questions not only about what it means to be an American, but about the value of a life, what it means to risk one, and what is owed afterward.
Author: Chris Hedges
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1416583149
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 196
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Book Description
Acclaimed New York Times journalist and author Chris Hedges offers a critical -- and fascinating -- lesson in the dangerous realities of our age: a stark look at the effects of war on combatants. Utterly lacking in rhetoric or dogma, this manual relies instead on bare fact, frank description, and a spare question-and-answer format. Hedges allows U.S. military documentation of the brutalizing physical and psychological consequences of combat to speak for itself. Hedges poses dozens of questions that young soldiers might ask about combat, and then answers them by quoting from medical and psychological studies. • What are my chances of being wounded or killed if we go to war? • What does it feel like to get shot? • What do artillery shells do to you? • What is the most painful way to get wounded? • Will I be afraid? • What could happen to me in a nuclear attack? • What does it feel like to kill someone? • Can I withstand torture? • What are the long-term consequences of combat stress? • What will happen to my body after I die? This profound and devastating portrayal of the horrors to which we subject our armed forces stands as a ringing indictment of the glorification of war and the concealment of its barbarity.
Author: Ofer Fridman
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 1498586929
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 257
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Book Description
Civil casualties and collateral damage have been long considered as an undesired outcome of military activity that has to be reduced. While most of the contemporary discourse on this topic has been primarily concentrating on three main factors: the legal aspects of causing civil casualties, the impact of war on local population, and different factors of military professionalism required to avoid disproportional harm to civilians; this book asks an entirely different question. As the subject of civil casualties during military operations seems to be highly politicized, this book takes this discourse out of its usual niches and suggests that the indirect responsibility rests with the politicians and the public, which they represent. When a society, in the beginning of the 21st century, sends its troops to a battle, does it really care about the enemy civilian casualties? To answer this question, this book traces the political and cultural factors that have led to the failure of Non-Lethal Weapons – the great promise of the 1990s, which was intended to make the war significantly less lethal than it was known before. Examining three different cases, this study explains that the idea of minimizing civil casualties is no more than an illusion, and, in fact, neither politicians, nor societies, feel really stressed to change this situation.
Author: Igor Primoratz
Publisher: OUP Oxford
ISBN: 0191537446
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 276
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Book Description
The protection of noncombatants from deadly violence is the centrepiece of any account of ethical and legal constraints on war. It was a major achievement of moral progress from early modern times to World War I. Yet it has been under constant attrition since - perhaps never more so than in our time, with its 'new wars', the spectre of weapons of mass destruction, and the global terrorism alert. Civilian Immunity in War, written in collaboration by eleven authors, provides the first comprehensive analysis of all main aspects of this highly topical subject. It considers the arguments for rejection of civilian immunity and the main theories of the grounds and proper scope of this immunity, both deontological (just war theory) and consequentialist. Separate chapters examine the historical development of the idea of civilian immunity, its standing in current international law, and the problem of "collateral damage": of harming civilians without intent, as a side-effect of attacks on military targets. The volume also addresses a string of specific issues. Civilian immunity has undergone much attrition with the development of air warfare and the tendency of military conflict to degenerate into "total" war. On the other hand, modern military technology with its precision guidance missiles and "smart" bombs opens up the possibility of restricting deadly violence to its proper targets and staying clear of civilian life, limb, and property. Another pressing issue is the fate of women in war in light of mass rapes characteristic of some 'new wars'.
Author: Marcus Schulzke
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9781316639238
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 0
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Book Description
There are strong moral and legal pressures against harming civilians in times of conflict, yet neither just war theory nor international law is clear about what responsibilities belligerents have to correct harm once it has been inflicted. In this book, Marcus Schulzke argues that military powers have a duty to provide assistance to the civilians they attack during wars, and that this duty is entailed by civilians' right to life. Schulzke develops new just war principles requiring belligerents to provide medical treatment and financial compensation to civilian victims, and then shows how these principles can be implemented in governmental, military, and international practice. He calls for a more individual-focused conception of international law and post-war justice for victims - as opposed to current state- or group-based reconstruction and reparation programs - which will provide a framework for protecting civilian rights.
Author: Stephen J. Rockel
Publisher: Between the Lines(CA)
ISBN: 9781897071120
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 0
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Book Description
A provocative and powerful collection that explores the concept of "collateral damage" through wars across space and time
