# Total War VS Civilized Warfare **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 5, 2009, 6:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/total-war-vs-civilized-warfare/502001 "2009-07-05T18:36:08Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![chowder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/977dab/32.png) [@chowder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chowder)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2009, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/total-war-vs-civilized-warfare/502001/41 "2009-07-07T15:45:56Z")
**Smash** has absolutely no intention of carrying his arguments further. Just as in other threads he starts, he posts a few times then does what the Panda does, eats, shoots and leaves. This will not be his last attempt to get us to fight among ourselves, I guarantee it ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2009, 5:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/total-war-vs-civilized-warfare/502001/42 "2009-07-07T17:24:55Z")
[QUOTE=AK84] You post was excellent uptill the quoted text. The reason for investing in smart weapons is not to reduce civilian casualties, at times thats a side effect. You invest in them so you can pretty much gaurentee the destruction of the target with the expension of a minimum amount of ammunition and minimum exposure to your own forces. Same with arty, you want shells that can destroy the target on the first salvo as opposed to a barrage which just “telegraphs the punch” and exposes your own arty tp the enemies counter battery fire. [/QUOTE] I thank you for the compliment. 🙂 I also disagree with your final assessment here. True, you want to destroy the proposed target with the minimum exposure of your own forces. I don’t think a ‘minimum amount of ammunition’ is important though, since it’s really the cost that becomes the factor…and smart ammunition, while certainly is a minimum, also costs a LOT more, so it balances out. But let’s do a comparison in killing ability between Excalibur and the MLRS in order to kill your target in the first salvo without telegraphing your punch. Now, the TOT aspect is available for both systems, and has been for decades. This is one of the few US military innovations that is all us, and we’ve used it effectively since WWII. By now it’s been developed to the point where the precision is astounding. Ok, the target is counter battery fire in close proximity to civilian buildings and populations. With an MLRS battery, firing a TOT mission, they can essentially wipe out everything within several square kilometers instantly…no chance at all that our punch will be telegraphed, no way anyone is getting out of there alive. Including those civilian structures or populations. If we use Excalibur though, we can fire a salvo from a regular 155 battery and drop the rounds precisely on the counter battery unit (we could actually drop individual rounds on individual guns if we had spotters and if this was desired…or drop rounds on ammo colliers or personnel carriers or whatever), minimizing collateral damage and civilian casualties. The enemy counter battery is just as dead in both cases, the cost of the mission was higher for the Excalibur volley (in terms of money, especially development) than for the MLRS volley, even though a minimum of ammunition was used. So, if minimizing civilian casualties is not one of the major goals, why use Excalibur? The old system did the same job after all…though it killed a lot more civies and tore up a lot more structures. Why use the new hyper-precision munitions if you could use cluster bomblets? Or why continue to refine and develop precision munitions to get greater and greater accuracy? The stuff we used in Desert Storm was pretty effective after all…and the first smart bomb was used in Vietnam…why continue to develop them when they already did the job of killing the enemy, though at a higher cost of civilian casualties? To me, the answer is that the American people (and most of the peoples in other nations with such capabilities) are no longer tolerant of the mass slaughter of civilians, and that, though it costs more and takes longer to develop, it’s money we and they are willing to spend to attempt to minimize those civilian causalities as much as is humanly possible. This only makes our military more effective in the fact that we can fight our enemies even when they choose to put themselves in close proximity to civilians and civilian structures. We could always (well, for the last several decades anyway) simply kill them all and let the gods sort them out, after all. -XT ---
**Author:** ![Anne\_Neville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Anne\_Neville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anne_Neville)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2009, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/total-war-vs-civilized-warfare/502001/43 "2009-07-07T17:48:54Z")
> [@smiling\_bandit](#): > > What a grotesque ideology you have. People who risk their lives for the safety and security of others… treated as pitiable figures? Bullshit. The brave warrior, the Christian knight, the hard-fighting infantryman - these are not pitiable figures, and deserve every ounce of respect a society can have for them. Your silly idea would see the end of all courage if you had your way. And then another, less… “pleasant” group would simply muscle in, once you had finally run out all idea of heroism with your angsty purile hand-wringing. A firefighter rescuing people from a burning building is not courageous or heroic? ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2009, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/total-war-vs-civilized-warfare/502001/44 "2009-07-07T18:05:12Z")
> [@Anne\_Neville](#): > > A firefighter rescuing people from a burning building is not courageous or heroic? How did you get _that_ from my post? I mentioned a few example, but I don’t think I am required to write out every possible example of heroism to please every possible group. I certainly don’t limit it to those I gave, but they were the thrust of my post. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2009, 6:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/total-war-vs-civilized-warfare/502001/45 "2009-07-07T18:08:57Z")
> [@Anne\_Neville](#): > > A firefighter rescuing people from a burning building is not courageous or heroic? They are, and in a much more uncomplicated way. The firefighter, if he rescues people from a building, is a hero, full stop. The soldier, if he kills the enemy successfully, may not be a hero, if he’s fighting for the wrong side. Soldier is nasty work. Sometimes it’s necessary, but it’s horrific, nasty work. ---
**Author:** ![Declan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecae2f/32.png) [@Declan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Declan)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2009, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/total-war-vs-civilized-warfare/502001/46 "2009-07-07T19:49:14Z")
> [@Odesio](#): > > Millions of rifles were produced during the American Civil War. They were mass produced with interchangeable parts and everything. > Odeiso And if the Union or the Confederates had airpower they would have been bombing each others civillian factorys. I think a comparison here is needed between the Civil War, WW1 and WW2 for the amount of civillians required to support the armies tail, before I would give the nod to those quoted individuals. I think that there is a difference between the three conflicts, in that while WW1/2 used automation to free up manpower for the front, the Union at least made heavy use of fresh immigrants to flesh out its forces, and according to others , the Union was never in full war economy. If the above does not make sense I will try and clarify what i mean. Declan ---
**Author:** ![Anne\_Neville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Anne\_Neville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anne_Neville)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2009, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/total-war-vs-civilized-warfare/502001/47 "2009-07-07T20:38:01Z")
> [@smiling\_bandit](#): > > How did you get _that_ from my post? I mentioned a few example, but I don’t think I am required to write out every possible example of heroism to please every possible group. I certainly don’t limit it to those I gave, but they were the thrust of my post. It seemed to me that you were implying that there could be no courage or heroism without war. I was pointing out an example of courage and heroism that wouldn’t require war. ---
**Author:** ![Anne\_Neville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Anne\_Neville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anne_Neville)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2009, 9:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/total-war-vs-civilized-warfare/502001/48 "2009-07-07T21:31:40Z")
If you wanted to argue that everyone who risks their life for the safety and security of others is heroic and should be admired, I’ll offer the counterexample of a hit man. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2009, 9:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/total-war-vs-civilized-warfare/502001/49 "2009-07-07T21:43:58Z")
I think you win the “Least Applicable Counter-Example” Award. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![SmashTheState](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@SmashTheState](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SmashTheState)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2009, 10:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/total-war-vs-civilized-warfare/502001/50 "2009-07-07T22:36:48Z")
> [@chowder](#): > > **Smash** has absolutely no intention of carrying his arguments further. > > Just as in other threads he starts, he posts a few times then does what the Panda does, eats, shoots and leaves. > > This will not be his last attempt to get us to fight among ourselves, I guarantee it I make a conscious effort not to respond immediately when someone makes a cogent argument, so that I have time to think about it and possibly alter my opinion or belief. When you see me responding immediately to what someone has said, it’s either because I have my hackles up and I’m replying out of some sort of need for emotional catharsis, or because the argument was so poor that I feel no need to think on it. I leave it as an exercise for the reader to guess for which of these two your posting qualified. I have been reading people’s responses with avid interest. You may be sure that if and when I feel the need to challenge someone’s position so that I might better convince myself of its correctness (or dispel any lurking sympathy for it), I will do so. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2009, 11:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/total-war-vs-civilized-warfare/502001/51 "2009-07-07T23:05:20Z")
…in Da Nang all we _had_ sometimes were hackles… ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2009, 1:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/total-war-vs-civilized-warfare/502001/52 "2009-07-08T13:41:03Z")
> [@SmashTheState](#): > > I make a conscious effort not to respond immediately when someone makes a cogent argument, so that I have time to think about it and possibly alter my opinion or belief. With all the shit you’ve been taking, I wanna take the time to call this out as an especially reasonable attitude to take in any debate. Would that more people took it. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2009, 2:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/total-war-vs-civilized-warfare/502001/53 "2009-07-08T14:20:09Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > …in Da Nang all we _had_ sometimes were hackles… Hackles? Luxury. In the Kybher Pass, we used to _dream_ about hackles. ---
**Author:** ![SteveG1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bb73d2/32.png) [@SteveG1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SteveG1)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2009, 2:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/total-war-vs-civilized-warfare/502001/54 "2009-07-08T14:26:25Z")
> [@AK84](#): > > Warfare has never been “civilised” outside the mind of some romantics. Rome v carthage was total war, Rome v Persia, Byzantines v Arabs, Mongols all over the world, the Egyptians v Nubians and later the Hittites and Babylonians and Assyrians etc were vicious total wars. This. Toss in the Assyrians and the first Emperor of China, for that matter. The idea was to completely crush the enemy, and in some cases (Carthage) salt the land and drive them into extinction. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2009, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/total-war-vs-civilized-warfare/502001/55 "2009-07-08T14:45:05Z")
> [@SteveG1](#): > > The idea was to completely crush the enemy And see them driven before you. ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2009, 3:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/total-war-vs-civilized-warfare/502001/56 "2009-07-08T15:51:22Z")
And hear the lamentation of their women… -XT ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2009, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/total-war-vs-civilized-warfare/502001/57 "2009-07-08T16:07:26Z")
What? Hear the lamentations of their women? You didn’t tell us that… No, don’t go pointing to the orders. What part of us being a horde of illiterate barbarians did you not understand? If you want us to know what your plans are, you have to put it on the agenda for the pre-sack briefing. Anyway, what’s done is done. We killed all the women. Yes, and the children. We saved the livestock though. Will you settle for hearing the lamentations of their sheep? ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2009, 4:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/total-war-vs-civilized-warfare/502001/58 "2009-07-08T16:10:04Z")
_looks sheepish_ You need to do it in an Austrian accent too… (that’s what all the real, proper barbarians use these days. As for the sheep…well, I’ll leave what to do about them to your own imagination…) -XT ---
**Author:** ![griffin1977](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/977dab/32.png) [@griffin1977](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/griffin1977)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2009, 4:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/total-war-vs-civilized-warfare/502001/59 "2009-07-08T16:15:50Z")
> [@xtisme](#): > > You need to do it in an Austrian accent too… > > -XT Somewhere on the Steppe in Mongolia a loud spinning sound can be heard. You spend your life [pillaging the entire known world](http://www.people.ubr.com/historical-figures/by-first-name/g/genghis-khan/genghis-khan-quotes/the-greatest.aspx), and then your best line gets paraphrased by some kraut in a banana hammock who takes all credit 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Sailboat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sailboat/32/461_2.png) [@Sailboat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sailboat)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2009, 4:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/total-war-vs-civilized-warfare/502001/60 "2009-07-08T16:32:29Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > Sherman’s March to the Sea was a classic example of “Total War”. Not strictly true. Sherman did not employ the entire civilian population in war industries, he did not kill indiscriminately. He made war on property, which is one _element_ of total war. In spirit it was much more like a mediaeval [Chevauchée](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chevauch%C3%A9e) than total war. As an aside, it’s interesting how much complaint his destruction of property, but only limited killing, generated among people who were quite happy to praise the property-destroying raids of their own cavalry commanders, and killing in warfare. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/total-war-vs-civilized-warfare/502001.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/total-war-vs-civilized-warfare/502001.md?page=4)