# What does "minimize civilian casualties" mean? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 18, 2006, 1:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-minimize-civilian-casualties-mean/365000 "2006-07-18T13:00:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2006, 2:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-minimize-civilian-casualties-mean/365000/61 "2006-07-23T02:14:12Z")
[QUOTE=hawthorne] **What does “minimize civilian casualties” mean?** [/QUOTE] Dwarves die! . . . I am **so** going to Hell . . . ---
**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 23, 2006, 3:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-minimize-civilian-casualties-mean/365000/62 "2006-07-23T03:20:52Z")
> [@](#): > > What does “minimize civilian casualties” mean? So you’re saying it doesn’t mean cut people up into little pieces? Oops, my bad. ---
**Author:** ![David\_Simmons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9de053/32.png) [@David\_Simmons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_Simmons)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2006, 3:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-minimize-civilian-casualties-mean/365000/63 "2006-07-23T03:27:07Z")
[QUOTE=Little Nemo] I think most reasonable people would agree that the mission goals in Iraq have never been clearly stated. The goals you mentioned have been on the list but items on the list have repeatedly been added and erased and the ones you’ve mentioned have never had any consistent priority. So I figure that the real American mission in Iraq at the moment is “let’s try to stay alive and provide some level of stability in the short term while the government back home tries to figure out where we’re going in the long term.” [/QUOTE] Good points as to the lack of a consitently coherent policy. I think the ones I stated are what GW and Rummy keep coming back to but I agree they are also all over the place at times. However, I really don’t see that your hypotheticals are at all realistic. Your first example only minimizes civilian casualties as compared to the second and both of them are unrealistic. In any case, I’m willing to let the thread not die but just fade away like McAurthur’s Old Soldier. ---
**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 23, 2006, 5:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-minimize-civilian-casualties-mean/365000/64 "2006-07-23T05:03:58Z")
I guess there’s just different meanings to what “minimize” can mean. We’ve seem to have had three different ones in this thread: 1 - It means nothing, it’s just a propaganda soundbite. I disagree. 2 - It means reduce to zero if possible. This meaning is probably the most correct one in a literal sense but is not the one most commonly used. For example, most people would say we should minimize drunk driving. But if we meant this literally, this would be a call to prohibit the use of alcohol or automobiles in order to bring drunk driving down to zero. 3 - It means as low as possible within a given set of guidelines. This is the meaning I think is most commonly meant. In reference to drunk driving, we mean minimize it within the guidelines of allowing people opportunities to drink and to drive but not together. In reference to civilian casualties during a military mission, we mean minimize them within the guidelines of the mission succeeding and with an additional goal of minimizing the casualties of your own troops. ---
**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 23, 2006, 5:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-minimize-civilian-casualties-mean/365000/65 "2006-07-23T05:25:13Z")
I think your number 3 is about as good a definition as I’ve seen. I agree completely. Good post Little Nemo. -XT ---
**Author:** ![canadian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/bb73d2/32.png) [@canadian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/canadian)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2006, 6:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-minimize-civilian-casualties-mean/365000/66 "2006-07-23T06:11:48Z")
To minimize civilian casualties is - Relatively a new term used in recent wars especially to win mass population approval of the countries, friendly or not whose public objections might interfere, reduce or even backfire with the original goal of the war operations - Is the term aggressively attached to the actual or estimated numbers that are below or in the area of the numbers “normally” expected (e.g. “expert” can tell you on TV that, yes those numbers are expected) when latest and conventional technology weapons are used - Method of psychological warfare that patently demonizes and dehumanizes the victim and allows further civilian casualties under the same concept - And finally, everything is done within the budget for the operation and success of the operation has not been overly jeopardized. ---
**Author:** ![David\_Simmons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9de053/32.png) [@David\_Simmons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_Simmons)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2006, 6:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-minimize-civilian-casualties-mean/365000/67 "2006-07-23T06:14:54Z")
[QUOTE=Little Nemo] 3 - It means as low as possible within a given set of guidelines. This is the meaning I think is most commonly meant. … In reference to civilian casualties during a military mission, we mean minimize them within the guidelines of the mission succeeding and with an additional goal of minimizing the casualties of your own troops. [/QUOTE] I could go with this except I would reverse the order of minimizing our forces casualties vs. civilian casualties. I still believe … > [@me](#): > > I have great doubt that planners would jeopardize their own forces by accepting more casualties than necessary. Why should they? The detailed operational planning is done at the regimental or battalion level. Would the planners create a plan with the prospect of injuring people they know and work with in order to not overly endanger enemy civilians? I think the answer is that no, planners wouldn’t do that. The question is, should they? I don’t think so but others’ opinions may vary. ---
**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 24, 2006, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-minimize-civilian-casualties-mean/365000/68 "2006-07-24T00:56:36Z")
David, I’m not sure I follow your last post. You said you’d reverse the order of what I posted but then seemed to say you’d follow the same order. If the confusion resulted from what I wrote, let me be clear: I feel that a higher priority should be given to preventing casualties on your own side than to preventing casualties on the other side. That may not be objectively fair but I think pretty much everyone will have a bias towards their own people rather than the other side. ---
**Author:** ![David\_Simmons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9de053/32.png) [@David\_Simmons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_Simmons)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2006, 1:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-minimize-civilian-casualties-mean/365000/69 "2006-07-24T01:23:46Z")
[QUOTE=Little Nemo] David, I’m not sure I follow your last post. You said you’d reverse the order of what I posted but then seemed to say you’d follow the same order. If the confusion resulted from what I wrote, let me be clear: I feel that a higher priority should be given to preventing casualties on your own side than to preventing casualties on the other side. That may not be objectively fair but I think pretty much everyone will have a bias towards their own people rather than the other side. [/QUOTE] What I was trying to say was that I got the impression from your definition 3 that you would minimuze civilian casualties first and then add in the provision of minimizing casulaties among our forces only if civilian casulaties weren’t increased. I believe the proper order is to minimize our casualties and then try to minimize civilian casualties if that can be done without the danger of increasing ours. Troop morale is going to be adversely affected (I mean the troops are really going to be pissed) when word gets out that their welfare comes behind that of enemy civilians, and word will get out. My experience has been that the GI on the line doesn’t give a damn about the welfare of enemy civilians while the battle is on. He, or she, will not shoot them needlessly but they are the enemy. In a conventional war they are the ones who are supplying the enemy army with the wherewithal to try to kill me. In a guerrilla war they might be hiding or informing for the guerrillas, or be guerrillas themselves. ---
**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 24, 2006, 1:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-minimize-civilian-casualties-mean/365000/70 "2006-07-24T01:37:07Z")
I agree. Sorry I wasn’t clearer in my post. ---
**Author:** ![Measure\_for\_Measure](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/measure_for_measure/32/557_2.png) [@Measure\_for\_Measure](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Measure_for_Measure)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2006, 6:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-minimize-civilian-casualties-mean/365000/71 "2006-07-24T06:05:36Z")
“Minimize civilian casualties”: Translation: “All our targets are military ones, and we avoid using the least accurate weapons in our arsenal in residential neighborhoods. We don’t always have to use the most precise (and expensive) ones though.” There was a decent pit thread on this topic, in which Beagle and flyboy88 educated me about evolving US policies with regards to carpet bombing and the like. Feb 2003: [Come bitch about US bombing raids, not limited to: Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Dresden,Tokyo](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=163413&highlight=TARGET+CIVILIANS+beast+decades) ---
**Author:** ![hawthorne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/c89c15/32.png) [@hawthorne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hawthorne)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2006, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-minimize-civilian-casualties-mean/365000/72 "2006-07-28T16:53:59Z")
This is an update, not a bump. Upthread, I said: > [@](#): > > I do recall seeing a story - years ago - where proposed sorties were being vetted by military lawyers (and IIRC, Australian pilots nonetheless declining a task that had been approved). But I suspect that was merely clearing sorties under Fourth Convention considerations). There are a couple of stories in the Australian press today about this. The stories are from a book by the foreign affairs editor of the _Australian_ newspaper. By way of context, that’s a right-leaning Murdoch broadsheet. The stories are url=[http://www.news.com.au/story/0,10117,19945207-2,00.html](http://www.news.com.au/story/0,10117,19945207-2,00.html)]Aussie veto stops war crimes and [Australia-US alliance laid bare](http://www.news.com.au/story/0,10117,19943761-2,00.html). > [@](#): > > Towards the end of the war the coalition was expecting a nasty fight to enter Baghdad, which did not eventuate. The coalition was prepared for a serious battle. In one set of proposed operations McNarn vetoed three of five proposed US Air Force weapons systems. These were mainly huge bombs of different types. This led to an explosive reaction from one of the US air force officers present, who called McNarn a “pencil dick”. > > McNarn in response read from the US Air Force’s own Concept of Operations document, which said the particular bomb under question was not accurate for a radius of less than 16m and was unsuitable for use in a built-up area. The most senior American commanders ultimately ratified McNarn’s judgment. > [@](#): > > Every night at headquarters in Qatar the most senior commanders would gather. They would hold a secure video teleconference with all the other commanders in the different headquarters and of the different services (air force, navy etc). Each commander participating would have some staff back-up with him. At this conference they would go through the list of targets nominated for the next day. > > McNarn had, among others, Australian intelligence officers and military lawyers with him. An independent intelligence assessment capacity was essential, and without the military lawyers he could hardly have done his job at all. > > On a number of occasions McNarn played his red card. The first time he did it, it was a great shock to the Americans he was dealing with. But it also liberated some participating Americans who may have been uneasy about a particular target but did not themselves possess the red card power and may even have been cautious about speaking up against a plan devised by a fellow commander, or perhaps even someone more senior to them. > > Once or twice McNarn put his objections in writing, saying that the proposed action was against the coalition’s strategic objectives, militarily unnecessary and against the laws of armed conflict. > > “Shit!” one American exclaimed when he saw this document. “What if this leaks?” > > To which the Australian replied, well, it won’t matter if you don’t take the illegal action, or words to that effect. Interesting, though it is hard to have confidence in a process where the term “pencil dick” is used. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-minimize-civilian-casualties-mean/365000.md?page=3)