You Can’t Stop Genocide Without Killing Civilians

ISIS-Mass-KillingBy the time World War II was over entire cities had been devastated and hundreds of thousands of civilians had been killed by the Allies in one of the last wars whose virtue we were all able to agree on. The civilians were not limited to enemy German and Japanese civilians, but included French civilians in occupied territory, Jewish prisoners and numerous others who were caught in the war zone.

To the professional pacifist these numbers appear to disprove the morality of war, any war, but they were the blood price that had to be paid to stop two war machines once they had been allowed to seize the strategic high ground. There was no other way to stop the genocide that Germany and Japan had been inflicting on Europe and Asia except through a way of war that would kill countless civilians.

A refusal to fight that war would not have been the moral course. It would have meant that the Allies would have continued to serve as the silent partners in genocide. The same thing is true today.

War is ugly. It is made moral by why it is fought, not by how it is fought.  If we are fighting a war to prevent mass murder, our moral obligation is to win it as quickly as possible. Not as cleanly.

Our attempt to streamline the ugly parts into a drone taking out a terrorist target with no collateral damage is a moral fiction. Civilians die in drone strikes as in any other form of attack and believing that we can have our moral cake and eat it too has convinced some that any other kind of war is immoral.

If we had set out to win World War II as cleanly as possible the price for our morality would have been paid by our own soldiers as well as by the countless victims of Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan.

As we can see the way that American soldiers and Afghan civilians paid the price for Obama’s morality.

As I wrote in The Great Betrayal, “the number of Afghan civilian casualties caused by American forces had dropped between 2009 and 2011, but civilian casualties caused by the Taliban steadily increased… 2009 proved to be the deadliest year for Afghan civilians with over 2,400 killed… with the Taliban accounting for two-thirds of the total. While the percentage of casualties caused by US forces fell 28 percent, the percentage caused by the Taliban increased by 40 percent making up for American restraint.  This fell into line with the increase in NATO combat deaths which rose from 295 to 520.”

“By 2011, the ISAF forces were responsible for only 14.2 percent of Afghan civilian deaths, while the Taliban were responsible for 79.8 percent of them.”

American soldiers were killing fewer Afghan civilians, but more Afghan civilians were dying. The rules of engagement allowed the Taliban to win which meant that they would be able to kill more civilians. Instead of helping Afghan civilians, we were causing more of them and more of us to be killed.

Obama’s moral approach to war was what the Jewish sages had called the “righteousness of fools.”

This issue takes on a renewed urgency as the United States confronts ISIS genocide in Iraq and Syria. To stop ISIS, we will have to do what we were unwilling to do when it came to fighting the Taliban. We will have to hit them and hit them hard.

There was a time when we could have dealt a setback to ISIS with drone strikes. Obama golfed that golden time away. Pinpoint strikes will no longer stop the Islamic State. Only decisive force will.

The White House was panicked enough to relax the rules on “near certainty” allowing more freedom of action against ISIS, but it’s also not nearly enough. ISIS is not a group of terrorists hiding in caves. It operates like an army. It sustains its forces by maintaining a constant forward momentum. This is something that it has in common with Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan, both of whom were running fragile military and economic enterprises that depended on a steady stream of new conquests.

Stopping ISIS will require a willingness to either put boots on the ground or accept heavy civilian casualties. We once again have a choice between “Shock and Awe” or years of occupation.

We made the wrong choice in the past. We have to be willing to make the right one now.

We can break ISIS if we are willing to clear away the obstacles in the kill-chain by moving as quickly as the enemy does. Instead what we have is the worst of both worlds, a process of approving strikes that treats ISIS as if it were a ponderous conventional foe combined with minimal strikes better suited to the kinds of terrorist enemies we were fighting a decade ago.

Our enemy is mobile and resourceful. It knows our tactics and our limitations. Our people need to be free to take immediate and responsive action on the spot instead of relying on a process that has become too slow and inflexible under the bureaucratic pace of drone warfare.

Obama’s delays closed the door on our opportunity to rescue American hostages being held by ISIS. The dithering which has accompanied all of his military decisions is completely unworkable when confronting groups that have learned to quickly adapt and respond. If the war against ISIS continues to be run through the White House, filtered through its advisers and polls, then the war will be lost.

On the battlefield we have to be willing to accept that if we use large scale bombing to go after a military group that uses civilians as human shields, there will be large numbers of civilian casualties. But that number will be far less than what it would be if ISIS gets to carry out its genocides and continues to drag out the war across the region.

The lesson that we should take away from Afghanistan is that finicky attitudes about civilian casualties only end up costing more civilian lives.

Ending a war requires the use of decisive force. The alternative is the miserable situation in Israel in which it hurts Hamas enough to buy some time, but not enough to stop another war two years later.

Sparing terrorists to save civilians is morally and practically backward. Terrorists kill civilians. Sparing terrorists means that more civilians will die.

On September 10, 2001, Bill Clinton said that he could have had Bin Laden taken out if not for the collateral damage in Kandahar. As a result of his inaction, 3,000 people in the United States and countless civilians in Afghanistan died. By trying to prevent 300 civilian casualties, he actually caused ten times and then a hundred times that many civilian casualties.

We can’t afford any more Clinton moralizing that sacrifices the World Trade Center to spare Kandahar and then has to bomb Kandahar anyway. We can either learn the lessons of Afghanistan or continue losing thousands of Americans to wars that never end.

*

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  • mollysdad

    The Islamic State assumes that we will not use nuclear weapons to destroy it.

    I say we should consider refuting that assumption.

    • Biff Henderson

      I’m more in favor of un-shelving the neutron bomb. Political fall-out be damned. I’m for fall-out that’s easy on future generations.

      • sundance69

        Amen to that, Syria is a pile of rubble anyhow.

    • sundance69

      Can you say parking lot. They all hate us anyhow, why not give them something to really chew on?

      • MukeNecca

        Oh no, no parking lot, please. They will be next day screaming in the UN that we now must give them cars.

    • Bamaguje

      Nuclear weapons?
      Isn’t that overkill?

      • Larry Larkin

        No such thing as overkill. There is kill and not kill.

      • cree

        With allah’s only true prophet’s goal of world domination, it might depend on if people refuse to be under world domination subjugation. Iran and Pakistan may have a say in how that plays out; on whether how much more heat is applied to their long cold war.

      • mollysdad

        You can’t kill too many camel piss drinkers.

      • Harry_the_Horrible

        In any case, I don’t think we have a concentrated enough target for the use of nukes.
        What we really need is aircraft loitering 24/7 over the line of battle and along their lines of communication, with FACs to guide them.

      • http://LiberalPandemic.wordpress.com/ Peter Pocket

        A few MOAB’s will do the trick just fine.

    • Gee

      I agree, but for a different reason.

      In 1945 the US used two nuclear weapons and it so shocked the world that they were never used again.

      I believe that to send a real message to the entire world might just be the ticket. Plus the undeniable destruction of the ISIS

    • truebearing

      We don’t need nukes to destroy ISIS. We just need a competent CIC that loves and defends America. Bush made his fair share of mistakes but he would have hammered ISIS into dung beetle food by now.

      • mollysdad

        What we need is a batshit crazy fundamentalist who’s willing to do whatever it takes to make the entire space between the Mediterranean Sea and India safe for Christianity.

      • MLCBLOG

        Absolutely.

  • camp7

    War is cruelty. There is no use trying to reform it. The crueler it is, the sooner it will be over. ~ William Tecumseh Sherman

    Hard war is how to end a war. History tells us it takes wisdom, leadership and faith. I don’t see those characteristics in the current White House administration. My senses tell me that Obama will cause the death of thousands because he is not wise, he’s not a leader and he loves himself more than anyone or thing.

    You’re correct Daniel. Unfortunately, Obama will kill more civilians through negligence than would be killed by a total war effort to defeat Islam and end the war. So far the tally is not in his favor. Other than a military coup d’état I don’t see any changes of the status quo. On the up side, in two years the American public will be so disgusted with this idiot, they might elect a real leader.

    • truebearing

      Very well said. Obama’s malignant narcissism is a scourge to America. ISIS, Ebola, illegal aliens flooding the borders, profligate spending…he is a not a defender, not a warrior. He surrenders to every threat.

      • Biff Henderson

        Surrender. Obama hangs the public on a lie, the inverted, broken cross of peaceful sacrifice, that the murderous and foul sup on at their leisure. We’re the frozen sheep in a meadow after an ice storm while the shepherd dreams of moonbeams thawing the cold heart of a ravenous dog.

      • JacksonPearson

        “he is a not a defender, not a warrior. He surrenders to every threat.” Yes….

    • wildjew

      “…in two years the American public will be so disgusted with this idiot, they might elect a real leader.”

      Electing a real leader will mean conservatives are not swindled by “Establishment” Republicans into nominating a loser like we were in 2008 and 2012.

    • nobullhere

      Unfortunately, the way of the West these days is not to fight wars to win, and that is why we haven’t won any against a well-equipped enemy for 70 years. Our tactics, political correctness and determination to hold the ‘moral high ground’ regardless of everything else guarantees defeat. We expect the Israelis to fight a politically correct war, and there is only one outcome of fighting politically correct wars – the enemy ultimately wins.

      • camp7

        True. Difference is, the enemy is within and we’re getting down to brass tacks. Our “moral high ground” is eroding into a dark valley of radical totalitarianism and Islamic fanaticism. It’s basic survival now, kill or be killed. Slavery is worse than death.

    • JB Ziggy Zoggy

      Defeat islam? What makes you think Barack Hussein Obama wants to do that?

      • camp7

        10-4. Just two more years of watching the freak show. Then again, there may be an encore.

      • MLCBLOG

        Exactly!!!

    • CapitalistPig

      Thanks, I was trying to remember that very quote from Gen. Sherman.
      Now, on to Atlanta!………….errrr, ISIS!.

      • SCREW SOCIALISM

        Kicking the crap out of ISIS will tarnish their image and make them LOOZERS.

        • MLCBLOG

          Would.

      • camp7

        I always liked that Sherman’s style. He got things done.

  • truebearing

    Brilliant and simple polemic, Daniel. There is no way to win a war with rules of engagement that favor the enemy in every way. Wars are won when the rules of engagement are dictated by the shortest path to victory.

    Clinton’s rationalisation on why he didn’t take out Bin Laden is a lie. What he cared about was his own political/moral standing, not concern about civilians, or morals in the truest sense. Just as with Obama, Clinton always had a political consideration that took priority over any military decision. His unwillingness to do what leaders are elected to do — take on great moral responsibility — resulted in many times the number of civilian deaths he claims to have avoided… but it gave him something for him to brag about.

    In Clinton’s self-deluded mind, his hands are clean, but in reality his moral turpitude and cowardice have him floating neck deep in the blood of victims he could have saved…many of whom have yet to die as a consequence of failing to eradicate the nascent evil of Al Qaeda.

    Narcissists like Obama or Clinton make terrible military commanders. They can’t fight wars with the ferocity or dedication of a man protecting a nation he loves. The passionate defense of their fellow countryman is an impossibility. Yhey simply don’t care.

    • Hank Rearden

      Well said.

    • sundance69

      You cannot fight a politically correct war and win. Didn’t we learn our lesson in Viet Nam?

      • Harry_the_Horrible

        Nope.
        And, unfortunately, it looks like the “Laws of War” amount to “The US will not be allowed to bring its full force to bear upon an enemy, nor shall it be allowed to decisively win a war.”

      • truebearing

        Leftocrats never learn. Marxism has failed in every way, other than inflicting abject misery, yet they persist in trying to improve the square wheel of political ideology.

  • Bamaguje

    “If the war against ISIS continues to be run through the White House… then the war will be lost” – DG.

    Obviously Obama is taking the “commander” in Commander-in-chief too seriously. He has no military training or experience, and should let the Generals do their job.

    • sundance69

      Actually he should resign, he doesn’t know how to do much of anything but play golf and he’s not even very good at that.

    • truebearing

      He has fundamentally transformed his job description, along with everything else. The president is now the Surrenderer-In-Chief.

  • http://ruleofreason.blogspot.com/ Edward Cline

    Obama has been dithering on golf courses and fund raisers because what ISIS is doing he interprets to be a kind of “community organizing,” that is, organizing Syria and Iraq per the diktats of the Koran. He is friendly towards Islam. I don’t think he gives a fig about the civilians he claims he wants to save from drone strikes or ROE tactics. That’s a false front, a PR stance. What the public and the military expect him to do — that is, emasculate and terminate ISIS with unrestricted bombing and massive retaliatory force — goes against every one of his allegedly moral premises. He doesn’t want to hear about what ISIS does to civilians. He’d rather not know. He wants the war fought on his terms — not Sherman’s, or Patton’s — which will only guarantee defeat. He wants to defeat the U.S., just as it was defeated in Vietnam.

    • SCREW SOCIALISM

      All the fund raisers Obama goes to results in

      bad optics.

      Raising money is more important to Obama and the Demos than solving the many problems we face.

      I hope the Republicans take control of the Senate. It’s now or never.

    • MLCBLOG

      Exactly

  • mtnhikerdude

    War …. if you do not plan on reigning utter destruction on the enemy and breaking their will to fight ,there is no reason to declare war .

  • kevinstroup

    You cannot wage war without collateral damage. Not in this universe or this lifetime, anyway. War is extremely imprecise and messy. That is why it is a last resort. But once launched, go all out with victory the ONLY goal. By all means try to minimize adverse impacts, but always keep victory as the ONLY goal.

    • http://LiberalPandemic.wordpress.com/ Peter Pocket

      They can’t stop wringing their hands over the firebombing of Dresden. The Left knows only how to wage war on its own citizens.

  • Tradecraft46

    Glad to see someone notice. We killed civilians with alacrity during WWII. Now however we fear offending our enemies is we do so.

    The secret is that Muslim on Muslim violence does not bother them, so we should hire it done, by natural allies: give money like Richelieu did during the Thirty Years’ War, letting the Devil take the hinder and foremost.

    • nobullhere

      Yep. 3.1 million German civilians were killed during World War II

  • MukeNecca

    Some years ago I witnessed a traffic accident caused by a fire brigade truck colliding with a private car which resulted in death of the sedan driver and serious injury to his passenger. I don’t recall anyone questioning the wisdom of using fire trucks to save lives of people trapped in burning buildings.

  • Arafat

    OT.
    Write a comment for this column:

    http://dailyprincetonian.com/opinion/2014/10/is-the-center-for-jewish-life-stifling-free-speech-on-campus/

    Do not let Max Weiss get off scot-free as a fifth column Jews.

  • cheechakos

    Obama is a frightened boy-king desperate to be popular. His failure to respond in a timely manner using decisive aggressive strikes makes the US look weak and emboldens ISIS.
    ISIS has released a map of their planned conquests. The amount of civilian casualties will be horrific if they achieve their goal. And the survivors will be probably wish they were dead after ISIS enslaves them.

    • UCSPanther

      I hope the IDF and the people of the Balkans really show the Islamic State savages what it truly means to be a warrior….

  • Gee

    We are just as guilty. We have snipers withholding fire when there are civilians present even though they set up a rocket and fired it. I have berated that person because he was endangering the very people he swore to protect.

    Yes the only thing more terrible than a war won, is a war lost

    • http://LiberalPandemic.wordpress.com/ Peter Pocket

      Crazy john McCain was right about Obama when he said that “He’d rather lose a war than lose an election.” Well, he just did with Iraq.

  • Debbie G

    So after we defeat Isis, I wonder if those surviving civilians will now love and appreciate America for helping them out. I doubt it.

    • http://libertyandculture.blogspot.com/ Jason P

      In other words they’ll feel the same as they always did.

    • nobullhere

      At this rate, we won’t defeat ISIS.

    • MukeNecca

      Maybe, maybe not – it’s not very important. The important thing is that America will be feared enough to dissuade the Mohammedans from joining the next ISIS-like organization.

      • Debbie G

        I guess I should have added (sarc) at the end of my statement. Actually, I couldn’t care less if they like us or not. I was trying to say that whether or not we kill civilians, they will hate us just the same. So let’s do what we have to do to get the job done, and leave them shaking in their boots. Fear is good!

    • http://www.facebook.com/aemoreira81 aemoreira81

      If ISIS is defeated—you still have Putin in the picture. That makes this situation unlike any prior situation ever faced.

  • http://libertyandculture.blogspot.com/ Jason P

    That says it all. Shamefully these ideas are not even discussed in our culture even among most conservatives. Since WWII there is a bastardization of the “Just War” doctrine ties our hands and allows savage enemies to win, slaughter, and oppress. This article should be in any anthology of war ethos and ethics.

    • truebearing

      Perfect.

  • Bibliophilist

    “The only tactical principle which is not subject to change; it is, “To use the means at hand to inflict the maximum amount of wounds, death, and destruction on the enemy in the minimum amount of time.” – George Patton

  • Dan Knight

    Thank you Daniel.

  • Dan Knight

    Agreed: Though technically those who support our New Pacifism support the slaughter of the innocent …

  • truebearing

    The degenerate pacificism of the Left is a lie. They are more than happy to kill fetuses and impose death panels on old or sick people. They have no compunctions against killing political enemies.

  • JB Ziggy Zoggy

    “(War) is made moral by why it is fought, not by how it is fought.”

    Truer words were never written.

  • Joel Cairo

    The correct approach to warfare is to go in with a desire to win and the willingness to do whatever is necessary to achieve that win.
    As a subset of the above, it is likely that the best rules of engagement are
    1) shoot first and ask questions later.
    2) no questions will be asked.
    This becomes particularly necessary in situations such as we presently encounter where it becomes almost impossible to differentiate between combatants and non-combatants.

  • Erudite Mavin

    Daily Mail UK 10/13/14

    ‘There are hundreds of bodies with their heads cut off… they put their heads on display to scare us’: Survivors of Kobane massacre reveal the brutality of ISIS rampage in Syrian border town

    Thirteen-year-old Dillyar cannot get the image of his cousin being beheaded out of his mind. The pair were fleeing Kobane and running down a street when Islamic State fighters blocked their exit.

    Dillyar managed to slip through their grasp but his cousin Mohammed, 20, was seized, and gave a blood-curdling scream as one of the black-clad maniacs drew out a knife.

    ‘They pushed him to the ground and sawed his head off, shouting ‘Allahu Akbar’,’ the schoolboy told me yesterday. ‘I see it in my dreams every night and every morning I wake up and remember everything.’

    According to those who escaped, the jihadis’ savagery is more hideous than anyone feared.

    Headless corpses litter the streets of the besieged Syrian border town, they say, and some of the mainly Kurdish townsfolk have had their eyes gouged out.

    Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2790296/blood-curdling-screams-headless-bodies-siege-town-mail-man-sam-greenhill-reports-frontline-jihadi-squads-lie-wait-western-hostages.html#ixzz3G3wdWou1

  • 1Indioviejo1

    We won WW II because we engaged in total war to destroy the enemy and its resources including its population. We won an Unconditional Surrender. Grant did it too. Korea and Vietnam were fought differently and we lost. Let us never sacrifice our military in winless and eternal wars. Let us keep in mind that our main objective is to win by whatever means necessary.

  • wildjew

    I am watching Ted Cruz and Scott Walker. Who are you watching? Do you think Dr. Carson might make a good Secretary of Health and Human Services.

    • camp7

      Same here. Let’s hope they can wade through the political clay that’s being prepared for them by the Dems and the juggernaut GOP.

  • Jonathan Shockley

    2006:

    Lancet report concludes 655,000 deaths due to the US invasion of Iraq, with most known deaths directly attributable to US gun shots

    RESULT:

    Denial and Silence

    2014:

    Thousands killed by ISIS in the aftermath of a war torn Iraq

    RESULT:

    Massive Outrage and Attention

    “A propaganda system will consistently portray people abused in enemy states as worthy victims, whereas those treated with equal or greater severity by its own government or clients will be unworthy. The evidence of worth may be read from the extent and character of attention and indignation. While this differential treatment occurs on a large scale, the media, intellectuals, and public are able to remain unconscious of the fact and maintain a high moral and self-righteous tone. This is evidence of an extremely effective propaganda system.” -Noam Chomsky

    • johninohio1

      What conclusion do you wish me to draw from this?

      • Jonathan Shockley

        Chomsky’s words at the end

  • cxt

    Sad topic but some of your best work……IMO

    But what you said needed to be said.

  • MLCBLOG

    Dithering? Looks to me like stonewalling, deliberately delaying. After all, whose side do we think he is on. Obviously not ours!

    I must say though yours is a brilliant article. Well said. Would that we could actually do this now. Win, that is.

  • truebearing

    Nothing like a daily diet of B-52s, fighters, A-10s, Apaches, and relentless artillery. Throw in some cruise missiles, Predator Drones, and an occasional visit by some AC-130s, and you have a lot of dead terrorists. Couldn’t happen to a more deserving bunch of scum.

    Are you still over there? It looks like the airport in Baghdad is in trouble again.

  • Bamaguje

    I’m with you. But tanks, artillery and all, imply full military commitment to ground invasion.
    I don’t think Americans want U.S. troops involvement in another large scale war in the Middle east.

  • JB Ziggy Zoggy

    If you think Hillary Clinton has a chance of becoming President, you are a paid troll.

  • Bamaguje

    More like Muslim brotherhood Trojan horse.
    Despite his denials, the traitor-in-chief is probably still a Muslim.

  • CurmudgyOne

    Our man who no longer wants to be President, Barack Obama, wants to run and hide. He will never wage wage to win. He is more a Jihadist Sympathizer than he is a sympathetic human being or an American. He does not want to confront them. “Taqiyya” doesn’t seem to be working for him anymore. It’s time he faced the truth, learned the truth, told the truth, took his head out of the sand, and did his job. By the time ISIS arrives on our shores, it will be too late. Possibly already is. Read William Forstchen’s short book, “Day of Wrath.” It’s coming. I wonder if an action like that in the book would sway Obama … i personally don’t think it would.

  • CapitalistPig

    Kill them all…………& let Allah sort them out.

  • steve b

    NUKE EVERY ISIS CONTROLLED AREA IN THE ENTIRE MIDDLE EAST. NOT ONLY WILL YOU KILL MOST OF THEM, YOU’LL ALSO KILL MANY OF THE FUTURE TERRORISTS AND THE WOMEN WHO WOULD BREED THEM. WE DID NOT DISCRIMINATE IN WWII WHEN WE BOMBED HAMBURG, DRESDEN, BERLIN, TOKYO, HIROSHIMA AND NAGASAKI.

  • bigbiz2

    Americas biggest War criminal ..Abe Lincoln and his psycho blood thirsty Generals Sherman and Sheridan were responsible for hundreds of thousands of American civilian deaths.. American cities burned to the gr`ound.. whole towns forced to evacuate while looking for conferate sympathizers.This started the new modern aproach to war. When the US stopped killing civilians we stopped wining wars.