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Hernando Today

Who Are The 'Innocent Civilians?'

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By JOHN NASH, Of Cabbages and Kings

Hernando Today

Published: January 15, 2009

If they're not carping about Israel's use of "disproportionate force" in protecting itself from Islamic terrorists, teary-eyed liberals are wringing soft-but-anguished hands over the suffering of "innocent civilians" in cities attacked by Israel's admirable military forces. Unfortunately, those emotionally-confused liberals include most of the media, which can't wait to publish another photo of a ragged, tear-stained child being treated for some kind of injury, which may or may not be related to warfare. That sort of irresponsible journalism is a disservice to Israel, to peace-loving Arabs, and to the world-wide war on terrorists; it is also a relatively new phenomenon, which is difficult to explain or justify.
Except in rare cases (such as when David met Goliath to settle a dispute between arguing factions) wars are between peoples, which includes "civilians" as well as their armies. Civilians grow the food to feed the army. They build the army's weapons, provide a ready supply of recruits, and fund its operation. Therefore, civilians will inevitably suffer casualties in any war. Both German and British civilians suffered terribly from air raids carried out in the Second World War. In the 14th century, a seemingly invincible Ottoman Army laid waste to many of the cities through which it marched while capturing nation after nation. Civilians were not spared. When Japan decided to conquer China, it made no effort to avoid civilian casualties when it bombed and shelled crowded cities. In order to stop Japan's dream of controlling half of the globe (including even the United States), we had to level many of its cities, killing large numbers of civilians (many of which would likely have taken up arms against our troops, had we tried to invade their homeland).
The Germans routinely carpet bombed London before the Allies gained control of the air, and reversed that practice, resulting in hundreds of thousands of deaths among German civilians. Yes, civilians inevitably die in warfare, but are any of them "innocent"? One might quickly reply that, "Little children are surely innocent." But those youths all too often grow up to hate their traditional enemies; to wear a uniform, and carry a gun, or perhaps to build a better bomb.
The problem has become far more complex and difficult to understand in recent times, because when fighting breaks out between irregular forces (e.g., terrorists) and conventional military units, civilians often provide sanctuary, cover, and protection for the terrorists, so the two are inseparable. This is especially so for the current fighting in much of the Islamic world (e.g., Iraq, Afghanistan, Lebanon, Pakistan, and the Gaza Strip), where irregular forces use places of worship as forts and armories, and civilian homes as their barracks and artillery emplacements.
As best I can determine, Israel has tried hard to minimize civilian casualties in Gaza by targeting and striking only precise locations where enemy combatants are known to be. Civilians supporting those militants will unavoidably suffer, so will a few others caught in the crossfire. Hamas, on the other hand, routinely launches unguided, and untargeted missiles and mortar rounds into Israeli population centers, intending nothing other than terrorizing and killing whomever.
We did not, during World War II, focus news coverage on civilian casualties, because we knew, instinctively, that to do so would have been helpful to our enemies, avoidably demoralizing to our military forces, and upsetting for the civilian population that had to support them. The first significant evidence that our media was concentrating on civilian casualties in warfare reportage appeared during the Vietnamese conflict; I believe that such unusual attention on civilian suffering contributed significantly to our eventual failure in that troubled arena.
Then there's the problem in determining which of the casualties are civilians. Is a soldier home on leave and in civilian clothes at the dinner table with his family a civilian? Is a 10-year-old boy that serves as a lookout and message runner for irregular forces a civilian? Is a physician that works to restore wounded fighters to combat status a civilian? Is an old woman that happily allows snipers to shoot from her house windows a civilian? Does the cleric who permits storage of ammunition in his mosque qualify as a civilian? And, especially, is the terrorist in mufti a civilian?
War is wrong! It is amoral, brutal, and inexcusable, but it will continue to exist for as long as man is greedy and not far removed from his primitive state — which may be forever. Therefore, many will die and even more suffer terrible wounds; some will, unavoidably, be civilians, so let's get beyond our current fascination with photos of such. Instead, let's just feature close-up photos, in living color, of victims of bloody highway accidents, which seem to fascinate us to such an extent that we hold up traffic on the Interstate by slowing down to gawk.
And, especially, let's drop the use of "innocent civilians." There are very few such, and it's most difficult to decide just which they are.

Of Cabbages and Kings is a regular feature of this paper. The author invites relevant and rational comment, which may be sent to him at john@have-eye.com.

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