What Civilians Do Not Understand About War

I want to live in a world where everyone abides by Jesus’ words, “Love your enemy.” That is the only world where peace will reign and wars will be a thing of the past. Unfortunately, that is not the world we live in today and so we have to face the realities of war, realities, that most civilians in the West fail to understand. Subsequently, it leads to demands that are illogical given the nature of war, and worse…it leads to disastrous policies.

Civilian casualties are unavoidable.

War is ugly, gruesome, and devastating for anyone in its path. Even the most righteous nation (as if one exists), with the most righteous cause, will have to bear the burden of causing civilian casualties. In war, even with current technologies, they are unavoidable. We have certainly gotten better since the dawn of modern warfare with precision-guided munitions, but human error, failing technologies, imperfect intelligence, and enemies who cower behind civilian populations lead to innocent people dying. The best a country can hope for is to minimize them but to achieve strategic and operational objectives, it is a price any country will have to pay.

While civilian casualties are heart-wrenching, demands to eliminate civilian casualties are unhelpful. What is helpful is to focus efforts and energy on the issues that…