Reddit reviews Men Against Fire: The Problem of Battle Command

I haven't read this book but it makes the argument that no more than 1 in 4 soldiers actually fired their weapons at the enemy during world war II. https://www.amazon.com/Men-Against-Fire-Problem-Command/dp/0806132809

I was afraid this would happen. You essentially read exactly what you wanted to see in my post.

> Just because you didn't freak out or cry when you saw the World Trade Center collapse doesn't make you "all kinds of fucked up"

Where did I ever suggest that? You took something I said all the way at the bottom of my post, completely unrelated to my reaction as a teenager to the WTC, and tried to jiujitsu those things together.

To clarify, I said that if you were playing truly disturbing videogames at a young age, ones that place you in the roles of a genocidal death camp guard or a serial rapist, then you would be "all kinds of fucked up". That doesn't take a PhD from Harvard to figure out.

> Have you been desensitized to seeing violence happening on a screen? Apparently so. I can't say I or any of my gamer friends have had the same experience, but that's anecdotal evidence for you.

It's pretty much proven that Generation X and Y are far more desensitized to violence than previous generations because of media. That's just proof.

> Even if it's true, does it really matter? That doesn't make you any more likely to commit violence in real life, and I'm sure you'd still have a strong emotional reaction if you were actually involved with or witness to a real, in-person violent situation.

Yes, it does, because it cultivates a great potential to kill.

I recommend you to read On Killing by Lieutenant Colonel Dave Grossman, a former psychology professor at West Point. West Point. You know, the military academy that trains future US Army officers. He's kind of an authority on what it takes to prepare soldiers to kill human targets.

His research compiled some very interesting facts. For example, Samuel Marshall, a Brigadier General and World War I vet, noticed that there was a big ratio disparity between rounds fired and rounds hit among servicemen in World War II. Few soldiers were even actively aiming at their targets.

To amend this, several training changes were made. The US Army replaced their bullseye targets with ones shaped like human silhouettes. Instead of firing at static targets, the focus was shifted to pop-up targets, forcing soldiers to react and fire rapidly. They didn't have the luxury to think about the action they were able to carry out.

The soldiers who graduated from this adjusted program and went into the Korean War had far higher kill ratios. Not because they were better trained, but because they were desensitized.

Videogames don't make you a killer but it gives you far greater potential to be one. I'm not foolish enough to think I've been immune to those effects and anyone who disagrees is laughing in the face of 70 years of proven military research.

You typed an emotional, reactionary reply where you assumed that I'm saying video games are bad. I'm not. Dude, you are talking to a guy who used to work for Major League Gaming. I probably put more hours into violent games than anyone else in this thread, but that doesn't mean I'm going to act like some threatened child whenever a serious psychological study comes up linking games and violence. I absolutely do believe there is a correlation. No doubt about it. Violence is a powerful tool to tell great stories but, like anything else, you get used to it over time. The first time you see naked women at a nude beach may be a big deal, but by the 50th time, they just becomes part of the background.

There's obviously a big difference between killing something in a game and killing in real life but even the simulation of it already prepares an individual to an extent. Basic Training is a far cry from actual warfare, but it prepares you.

By the way, if you read Grossman's book, you will see that he also agrees with us in saying that violence is not a bad thing in and of itself. On the contrary, it's actually a vital trait required in true self-defense. If there is a clear threat or danger to yourself or your loved ones, there's no way to guarantee that safety unless you're willing to kill to preserve those lives. What he's saying is that it's foolish to believe that violence is cultivated in a bubble. You can't tell me religious beliefs, political beliefs, or whatever lead to violence and then turn around and claim that suddenly certain mediums are just incapable of affecting the subconscious, especially a medium that features killing as a staple.

> S.L.A. "Slam" Marshall was a veteran of World War I and a combat historian during World War II. He startled the military and civilian world in 1947 by announcing that, in an average infantry company, no more than one in four soldiers actually fired their weapons while in contact with the enemy. His contention was based on interviews he conducted immediately after combat in both the European and Pacific theaters of World War II.

https://www.amazon.com/Men-Against-Fire-Problem-Command/dp/0806132809

> I'd like to think I'd at least kill the nazi on the stairs.

[The odds aren't in your favor.] (https://www.amazon.com/Men-Against-Fire-Problem-Command/dp/0806132809) Roughly three out of every four GI's never fired their weapons during the war, "even though they were engaged in combat and under direct threat".

It might seem facile or backwards, but willingness to engage with lethal force, and strong battlefield discipline are critical traits of elite units, and these traits are really not all that common nor easy to acquire.

During WW2, US army historian S.L.A. "Slam" Marshall developed a combat effectiveness metric he termed "ratio of fire". In his 1947 book "Men Against Fire", he made the following spectacular claim about US combat forces:

> In an average experienced infantry company in an average day's action, the number engaging with any and all weapons was approximately 15 per cent of the total strength. In the most aggressive companies, under the most intense local pressure, the figure rarely rose above 25 percent of the total strength from the opening to the close of the action.

Marshall's analysis was problematic at best (it is widely discredited today), but his work did highlight a frequently observed disconnect between a unit's expected combat performance, and observed outcomes. Military historian John Keegan's Soldiers describes a Napoleonic-era Prussian experiment, where a musket battalion demonstrated a 60% kill ratio at 75 yards when firing against targets, and a 2% kill ratio at 30 yards when firing against a human enemy. This same phenomenon has been noted in many other wars: Dave Grossman's "On Killing" describes how WW1 British Lieutenant George Roupell had to march up and down the trench hitting his men with his sword, ordering them to stop firing high, while US forces in Vietnam famously expended fifty thousand rounds for every enemy soldier killed. At Rorke's drift, British infantry were surrounded by Zulu warriors at close quarters, yet still managed a hit ratio barely over 10%. Whatever lies at the root of this behavior, an average soldier is not nearly as dangerous as his battle circumstances and weaponry might make him. Elite units do not display this gap (nor do crewed weapons).

Of course, soldiers do kill each other during war. As Carl von Clausewitz noted, the vast majority of combat casualties happen after a battle, when an enemy has routed and is at its most vulnerable. A unit that can maintain cohesion in the most dire circumstances can avoid the worst part of the battle, and garner an elite reputation. Among the North American Plains Indians, a warrior tradition called "counting coup" served as the measure of a tribe or individual's merit in war. Under this scheme, the highest act of bravery was touching an enemy with a hand or a stick, and escaping unscathed. This was, of course, most easily accomplished once the enemy had routed. This practice allowed the Plains Indians to engage in warfare without destroying each other.

Napoleon's Old Guard never fled the battlefield (they were ultimately annihilated at Waterloo after the Young Guard did rout). Alexander the Great dealt with several routing opponents, but never once panicked and fled himself. Smedley Butler never routed.

As far as how a unit can acquire these traits, sometimes it is via their commander. Napoleon, on the other hand, carefully used esprit de corps to grow the Guard into an elite fighting force. Professional military today use extensive training and conditioning (and snipers are always deployed as a team). In any case, once you realize that an untrained enemy's fire is probably about as dangerous as the bathroom guy in Pulp Fiction, you can focus all your effort on making him rout, at which point you'll be able to command the outcome.