# Rewarding "Courageous Restraint"=Way to Cut Civ Cas?



## The Bread Guy (4 May 2010)

Uh, am I out of whack here, but how many soldiers would hold fire or not do something just because they _might_ get a gong?  You think they might just be, I don't know, following the rules?  Or am I missing something in the concept?

This from the Associated Press:


> NATO commanders are weighing a new way to reduce civilian casualties in Afghanistan: recognizing soldiers for "courageous restraint" if they avoid using force that could endanger innocent lives.
> 
> The concept comes as the coalition continues to struggle with the problem of civilian casualties despite repeated warnings from the top NATO commander, Gen. Stanley McChrystal, that the war effort hinges on the ability to protect the population and win support away from the Taliban.
> 
> ...


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## Journeyman (4 May 2010)

> ...recognizing soldiers if they avoid using force...


_Finally_, some recognition for the French and Germans up in RC-North.


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## The Bread Guy (4 May 2010)

Journeyman said:
			
		

> _Finally_, some recognition for the French and Germans up in RC-North.


Tough crowd  ;D


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## GAP (4 May 2010)

It's a good thing we are pulling out in 2011.....next will be a medal for going potty in the correct place... :


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## TN2IC (5 May 2010)

Journeyman said:
			
		

> _Finally_, some recognition for the French and Germans up in RC-North.



You owe me a new computer screen and Timmies.


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## Gunner98 (5 May 2010)

So, there is a role for conscientious objectors in the military and on ops!  Let's not forget the Dutch and Romainans in RC(S).


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## McG (5 May 2010)

While this might seem easy to poke fun at, there are plenty of examples from within our own military across various missions where soldiers have achieved good to great things through the courage to leave them selves open while exercising restraint and still not backing down.  I don't see anything wrong with recognizing this bravery in the same way we recognize bravery when bullets are flying.


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## OldSolduer (5 May 2010)

Question is:

Is this "policy" going to put OUR soldiers lives at risk? While I do agree with MCG and our troops have exercised restraint despite being in danger, will some make the wrong decision, show that restraint, and end up dead because of it?
While I agree with this in principle, let us not forget that there are times when our troops will have to pull the trigger.

And this came from the leadership that closed various amenities on KAF because "we are at war" and these amenities caused the troops to lose focus...


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## Gunner98 (6 May 2010)

MCG said:
			
		

> While this might seem easy to poke fun at, there are plenty of examples from within our own military across various missions where soldiers have achieved good to great things through the courage to leave them selves open while exercising restraint and still not backing down.  I don't see anything wrong with recognizing this bravery in the same way we recognize bravery when bullets are flying.



And Rwanda is not one of them!  I agree with MAS, this Comd is becoming increasingly politically-correct.  How about punishing those who use excessive or inappropriate force, then they might create the balance necessary to minimize casualties.


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## SeanNewman (6 May 2010)

I agree that there needs to be more punishment when we get it wrong and kill innocent people than rewarding when we don't.

The Oka-type scenario is what something like a Medal of Bravery would be applicable for.

There are all sorts of times when lethal force is 100% justified, but if someone says "launch a Hellfire" at a group of people who end up to have not really been that much of a threat, there needs to be more than "Well I was there and nobody can second guess me because you don't understand what it was like".

Rewarding restraint is a very dangerous slope.  Without knowing the full intent, the first situation that comes to mind is the vehicle speeding toward the convoy and ignoring the entire escalation of force spectrum to stop.  Now that soldier is potentially letting the car to within X metres instead of X+50 metres.


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## OldSolduer (6 May 2010)

Petamocto said:
			
		

> le
> Rewarding restraint is a very dangerous slope.  Without knowing the full intent, the first situation that comes to mind is the vehicle speeding toward the convoy and ignoring the entire escalation of force spectrum to stop.  Now that soldier is potentially letting the car to within X metres instead of X+50 metres.


I concur. 

While the motive is noble, it may put our troops lives at risk.


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## McG (6 May 2010)

Simian Turner said:
			
		

> MCG said:
> 
> 
> 
> ...


No.  Rwanda was not.  But that is because Rwanda was not a capable force showing restraint - Rwanda was an non-capable force showing impotence.

I am somewhat perplexed by the apparent wisdom of some that offering positive recognition for restraint will lead to more avoidable deaths and that we should instead institute greater punishment.  Nobody is going to get themselves killed in the hopes of collecting a medal for courageous restraint, but guys will hesitate if we establish cause to fear reprisals.

Also remember that we are soldiers.  That does not mean we accept risk and casualties to kill the enemy – it means we accept risk and casualties to accomplish the mission.  If greater restraint sees casualties incurred at an increased rate but an earlier achievement of the mission, then that is the cost of business – and in the long run, the earlier victory will mean fewer casualties to the coalition and non-combatants.


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## Gunner98 (6 May 2010)

MCG said:
			
		

> Also remember that we are soldiers.  That does not mean we accept risk and casualties to kill the enemy – it means we accept risk and casualties to accomplish the mission.  If greater restraint sees casualties incurred at an increased rate but an earlier achievement of the mission, then that is the cost of business – and in the long run, the earlier victory will mean fewer casualties to the coalition and non-combatants.



Yes indeed we are soldiers, that is not hard to forget, but what is the 'victory' you are expecting in Afghanistan?  So taking more early casualties to accomplish the mission is acceptable to you - I don't think our superiors, government or public would agree.  It would seem we are taking more casualties now than we were 9 years ago, so...is victory close at hand and our mission is near complete?


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## McG (6 May 2010)

Simian Turner said:
			
		

> So taking more early casualties to accomplish the mission is acceptable to you - I don't think our superiors, government or public would agree


That is not what I said.  We need to be ready to accept a higher rate of casualties for tactics that will end the war quicker – we will then see fewer aggregate casualties.



			
				Simian Turner said:
			
		

> It would seem we are taking more casualties now than we were 9 years ago, so...is victory close at hand and our mission is near complete?


Don't distorte what I've said & attack strawmen because they are easier than the argument I have actually made.  I did means the end of the war is near.  
I am saying that we should not prolong the war for the sake of risk aversion (casualty aversion).

It is not about taking more casualties to end the mission.  It is about not shying from effective tactics even if those tactics result in higher short term losses.

Our Counter insurgency doctrine tells us that that we will generate more insurgents every time we kill the wrong people.  It tells us that we win by stealing the insurgents moral support base.  It tells us we need to exercise restraint in order to win.  

We should not be punishing soldiers who could have exercised more restraint – but we should positively recognize those who do.  We should only punish recklessness – either reckless use of force or reckless restraint –  and violations of RoE & LoAC.


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## OldSolduer (6 May 2010)

MCG said:
			
		

> We should not be punishing soldiers who could have exercised more restraint – but we should positively recognize those who do.  We should only punish recklessness – either reckless use of force or reckless restraint –  and violations of RoE & LoAC.



This I can wrap my brain around. Thank you for clarifying that.


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## Greymatters (6 May 2010)

MCG said:
			
		

> Our Counter insurgency doctrine tells us that that we will generate more insurgents every time we kill the wrong people.  It tells us that we win by stealing the insurgents moral support base.  It tells us we need to exercise restraint in order to win.



I dont mean to nitpick, but this concept has been around a long time, and was common knowledge long before it got published in the COIN manual.  It also covers the concepts of using appropriate levels of force during a situation and at the right time, i.e. considering whether operational goals will significantly interfere with strategic or political goals.


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## Gunner98 (6 May 2010)

MCG said:
			
		

> That is not what I said.  We need to be ready to accept a higher rate of casualties for tactics that will end the war quicker – we will then see fewer aggregate casualties.
> Don't distorte what I've said & attack strawmen because they are easier than the argument I have actually made.  I did means the end of the war is near.
> I am saying that we should not prolong the war for the sake of risk aversion (casualty aversion).
> 
> It is not about taking more casualties to end the mission.  It is about not shying from effective tactics even if those tactics result in higher short term losses.



I apologize if I distorted your ideas, it is often hard to interpret the written word because we can't hear the author's intra-cranial thought process.  I agree that the end of our participation in the war is near - victory is not.  Unfortunately in counter-insurgency operations we are not ready to accept the larger number of early casualties because it is impossible to foresee that there will be a decrease later in the execution of the mission.  The only way we have found to predict the future in operations is by 'wargaming' and unfortunately the actual results (casualties and victory) are not always what we were able to predict.   Many people criticized MGen Leslie in 2005 when indicated that Afghanistan would be a 20-year venture because, "every time you kill an angry young man overseas, you’re creating 15 more who will come after you.”

Ref for quote, http://briarpatchmagazine.com/detestable-murderers-and-scumbags-making-sense-of-canadas-deployment-in-afghanistan/comment-page-1/

Regret numerous edits - I wanted to get my quote relevant and correct.


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## bdave (8 May 2010)

I was given a book by a LT called "The Warrior's Way: A treatise on Military Ethics" by Richard A. Gabriel.
I'm sure some of you have read it. It deals with the different ethical dilemmas faced by soldiers.
It's a good read.

In one of the chapters, it mentions how a PC military is a very negative thing. 

In one of the chapters he quotes General Walter Kerwin:


 The Warrior's Way: A treatise on Military Ethics . Page. 79 said:


> "We face a dilemma that armies have always faced within a democratic society. The values necessary to defend that society are often at odds with the values of the society itself. To be an effective servant of the people the army must concentrate not on values of our liberal society, but on hard values of the battlefield...We must recognize that this military community differs from the civilian community from which it springs. The civilian community exists to promote the quality of life; the military community exists to fight and, if need be, to die in defense of that quality of life. We must not apologize for these differences. The people...are served by soldiers disciplined to obey the orders of their leaders, and hardened and conditioned to survive the rigors of the battlefield. We do neither our soldiers nor our people any favors if we ignore these realities"
> 
> [...]The need to separate the military from the civil society has been recognized by the society's political leaders in their willingness to create within the military a set of institutions that renders it virtually autonomous and self-governing on a day-to-day basis. Thus, military establishments have their own court, codes of law and regulations, police, trial procedures, judges, court of appeals, and even their own prisons. All these institutions exist and function quite apart from the larger society and with society's approval. To a large extent, then, the social distance between the society and the profession already exists. To insist on a congruence of all but the most basic values of society and profession runs the risk of either militarizing the state, as in totalitarian societies, or civilianizing the profession to mirror the larger society as much as possible. Neither path serves the profession or a democratic civil order well.



I don't know much, but this makes sense to me. I don't understand why those who have been in service for so long wish to impose restrictions on our soldiers, and instill doubt and hesitation in their mind; something that is extremely dangerous in a battle, where split second decisions can mean the difference between life or death.


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## TangoTwoBravo (8 May 2010)

bdave said:
			
		

> I was given a book by a LT called "The Warrior's Way: A treatise on Military Ethics" by Richard A. Gabriel.
> I'm sure some of you have read it. It deals with the different ethical dilemmas faced by soldiers.
> It's a good read.
> 
> ...



It is a good book, but the quote you have doesn't really apply to the topic, nor to the statement you follow-up with regarding restrictions on soldiers.  We must have restrictions.  Those are a huge part of what makes us soldiers and not gang members.  

What the quoted General is getting at is that military culture and ethics will be distinct in some manner from society at large.  He is not saying that we should go around without restrictions.


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## bdave (8 May 2010)

Tango2Bravo said:
			
		

> It is a good book, but the quote you have doesn't really apply to the topic, nor to the statement you follow-up with regarding restrictions on soldiers.  We must have restrictions.  Those are a huge part of what makes us soldiers and not gang members.
> 
> What the quoted General is getting at is that military culture and ethics will be distinct in some manner from society at large.  He is not saying that we should go around without restrictions.



I realize that, but found it somewhat applicable to this situation.
I am alluding to politically correctness and how some are trying to implement it into the military.


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## Greymatters (10 May 2010)

Political correctness was being pushed on military members when I joined and was still there 20 years later. Its just political and civilian oversight of military activities and culture, and it will still be there in another twenty years...


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## McG (23 Jun 2010)

> *Soldiers' restraint risky Proposed medal honouring those who don't fire unnecessary -- and foolish*
> Peter Worthington
> The Calgary Sun
> 23 June 2010
> ...


From previous articles, I did not get the impression that the intent was to create a new medal but to use existing medals (like the medal of bravery) when recognition may be due.

I would agree that creating a new medal sends the wrong message, but I don’t see anything wrong in positive recognition within the honours and awards that we already have.


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## Pusser (24 Jun 2010)

The list of people I have not shot over the years is long and distinguished.   ;D

Whether to shoot or not is a question of judgement and professionalism.  People should be recognized for doing the right thing, which could be shooting or not shooting, depending on the circumstances.  Our current system of honours will cover this.  No new medal is required.


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## Foxhound (25 Jun 2010)

This might fit in here.

From the Globe & Mail.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/asia-pacific/canadian-afghan-sweep-in-panjwaii-uncovers-ied-caches-militants/article1618094/



> Canadian and Afghan troops have wrapped up a successful five-day military operation in the Panjwaii district *without firing a single shot. * [Emphasis added.]
> 
> The operation, which began Monday, involved the 1st Battalion of the Royal Canadian Regiment, along with Afghan security forces near the village of Chalghowr in the Panjwaii district west of Kandahar.
> 
> The mission was to push the Taliban out of the area, about nine kilometres from Kandahar city, and to keep it under government control.



(I still wish they would learn to capitalize the word "The".)  _Never pass a fault._  ;D


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## tomahawk6 (25 Jun 2010)

While there has been a drop in civilians killed - something like 44% maybe higher, there has been a corresponding increase in coalition casualties. The civilians dont feel safer when the taliban can attack without retribution. The taliban know the ROE's and are using them to their advantage. In WW2 there were no ROE's.


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## mariomike (26 Jun 2010)

tomahawk6 said:
			
		

> The taliban know the ROE's and are using them to their advantage. In WW2 there were no ROE's.



Canadians showed "courageous restraint" during the war. The people of Revigny, France were spared because of it. Bomber Command was ordered by SHAEF to bomb the rail yard at Revigny, in support of the soldiers in Normandy. Before they could bomb however, the people of Revigny had to be warned to leave each afternoon of a night attack by BBC broadcasts: "Nous allons rendre visite a Maginot ce soir."  It was one of the conditions for bombing French railway centres. It was not difficult for the Revineens to work out the meaning of the message - Andre Maginot, the French Minister of War who gave his name to the famous "Line", had been born in Revigny. 
They made three trips to Revigny. But, it was only on the third an final trip that visibility was clear enough for them to drop their bombs safely. Of course, the Luftwaffe was waiting and they paid a high price. 41 Lancasters ( 22 per cent of the Lancasters involved ) were shot down at Revigny. ( Revigny was still under German occupation ) But, they destroyed their target. Five civilians were killed, three others were slightly injured.


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## tomahawk6 (26 Jun 2010)

No such warnings were issued to the Japanese and German populations that we were going to firebomb their cities. Occupied areas were warned because we needed their help when it came time to invade.


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## mariomike (26 Jun 2010)

tomahawk6 said:
			
		

> No such warnings were issued to the Japanese and German populations that we were going to firebomb their cities.



"the United Stated showered the Japanese cities of Nagasaki, Hiroshima, and 33 other potential targets with over 5 million leaflets warning civilians of the impending attack.": 
"Read this carefully as it may save your life or the life of a relative or friend":
http://www.damninteresting.com/ww2-america-warned-hiroshima-and-nagasaki-citizens

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/world-war-2/6086189/World-War-2-Text-of-note-to-German-people.html

http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/2WWstrategic.htm
Please scroll to (7) on the link above.

"We in Britain know quite enough about air raids. For ten months your Luftwaffe bombed us. First you bombed us by day. When we made this impossible, they came by night. Then you had a big fleet of bombers. Your airmen fought well. They bombed London for ninety-two nights running. They made heavy raids on Coventry, Plymouth, Liverpool, and other British cities. They did a lot of damage. Forty-three thousand British men, women and children lost their lives; Many of our most cherished historical buildings were destroyed.

You thought, and Goering promised you, that you would be safe from bombs. And indeed, during all that time we could only send over a small number of aircraft in return. But now it is just the other way. Now you send only a few aircraft against us. And we are bombing Germany heavily.

Why are we doing so? It is not revenge-though we do not forget Warsaw, Belgrade, Rotterdam, London, Plymouth and Coventry. We are bombing Germany, city by city, and even more terribly, in order to make it impossible for you to go on with the war. That is our object. We shall pursue it remorselessly. City by city; Liibeck, Rostock, Cologne, Emden, Bremen; Wilhelmshaven, Duisburg, Hamburg - and the list will grow longer and longer. Let the Nazis drag you down to disaster with them if you will. That is for you to decide.

In fine weather we bomb you by night. Already 1000 bombers go to one town, like Cologne, and destroy a third of it in an hour's bombing. We know; we have the photographs. In cloudy weather we bomb your factories and shipyards by day. We have done that as far away as Danzig. We are coming by day and by night. No part of the Reich is safe.

I will speak frankly about whether we bomb single military targets or whole cities. Obviously we prefer to hit factories, shipyards, and railways. It damages Hitler's war machine most. But those people who work in these plants live close to them. Therefore, we hit your houses and you. We regret the necessity for this. The workers of the Humboldt-Deutz, the Diesel-engine plant in Cologne, for instance-some of whom were killed on the night of May 30 last-must inevitably take the risk of war. Just as our merchant seamen who man ships which the U-boats (equipped with Humboldt-Deutz engines) would have tried to torpedo. Were not the aircraft workers, their wives and children, at Coventry just as much 'civilians' as the aircraft workers at Rostock and their families? But Hitler wanted it that way.

It is true that your defences inflict losses on our bombers. Your leaders try to comfort you by 'telling you that our losses are so heavy that we shall not be able to go on bombing you very much longer. Whoever believes that will be bitterly disappointed. I, who command the British bombers, will tell you what our losses are. Less than 5 per cent of the bombers which we send over Germany are lost. Such a percentage does very little even to check the constant increase ensured by the ever-increasing output of our own and the American factories.

America has only just entered the fight in Europe. The squadrons, forerunners of a whole air fleet, have arrived in England from the United States of America. Do you realize what it will mean to you when they bomb Germany also? In one American factory alone, the new Ford plant at Willow Run, Detroit, they are already turning out one four-engined bomber able to carry four tons of bombs to any part of the Reich every two hours. There are scores of other such factories in the United States of America. You cannot bomb those factories. Your submarines cannot even try to prevent those Atlantic bombers from getting here; for they fly across the Atlantic.

Soon we shall be coming every night and every day, rain, blow or snow-we and the Americans. I have just spent eight months in America, so I know exactly what is coming. We are going to scourge the Third Reich from end to end, if you make it necessary for us to do so. You cannot stop it, and you know it.

You have no chance. You could not defeat us in 1940, when we were almost unarmed and stood alone. Your leaders were crazy to attack Russia as well as America (but then your leaders are crazy; the whole world thinks so except Italy).

How can you hope to win now that we are getting even stronger, having both Russia and America as allies, while you are getting more and more exhausted ?

Remember this: no matter how far your armies march they can never get to England. They could not get here when we were unarmed. Whatever their victories, you will still have to settle the air war with us and America. You can never win that. But we are doing so already now.

One final thing: it is up to you to end the war and the bombing. You can overthrow the Nazis and make peace. It is not true that we plan a peace of revenge. That is a German propaganda lie. But we shall certainly make it impossible for any German Government to start a total war again. And is not that as necessary in your own interests as in ours?"

1942:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KhmRrTsv55Y


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## SeanNewman (26 Jun 2010)

That message is pretty prophetic, and Rommel said the same thing about Africa.

To paraphrase, as soon as America was allowed to gain one inch of foothold anywhere they would be unstoppable due to their production capability and the war in that campaign would only be a matter of how long you could hold them off; it would no longer be about trying to win.


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## vonGarvin (26 Jun 2010)

That wasn't a warning of "flee Hamburg tonight, lest you burn", it was more "We will continue to punch you in the balls until we win this war".  It was a show of might, not restraint.  Such messaging would go a long way if we used all the weapons in our inventory.


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## daftandbarmy (27 Jun 2010)

I recall one ocasion when one of my soldiers was 'verbally assaulted' by what could be loosly described as a large, ugly, aggressive 'Irish Harpey'. She did this rather frequently, picking on one of the younger chaps on each patrol, which was amusing but got to be a bore after awhile.

She assailed the young lad in his native language, which happened to be Irish. He was black, from Dublin (yes, Black Irish). She screamed something at him, apparently, to the effect that 'now you have your (black n-words) doing your dirty work for you'.  I watched him deliver an immediate reply in Irish - he had an ';A' level from a school in Dublin of course - which caused her to run screaming from the roadside. 

I asked him what he'd said, to which he replied "I told her to go eff hersel, you fat, ugly, oirish (other select adjectives) ... Sorrr'. 

His reward was to see us all curl up laughing for a few minutes, in a nontactical fashion, which seemed sufficient. Odd, we never saw her again.


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## GAP (4 Feb 2012)

Courageous Restraint award
Article Link
 Lions Led By Sheep
February 3, 2012


 NATO (the North Atlantic Treaty Organization) countries that have sent troops to Iraq or Afghanistan are having problems with their military commanders. The generals, and the troops who served in these combat zones, are unhappy with how their politicians back home endangered the lives of troops by putting restrictions on what the troops could do, even when it was a matter of life-and-death to the soldiers involved. The generals are angry at politicians who order troops into a combat zone without bothering to learn what exactly is going on there and ignore generals and staff officers who try to explain the situation. It's getting pretty ugly and the disputes won't go away.

Sometimes the argument gets public. Last year, a retiring U.S. Secretary of Defense openly questioned the ability of NATO to survive after its very mixed performance in Afghanistan and general unwillingness of members to pull their weight. It was pointed out that the U.S. supplies 75 percent of the budget for NATO and was constantly called on to do most of the fighting. In effect, too many NATO nations were joining to obtain protection provided by the American military, without making a contribution in proportion to the size of each member's economy and population.

NATO was originally created to protect Western Europe from the very real threat of Soviet invasion. But that threat disappeared when the Soviet Union dissolved two decades ago. Now, NATO is supposed to help protect member nations from more distant threats. In this case, Islamic terrorism and unrest in nations that supply NATO states with oil. But what's the point of having NATO, or the United States being part of it, if each nation can choose the degree to which it will participate.

American leaders are not the only ones unhappy with these disparities. Six years ago, NATO commanders in Afghanistan were openly complaining about all the strings attached to their authority by politicians back home. At that time, the ROE (Rules of Engagement) for NATO troops contained over seventy restrictions on how the NATO commanders could use troops assigned to them. Most of these have to do with where national contingents could be moved and how much danger they could be exposed to. The NATO troops are good at what they do but they could do more, and at less risk to themselves, if the NATO commanders had fewer strings attached to who can be used where and how. That would seem impossible, given that three dozen NATO nations had troops in Afghanistan. But it's only the major contributors of combat forces that NATO commanders are really worried about. By going public with complaints about the ROE problem the NATO commanders were setting up the politicians back home to take the heat for any casualties in Afghanistan. It also put pressure on the politicians to ease up on the ROEs, which were created mainly to win political points back home. 

The complaints six years ago led to some restrictions being lifted but most remained. This led to some ludicrous situations. Two years ago European NATO commanders recommended that NATO establish a combat award recognizing soldiers who risk their own lives to avoid Afghan civilian casualties. This would be called the Courageous Restraint medal and the first few would probably be awarded posthumously because the most obvious cases would involve NATO troops holding their fire when the enemy uses civilians as human shields. This enables the enemy to kill their better trained and equipped opponents. The best example of this occurred in 1993 when 24 Pakistani troops were killed by Somali gunmen using civilians as human shields. Those dead Pakistanis would be eligible for the Courageous Restraint medal. The only problem with this is that the troops are none too happy with this use of human shields or getting killed because of it. American troops have permission to do whatever it takes, if American lives are endangered. Other NATO troops have similar escape clauses (but sometimes not as robust as the American one) in their ROEs.

What commanders were trying to do was inspire the troops to sacrifice their lives in order to avoid civilian casualties. But the troops can do the math and realize that the bulk of civilian deaths are at the hands of the Taliban. That, however, is not news (in or out of Afghanistan). Any Afghan civilian dying at the hands of foreign troops is news. Most troops are not willing to die to help their boss avoid some unfavorable press.

Meanwhile, the traditional military awards for battlefield valor are still being earned for the usual reasons, to help one's fellow soldiers in a dangerous situation. This sometimes involves saving the lives of civilians, who are also being threatened by Taliban violence. But the NATO commanders were proposing the Courageous Restraint award for actions that go far beyond this into territory troops are reluctant to travel. Since troops who win medals for valor never think about winning a medal when they do what it takes to earn one, it's difficult to understand how a Courageous Restraint award will be anything but a propaganda ploy inflicted on the families of soldiers who die because of restrictive ROE that allow the Taliban to take shelter behind human shields and continue to shoot at NATO troops. The courageous restraint medal idea did not last long but the fact that it was even proposed put the spotlight on what a burden politically inspired ROE had become for the troops. 
end


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## jollyjacktar (4 Feb 2012)

That makes me feel sick and very angry all at the same time...  :rage:


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## OldSolduer (6 Feb 2012)

jollyjacktar said:
			
		

> That makes me feel sick and very angry all at the same time...  :rage:



Quite right. The good idea fairy was at work. Glad someone smacked it.


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## daftandbarmy (7 Feb 2012)

The only 'restraint' that works is to bring the troops home, of course. P.S. The idiots!


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## Kalatzi (7 Feb 2012)

The funny thing is - that it did work ...


In Northern Ireland to be exact ...

The British Army took more losses than if inflicted.


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## daftandbarmy (7 Feb 2012)

Kalatzi said:
			
		

> The funny thing is - that it did work ...
> 
> 
> In Northern Ireland to be exact ...
> ...



Here are the stats. 

http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/sutton/book/

If we took casualties, I can assure you that it wasn't because we were following a practice of 'courageous restraint'. If any of my commanders had suggested we follow a practice like that, I would have invited them to lead me out the door of the base, then again, I wouldn't have trusted them to do that job either.


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