Food for thought when contemplating an unprovoked attack.
Ask the citizens of Troy.
War has always been hell for everyone at times...we folks down south of my age can remember the tales told to us and see the remains of the civilian destruction
that’s why slavery or forced servitude sounded good once upon a time after defeat..you lived even after you were vanquished..it was sorta humane
take yer average medieval siege with some hard feelings involved..say involving a sister’s honour or something Medici like:
the overwhelming force outside the wall Sir Kills Alot might tell Sir YerToast inside that if he gives it up now his womenfolk will only be taken as concubines or handmaidens or domestics depending on beauty and fertility (if Lord Big Britches wants to up his gene pool or pay off horny subordinates) and your spawn say under aged 16 will be allowed to live and raised as their own......scout’s honour.. and you and all the men older than mid teens will only be piked or beheaded or hanged...hell, that was a deal to sir doomed and his posse and they were likely to take considering the alternative was to be skinned alive or disembowled and watch yet kids on pikes and babies boiled and whatnot and yer women still raped and violated in every imaginable way
we lull ourselves (not u skeeter..u purty durn smart) into thinking we are different or more humane
we just can afford the indulgence to be humane and puff ourselves up over that and worrying about silly crap like sexism, racism, homophobia, banning foie gras and other bigotry.... let things go Omega man around here and we can get just as wet as the Saxons or Mongols or Longshanks or whomever....we are civilized because we can be...that’s all
Civilians have always sustained the largest numbers of casualties in every war throughout the history of mankind. In the last 2 centuries at about a 100:1 ratio. Only the survivors, generally the victors, of warfare have the power to investigate and report about the casualties.
1:7 is considered a lean tooth to tail ratio for nations under arms and 1:15 isn’t uncommon for more loosely contracted support of fighting men. This implies there is at least an order of magnitude greater number of people who exhibit behavior adversarial to the opposing combatants, even when not considered directly fighting in combat.
So who is actually more morally accountable for the violent external casualties in warfare? Those who ignore the conflict and are either rebellious or apathetic, allowing the immoral any criminal course of action, or those on the tip of the spear who can exert their will to properly control events as morally, controlably, and expeditiously as feasible?
These are obvious reasons why there are always refugees leave their homes and are found emerging from combat zones. It is another reason why the intelligent take up arms to defend their nations. It also is a good reason for the intelligent to not too lightly ignore tyrannical extremists who seek to gain control of nuclear weaponry.