And even that hasn't brought respect from our enemies, or victory over them for decades now. When the government decided to put lawyers on the battlefield to teach our military how not to offend their enemies, this country lost the ability to win any war, using whatever means possible. I doubt Harry Truman sat around a table with a bunch of lawyers before he decided to offend Japan by dropping the bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Yup. Kill or be killed.
However, Americans have always had the reputation of being civil even during war. The Germans wanted to surrender to the Americans and not the Russians.
While fighting a war, we should always be thinking about what will happen when we are no longer killing the enemy. And yes, our ally may become our enemy and our enemy may become our ally... Turn Turn Turn. War is temporary — we hope.
Britain... the Revolutionary War.
Japan... WWII.
Germany... WWI and WWII.
The South... the Civil War.
Russia, China... The Cold War.