Civilian Deaths as Collateral Damage: Where do we draw the line between collateral damage and military incompetency?

Civilian Deaths as Collateral Damage: Where do we draw the line between collateral damage and military incompetency?

India-Mae Osborne
Politics 773: The Ethics of War
01.06.18

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An Aljazeera news report has claimed that a US coalition airstrike in West Mosul last year “may have resulted in the highest civilian death toll caused by the US in Iraq since the war began in 2003.” The increasing civilian death toll at the hands of the US within Iraq and Syria has raised the question of whether the US military has changed its rules of engagement, which govern its use of airstrikes.

Los Angeles Times 

In January 2017 President Trump tasked his National Security Team with formulating a plan to fight Isil, where, according to the National Security Presidential Memorandum, he recommended making “changes to any United State's rules of engagement and other United States policy restrictions that exceed the requirements of international law regarding the use of force against ISIS.” In other words, Trump seeks to push the rule of non-combatant immunity to its absolute limits, a rule which prevents the US military from carrying out strikes that are likely to cause civilian death. 

Whilst the rules of engagement have not technically changed, the Pentagon states that it is increasingly easier to call in strikes. A report released by Amnesty International describes an “alarming pattern of US led coalition airstrikes” leading to civilian casualties during the battle for the Eastern part of Mosul between October of 2016 and January 2017, arguing that it is clear that a reassessment of the rules of engagement is warranted, but to ensure more care is taken when assessing airstrikes, and not less.

Sputnik News

The US government’s loosening of the rules of engagement and the pushing of non-combatant immunity to its limits forces us to wonder just how much care is being taken to protect civilians in war zones. As distant observers of the horrors of war, we tend to see the deaths of civilians as a tragic and inhumane consequence of wartime. Despite their tragedy, civilian deaths are ultimately seen by those in the business of war as a means to an end, as collateral damage on the path toward a safer and more peaceful world. However, the legitimacy of collateral damage as a justification for civilian death is tricky, and forces one to ponder a range of questions; have the deaths of civilians in all cases been entirely unavoidable? Or is the increasing justification of civilian deaths as a means to an end creating a snow ball effect where civilian protection is less and less of a priority? What does the term collateral damage denote about the importance of civilian lives in these war stricken environments? 

Between late 2001 and 2012, close to 38,000 civilians were killed by US and allied forces in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, and Yemen, however Neta Crawford maintains that these numbers are “soft.” The US administration responded to these inexplicably high numbers with the same repetitive tone; that civilian death was simply the regrettable yet inevitable consequence of the ugliness of war. This minimisation of civilian death spurs from the long held view that the accidental killing or injure of non-combatants potentially serves military necessity.

Crawford claims that “In the view of many soldiers, because collateral damage is considered inevitable, concern for collateral damage should not get in the way of force protection or accomplishing the mission.” In the words of Lieutenant Colonel Nathan Sassaman, “collateral damage is one of the costs of war. War is imprecise and unpredictable. It is, in a word, terrible. If you aren’t willing to accept collateral damage as a cost of doing battle, then you shouldn’t engage the military in the first place.”

Macleans.ca

Civilian death as collateral damage appears unjustifiable and unethical, however remains an integral element of just war theory. Justice in war or ‘jus in bello’ specifies a distinction between combatants and non-combatants, where civilians are by no means permissible targets; however just wars doctrine of ‘double effect’ maintains that in order to heed the positive effects of war, civilian deaths are an inevitable consequence. So whilst it is impermissible to target civilians, the inevitability of inadvertent civilian death and injury is accepted as a means to an end. Patricia Owens claims that “describing civilian casualties as ‘accidents’ forms an integral part of the project of justifying war,” while Alex J. Bellamy argues that the distinction between combatants and civilians in itself enables us to think about war as a legitimate practice. In the words of Maja Zehfuss, this distinction “aids the justification of war in the first place,” where “the principle that is meant to protect civilians may be seen rather to put them at risk.” She adds, “Despite apparently putting civilians at the heart of considerations, it does so by objectifying them and hence ends up enabling the very thing it would seem to wish to protect against: making the killing of civilians acceptable.”

Crawford raises the important and compelling point that the attention and care given to civilian casualties is dependant on military necessity and strategy, the military occasionally advocating a “hearts and minds” approach to gain the enemy civilian populations favour. This is a strategic measure often used in the fight against ISIS, as the US becomes increasingly aware that civilian deaths only further demonizes the US and opens the door for increased ISIS recruitment. While this may be seen as a measure of civilian protection, in reality it only further fuels the objectification of civilians as collateral damage, as pieces on a chess board whose fate ultimately rests on the strategic military planning of the US military, and what they perceive as the quickest and easiest way to win the war.

Vice News

The laws of war ultimately side with military necessity, civilian deaths forgiven if they are unintended and not disproportionate to military objectives. The problem is how to measure civilian death alongside military necessity; how do we know that Trump’s proposed shifts to the rules of engagement will result in civilian deaths that are proportional, and ultimately necessary? Or how much civilian death will be claimed to be necessary and proportionate, when a range of other measures could have been taken to meet military ends? How do we distinguish between what is militarily necessary, and militarily incompetent? Perhaps we are already past a point of no return, where civilian deaths are becoming so commonplace in the military strategy against ISIS that any level of civilian death is deemed necessary; whether proportional or not. What the Trump Administration’s attitude toward the rules of engagement shows is that civilian protection is not the top priority, and won’t be any time soon.