Yes they can. It all depends on the policy. For example USAA routinely insures service members and those policies have a rider for dying in combat. And it is only a couple buck for a month on a normal $500k policy. When I retired I took that rider off.

Pretty much any insurance company does the same.

> Does private life assurance pay out if you are killed war-fighting?

That's only half the question.

The other half of the question is: do the people who die in war-fighting typically have private life insurance?

From my experience, the answer is a huge no. Most people go to war with government life insurance, simply because it's heavily pushed on them. They don't have a need for life insurance because they're unmarried 18-22 year old men, so I highly doubt that they have many non-SGLI policies.

The biggest reason people buy life insurance is because they're married and they have a mortgage. That disqualifies almost all of the military. Even if service members are married, they typically live in on-base housing and don't carry a mortgage.

No.