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Comment by m3kw9 | Hacker News Reader

Wars were exponentially more brutal the further back you went

Exponentially? Not really.

In pre-state societies, we generally seem to see around a 15% chance of dying due to warfare in your lifetime. Early states seem to see that fall to around mid-high single digits. And this decreases to tiny fractions in modern times, but mostly because warfare has declined rather than wars becoming less deadly. Brutal episodes of war--say the Eastern Front on WW2 or some of the theaters in modern wars--can see overall death rates of up to 20 or 30% of people involved. Given that the amount of people involved in military action has generally decreased (pre-state societies generally mobilize their entire military age male population as warriors, modern industrial states... don't), this suggests that ancient warfare is approximately as brutal as even lopsided modern warfare.

There's a difference between "young men killed on the battlefield" and "everyone else also being killed" - while (sadly) the latter did happen, e.g. Hiroshima, or as Russian troops swept through Germany, or Dresden, it wasn't par for the course or expected as what happens after the losing side lost.

The Soviets* pretty clearly did not kill all of the civilians in Germany, nor did they attempt to. Unlike the Germans themselves, who exterminated whole towns and had a plan that involved total genocide of their conquered peoples. Pretty wild to miss such an obvious example.

*really neither the sins nor the wins in WWII belong exclusively to the Russians. Another subtlety misleading aspect of this post.

> really neither the sins nor the wins in WWII belong exclusively to the Russians. Another subtlety misleading aspect of this post

I didn't mention any wins. As for the sins: did you get that despite my listing something the British did and something the Americans did?

Note the context: I corrected your use of “Russians” in favor of “Soviets.”

You did that, but that didn't seem to be the context at all. You were implying I was misleading people into thinking all the sins and wins were Russian, which I obviously wasn't doing.

The Germans attempted to exterminate entire races of people, the Soviets attempted to exterminate entire classes of people. The Soviets killed far more people if only because Stalin ruled for longer than Hitler.

As one of the first leaders of the Cheka said, "We are not waging war against individual persons. We are exterminating the bourgeoisie as a class".

IDK, WW1 sounds like a pretty bad time.

Fighting the modern US would be also be some sort of bizarre existential dread, knowing that every move you make is probably tracked and you have a decent chance of being killed with absolutely no warning.

Most likely way to die or become an amputee in modern war is being hit by artillery out of nowhere. There’s no glory in that so recruiters don’t talk about it much.

If one thing the Russo-Ukrainian war footage has though me is that scouting drones plus artillery has given both sides big impact sniper rifles.

ive been thinking that down the line both of these would be moved to space

For Russia, China and US yeah i think you are right, for the rest scout drones will do. Another interesting innovation i saw the Russia making was controlling drones by fiber optic wire to defeat anti drone EW. Im sure Ukraine is doing the same.

Legends of the Galactic Heroes did a great job exploring that theme.

After watching a few clips of drone warfare in Ukraine, I think humanity really needs to start taking a pass on wars.

Sounds excellent to me, but as long as we have drones and they're fighting our conflicts, we should probably think about giving them the vote? (before they start thinking about SkyNet?)

More personal, smaller scale, but many more individual conflicts per capita

People putting poop or muck on musket balls to cause sepsis.

I wonder what's the payout for individual soldier to do this to have somebody die after the battle has already ended with win or loss.

It takes the opponent out of the next battle which in a long campaign might improve your chances of getting home alive

It also consumes noncombatants. And it’s psi ops.

Wars end when the enemy loses heart, not sons.

It mobilises a number of resources to patch up a wounded/sick soldier.

There is a myth that the 5.56 round was designed to wound and not to kill (contrary to the 7.62 round the soviet side used) as it would make war costly in a very visible manner.

I guess the idea that inducing "Sepsis by poop" follows the same line of thinking.

I think it originated with pooping on swords/polearms: you're a peasant, just before the battle, and you have a massive adrenaline dump, part of which involves clearing out the intestines, so if you manage to channel your inner cat, as you barely get your breeches off you stick your weapon underneath. Then you tell all your buddies you totally just did that on purpose, to cause sepsis among the enemy...

If you're an grizzled noncom equivalent, when the newbies suddenly wind up with a fresh pile of squishy goop, you tell them the same story, and have them run their weapons through it, making them feel better about having squatted down in front of their buddies?

Lagniappe: how about this as a way to take physiological signs of adrenaline and turn them into an "I meant to do that" moment? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u_rotEpFtZU&t=64s

Did they really understand the link between poo and sickness? Sounds more like some sort of insult to me.

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