I found the first story about Pentagon cover ups about the role of Airstrikes in civilian casualties particularly interesting. I think the journalist did a good job of exposing the way that they knowingly put civilians at risk and the ways that they justify their deaths. The most striking to me is that they viewed the loss of Civilian life as most important to avoid from a strategic standpoint and then legal and moral viewpoints. To see people in such an inhumane way is difficult to understand or comprehend. The journalist also did well to talk about how the conception of air strikes ways in the conscience of the American citizens. We do not live in the war zones that our countries inhabit and so it is very easy to forget the reality for the Army. But then we think about how they portray air strikes as lowering the death count because US citizens do not have to go into these war zones and they can be remotely triggered. But then as the articles shows there are so many flaws in this system. Like how they decided to conduct these airstrikes is through limited intelligence and assessment of the areas. As one put it the air strikes don’t make the bombings more accurate or safer for those around but instead make it possible to conduct more air strikes in places they could not reach before. It was clear from the people that the journalist spoke to that they tried to make excuses but even “the fog of war” can explain the deliberate choice to ignore the pitfalls of airstrikes and proceed with this course of war.
I think the second part of story was extremely important to humanizing and bringing to light the stories of the people who were victims of the bombings. While people can state the death count of incidents or the overall war I think it can be hard in such a desensitized world for people to comprehend the severity. Unfortunately death is becoming more frequent and it is news that sells so it is often highly covered in the media. But I feel because of this normalization of coverage when we see death counts the weight of the deaths lose meaning. Some might not view a hundred deaths as gravely as thousands or even tens of thousands. But even one death is a grave and unfortunate matter. My Law and Economics Professor said that the optimal amount of murder in society is zero because it is not the result of some fortunate circumstance and can never be. While the military may try to argue it was in the pursuit of good, the lives of individuals should never be measured in this way. I think showing how people have lost their families and someotimes horrifically in more then one instance demonstrates the severity of the issue. Especially because often times the Military dehumanized them and made their actions which any person in such a stressful environment would do are used as the foundation for why the bombings occurred in the first place
