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Andy Loi

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What strategies does the military use to train soldiers to kill?

For a human being to kill another human being is definitely not a natural and easy thing to do. Soldiers who go to war are faced with many dangers and very often, unpredictable. In order to survive and not get killed by their enemies, they must kill them before the others do.

What are the processes and strategies that the military use to alter mind of a human being to become a soldier is not afraid of taking another people's life?

Soldiers from the Vietnam war were trained to survive surprise attacks. Killing becomes their instinct when they are faced with danger or even surprise.

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Topics: instinct kill soldiers veterans war
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    Feyisayo Anjorin 50+

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    Nov 7 2012: I don't think there is an elaborate strategy or a necessity for that. Not all killing is evil; not all killings are murders just as not all sex is adultery or fornication. So, in your own words:

    "Soldiers who go to war are faced with many dangers and very often, unpredictable. In order to survive and not get killed by their enemies, they must kill them before the others do."

    A soldier should be fighting for what he or she really believes in; and thus should be able to stand by such belief and die for it if need be. Its about survival; its about patriotism; its about belief.
    Even people that are tagged 'killers' as if they are some vermin are just human beings like us who made the wrong choice. There is no need for any complicated process of mind alteration for someone to fight in a war or to kill another person.
    A terrorist kills because of his or her belief in religion/religious leaders; a US marine would do the same for patriotism.

    • John Smith 30+

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      Nov 7 2012: "a US marine would do the same for patriotism."

      That's where you're wrong. Most US marine need a lot of training to be able to kill people in anything else than a direct self-defense scenario. Most people are not "patriotic" enough to just kill whenever the politicians ask them to.

    • Andy Loi

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      Nov 7 2012: I think patriotism is a belief and a drive that leads a person to go to war. Even though we have a mindset to survive, most of us are not born to take away someone's life naturally or for the purpose of survival.

      When I was studying a law course in high school eight years ago, my teacher was giving a lecture
      on a very unique case of involuntary manslaughter. A Vietnam veteran returned home from the war.
      He was trained to adapt guerilla warfare. Very often soldiers must always be ready for any surprise
      attack even while they were sleeping in trenches and caves. So when the veteran returned to his
      own home, it was very late at night. So the veteran decided to sleep in the living room because
      he did not wanted to disturb and wake up his wife and daughter. In the morning, the daughter
      saw his dad sleeping in the living room. She ran over to wake him up. Due to the veteran’s training
      during the war, his natural instinct was to protect himself and to kill anything that surprise them.
      Unfortunately, he woke up by surprise, acted naturally and killed his own daughter.

      I really think there's more than survival and patriotism; therefore I really want to more this "embedded" instinct especially from someone who has been trained to do so.

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