Addressing Friendly Fire
Friendly fire is often seen as an inescapable result of combat, and because it only accounts for a small percentage of casualties, can often be dismissed as irrelevant to the outcome of a battle. The effects of friendly fire, however, are not just material. Troops expect to be targeted by the enemy, but being hit by their own forces has a huge negative impact on morale. Forces doubt the competence of their command, and its prevalence makes commanders more cautious in the field.
Attempts to reduce this effect by military leaders generally come down to identifying the causes of friendly fire and overcoming repetition of the incident through training, tactics and technology.
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Famous quotes containing the words addressing, friendly and/or fire:
“He took up his pen, which seemed to parch like a martyr in his hand. He began to write, nevertheless, addressing the nine-and-ninety lies of the moment he hoped with for a night of saloperie at the side of the twisted strumpet, Fiction, who lasciviously rolled her eyes at him, hiked up her skirt, and beckoned him on.”
—Alexander Theroux (b. 1940)
“Their rebukes have never made me angry, because I have always wondered why they did not rebuke me more. They should have. Their friendly praise has been one of the sweetest, most warming things in my life in the theater. I do go on the stage unafraid of them and with love in my heart for them.”
—Minnie Maddern Fiske (1865–1932)
“There was the murdered corpse, in covert laid,
And violent death in thousand shapes displayed;
The city to the soldier’s rage resigned;
Successless wars, and poverty behind;
Ships burnt in fight, or forced on rocky shores,
And the rash hunter strangled by the boars;
The newborn babe by nurses overlaid;
And the cook caught within the raging fire he made.”
—Geoffrey Chaucer (1340?–1400)