avalononline | Ninth: A Tactical Decision (Text; anon)

(TW: Murder/Sororicide, Betrayal, DR Spoilers)

[The last few months had given Mukuro a lot to think about- especially with regard to her own death back home. One part still didn't make any sense to her:

What had she done wrong? Why had Junko killed her?

...It was with those thoughts swimming around in her head that she sent another late night message to the network.]

27 AUG XX, 0324

Reviewing the strategy from a recent battle at home. I want to understand the rational for the decisions taken.

A soldier is engaged in a stealth/undercover mission. However, they have made a mistake that risks the operation's success, and have not realised their error.

The mission commander is in a position to eliminate the operative to preserve their mission, without exposing themselves in the process.

Is that course of action reasonable? To put it another way- under what circumstances would you consider sacrificing one of your own men to ensure a mission's success or to prevent it's failure?

Don't feel you have to answer.

🔪

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

I would never consider sacrificing a life to be a reasonable course of action. Regardless of any mission's success or failure, the preservation of life should be the highest priority.

[That wasn't a username she recognised, but having someone putting a name to the message was nice, in its own way. Perhaps more so that it wasn't someone she knew.]

Would you try to preserve a person's life no matter who they are?

I'm a soldier. A mercenary. I've taken many lives in the past.

A life is irreplaceable regardless of who it belongs to. If any life can be spared, then every effort to do so should be made.

Even in a war, our priorities shouldn't be different. If the way we conduct ourselves in battle diminishes our reputation afterwards, then what have we gained?

Then do you think on a battlefield one army should try to spare the lives of those they fight against? A war can't be won that way.

[There's a long pause before his next message comes back.]

Not necessarily. Wars are won when the opposing side is no longer fighting, correct? The outcome doesn't require the opposing side to be killed. Sometimes it's enough to convince them to lay down their weapons.

If your cause is righteous, then the effort should be made to convince your opponent to stand down. If they can't be convinced or subdued, and they are endangering yourself or others, only then should taking a life be carefully considered.

Does that make sense?

If you can demoralise the opponents enough that they fall to despair and stop fighting, yes.

[Junko would think that the best outcome, wouldn't she...]

'If'. Often both sides will consider their cause righteous. Those that don't fight for other reasons.

Only killing in self-defence should negotiations fail is inefficient in warfare.

[Well... Diminishing morale is a means of resolving conflict without loss of life. That's not exactly what he meant, though it does satisfy the criteria.]

[As for the rest... conflating a concern for life as "inefficient" still doesn't sit right with him. But maybe he's trying to argue this from the wrong angle...]

By what means would you gauge that a war is well won?

[That was a question, wasn't it?]

When the mission object is complete.

If that is simply 'kill the enemy commander' or 'force the other side to surrender', then the War is won.

When would you decide the same?

A war is over when the conflict ceases. It is well won if that end can be achieved with as little loss of life as possible. How possible that is depends on the circumstances, but it should always be a consideration.

Do you not make a distinction between a war being over and it being well won?

There is a difference. A war being 'over' says nothing about which side completed their objectives, if any- a war being 'won' has one side gaining on the other.

There is also a difference between victory in a battle and victory in a war.

[Once again... Not quite what he meant. He frowns at his phone for half a minute before his next message comes:]

Do you have any moral obligations during conflict?

Are you asking if I hold myself accountable to any moral standards when I fight?

[He was...certainly getting her to think. Which, all in all, was probably a good distraction.]

Yes.

Keep myself alive. Keep those I'm fighting with alive to the best of my ability. Keep my Commander alive. Achieve the mission objective. Eliminate the enemy where necessary.

Otherwise, no.

And what makes these standards valuable to you?

Because

Because I care about my work. About performing well. Being useful.

On the battlefield I feel confident and capable. It's
the only time I do.

Um. That doesn't answer your question does it?

Not exactly, but you're not obligated to answer in a specific way. Your answers can't be wrong, so long as they're sincere.

Allow me to ask a different way: Why do you follow these standards? Is there meaning behind wanting to preserve your own life, or that of your companions or your commander? Why is your mission objective important to you? What value is there in eliminating your enemy?

Which standards? I want to do well because I'm proud of my work and I don't want to disappoint her.

I want to preserve my own life because I don't want to die.

My mission objective is important to me because it's important to my Commander. I want her to succeed, because she's someone very important to me.

Eliminating my enemy is part of the process. I kill her enemies and mine, or the enemies of those paying me when I served as a Mercenary. It had value as a means to an end.

Are all means equal, then, if they produce the same ends? I can't see how that could be true, especially in conflict. A peace achieved through violence is fragile. It doesn't address the motivations behind the conflict, and therefore hasn't resolved it in the same way that a peace achieved through understanding could.

As someone who is proud of their work, should you not also be proud of how you achieve it? Is the process of producing your end result not also as important as the result itself? Take a craftsman as an example. Whose work would you place more value on, one who is efficient by any means, or one who takes time to consider their work and the future it might have?

No, means are important for minimising collateral whilst causing the greatest harm to the enemy in the process.

I...yes. I value efficiency. But most of the work once a conflict has begun is based on muscle memory. There isn't time to consider in the moment. I would place value in the one who can perform most efficiently.

Unless you're talking tactics. Of course that's important.

...What...are you trying to understand?

Ninth: A Tactical Decision (Text; anon)

text; un: tuge

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