I rather suspect that what is involved is a mindset that says "We are peaceloving people, so if we involved in fighting that means we have been provoked beyond endurance, and that our enemies are so wicked they deserve to die."

In other words, a breakdown of the inhibitions that go along with a sense that the people on the other side are much the same as we are, just caught up in a different side in a war made by people far above us.

I think that dealing with that breakdown and lack might be what is implied by the term the US authorities have come up with for the proposed training in ethics for their militrary, that is supposed to help them recognise that killing non-combatants is wrong - "core warrior values".

If the US military have actually being failing till now to try to ensure that people they are training to kill understand those kind of things, and that they are aware of their duty, if need be, to disobey any orders that are in breach of these principles, it is a pretty shocking thing.

Is it possible to hope that this kind of training is now going to be applied to higher levels of command, including the Commander in Chief?