Rules of Engagement

Strategypage discusses rules of engagement and casualties in Afghanistan.

Short story:

We are actually pretty careful, but enemy use of civilians as human shields and honest mistakes meant we could never be perfect. Our "abuse" of firepower was a successful enemy information operation.

More restrictive rules of engagement in 2009 didn't likely increase our casualties given other factors.

There were some incidents where Americans were denied fire support because of improperly implementing the new ROE.

The major impact was that we more often let the Taliban get away rather than risk making the choice between saving our troops in combat or risking civilian casualties.

Afghans became unhappy with us for letting Taliban get away to terrorize them another day.

But since we weren't getting as much bad publicity, it was considered a success in Washington, D.C.

The whole story is worth reading.