On Grossman, S.L.A. Marshall, and Sheep (Ratio of Fire)

Tam brought up the work of S.L.A. Marshall, on which many of David Grossman's claims (principally that most people are physiologically and psychologically incapable of harming other people up-close-and-personal) are based. Marshall is famous for his widely-accepted assertion that only a small percentage of even trained soldiers actually fire their weapons in battle, let alone ferociously attack their enemy.

In answer to that lately-questioned assertion, and the highly remunerative programs based upon it, I found this interesting.

A parallel study to Marshall’s interviews, then, fully documented and straight from the subjects themselves [Canadian WWII combat vets] with no intermediary, presents data that is in direct contradiction to that of Marshall. The questionnaire respondents were exclusively Canadian, of course, and they cover a completely different set of subjects than Marshall’s interviews. They also apply only to the Canadian experience. However, Marshall strongly implied that his 15 to 25 percent ratio of fire was a universal condition of modern warfare, and Grossman has been very explicit in his championing of the universality of this phenomenon as a part of human nature. The evidence from the Canadian battle experience questionnaires indicates that non-participation in combat by riflemen was not a problem in the Canadian Army between 1943 and 1945; that infantry fire was usually quite effective; and that if there was a problem with the firing it was always due to too much fire rather than too little. Supposing Marshall was correct with respect to his claims, and there were problems with non-participation in the US Army, then either the Canadian Army was, by Grossman’s reckoning, many times more effective a fighting force (of which there is no evidence) or else claiming the universality of Marshall’s findings is factually incorrect. While it might be going too far to call S.L.A. Marshall a liar, he appears to have simply been wrong in his claims about the ratio of fire.

Although Grossman cites a few other pieces of evidence from military history to support his “killology” thesis, S.L.A. Marshall’s “hard data” is the centerpiece of his argument regarding the inability to kill: most of what remains is either derived from Marshall or anecdotal in nature. Since it is Marshall that forms the core of evidence underlying many of Grossman’s claims about killing in war, there are obvious problems inherent to reading the “killology” literature without reservation.

RTWT. This being the case, Grossman's "sheep, wolves and sheepdogs" metaphor, with its placid flocks of productive citizens all incapable of harming their fellow man in any way and desperately in need of a hard blue shell of professional "warriors," becomes ... oh, what's the word ... ah, yes. Bullshit.

This does, however, leave us with the undeniable reality of quite a large percentage of people who really do seem to fear and loathe the presence of fellow humans who are not defanged. That reality will need to be explained in some other way. Personally, I suggest a look at the "educational" system.