It can be a split-second decision, or one that plays out over long and agonizing hours: to kill or not to kill.

“Rules of engagement” is the dry, legalistic term for the visceral battlefield calculus of when and whether to use deadly force to counter threat, real or perceived. Across Afghanistan, these rules serve as the marching orders that govern Western troops’ daily encounters with Taliban fighters and color dealings with Afghan civilians.

U.S. Army Gen. David H. Petraeus, who on Sunday formally took command of Western forces here, must decide in the coming weeks or months whether to recalibrate the stringent rules of engagement laid down last summer by his predecessor, Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, who recently resigned over remarks that laid bare a dysfunctional civilian-military relationship.

Of Petraeus’ early command decisions, this will be among the most closely watched, not only by Afghan civilians, but by his own troops in the field. So far, he has struck a delicate balance in public remarks about the issue.
http://freedomsyndicate.com/fair0000/latimes00262.html

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