533 José Miguel Alía Plana Rules of engagement and governance of agramante’s camp of Japanese cowardice and the humanitarian need to put an end to the war;70 when NATO spokesmen recognised incidents of this type in Kosovo (1999), they lamented the consequences of their actions, but they underlined the good intentions of the operation and the use of the most advanced techniques, in the service of peace on behalf of the Alliance.71 In explaining the causes of an error that had caused collateral damage in an air attack, the good faith of the pilot was highlighted, his performance having been subjected to the ROEs dictated to that effect and the impossibility of totally eliminating the risk of these “accidents”.72 The allusion to the event as an “accident” is ideologically and ethically significant. The relationship between statistics, language and ideology is palpable. Words lacking ambiguity- “war”, “combat”, “death” - are eliminated from the postmodern lexicon, to be replaced by terms like “conflict”, which can occur within a company, a community of neighbours, between districts, delinquent groups or between nations. The introduction of the term “TIC”.73 In military language, it is impossible to find the word “death” in almost every manual; even the procedures established for the repatriation of “the deceased” in operation zones is also disappearing. On the other hand, the more external and superficial aesthetics of the hero-fighter are being copied and usurped by other social sectors, like sports stars in commercials. Quite a curious example is that of footballers who appear on television like Roman gladiators, Templar Crusaders or the 300 Spartans. Meanwhile, the real soldier, the one who fights and dies on the battlefield of Afghanistan or Ukraine, disappears in the fog of postmodernism without honours or recognition. He is a professional who receives a wage like any other worker, who if he falls in combat does not deserve any special attention from us. After all, he has chosen his profession voluntarily; nobody has forced him to die; he is not deserving of special recognition. The era of statues or commemorative stones, of names on streets and glorious monuments is a thing of the past. Raising sportspeople to the category of heroes has downplayed classic military heroism, which either disappears or becomes an abnormal quality, almost pathological, impossible or ridiculous. Redeker makes this point in his work “Le soldat impossible”.74 He studied the demise of the classical soldier and 70 POZO MARÍN, Alejandro. Las Guerras Globales. A critical view of the alleged novelty of contemporary wars and a revision of the global factors of armed conflicts. Doctoral thesis, University Jaime I, UNESCO Chair of Philosophy for peace, Department of Philosophy and Sociology, 2010, p. 363. 71 LARSON, Eric V.; and SAVYCH, Bogdan. Misfortunes of War. Press and Public Reactions to Civilian Deaths in Wartime. Santa Mónica: RAND Corporation, 2006, in www.rand.org, p. 94. 72 Ibid., p. 96. 73 “Troops in contact”, combat against Afghan insurgents. 74 REDEKER, Robert, Le soldat impossible. Paris, Roux, 2014. http://revista.ieee.es/index.php/ieee
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