Eli5 are there in the real world troops that are meant to die, if so how does that work.

Question

in strategy games you usually have troops at the frontline whose sole purpose is to die fighting to buy you time to execute your plans or to protect stronger troops. is this something that happens in real life / used to happen before, if so what are the logistics of it, do the troops know that they are most likely goona die, etc..

In: 399

Answer 1

Yes. An example that’s happening literally right now is in the fight for Bakhmut in Ukraine, with the Ukrainian forces just holding on to a corner of the city with the Russians having been trying to capture it for months and months.

There has been a long-running debate over the virtue of this from Ukraine’s side not based on the value of Bakhmut itself (which isn’t strategically important) but rather in whether their losses are worth the losses being incurred on the Russians during the fight. The argument on favour is keeping on fighting is that the Ukrainians are creating many – estimates assumes suggest as many as 5 – casualties for each Ukrainian casualty. Arguments against are that the quality of the Ukrainian troops being killed are high and that these troops might be better used elsewhere.

Either way, the implication is that trading the lives of your men either for time, land or (in this case) enemy lives is simply a calculation of resources, much like when to use limited artillery shells or aircraft. The *purpose* isn’t for them to die, it’s just recognised that some will, and in some circumstances more will die than in others.

But, of course, this is also a calculation performed outside of war. We know that using cars will result in people dying, we just think this cost is worth the benefit and try to do what we can to reduce the number as much as possible within certain constraints (e.g. reducing the speed limit to 30mph would save lives but also waste loads of time).

The soldiers in question likely will know that their role is to “hold on as long as possible” but in some situations this means “until you die” and in others it means “until we order you to retreat”. They may not know which they’re in until they’re in the thick of it, though.