Some Remarks on Slaughter

During the author's two years as an Army psychiatrist, he learned that many relatively normal young men he interviewed had observed or participated in the slaughter of defenseless Vietnamese people. Six psychological, social, and mechanical principles contributed to the occurrence of such slaughter; the universalization of the enemy; the "cartoonization" of the victim; the dilution of responsibility; the pressure to act; the natural dominance of the psychopath; and the ready availability of firepower.