NORTHGUY3 and BARTIMUS
How much slaughter, rape, pillage, etc occured varied MASSIVELY, and for a varity of reasons.
Some wars, at least in part, really and truely were fought with the highest degree of honorable behavior. Others not so much, and in some cases it was the same troops involved in remarkable good behavior in one conflict, and bad behavior in another.
Much of the American Revolution, and U.S. Civil War was fought with high standards of behavior. (I'm sure some idiot will cite an exception, and try and claim the exception was the standard) And even when Sherman did his March to the Sea, he AVOIDED pitch battles, and as much as possible targeted PROPERTY.
There are a number of cases of women on the battlefield from these wars, and other than stray shots they were EXTREMELY safe. (However, stray shots did kill some, such as the famous cases of the nurse at Gettysburg)
One key in these cases, is that the civilians were confronted with a MASS of soldiers, most of whom were decent young men. Alone at night, encounter a small group of soldiers, or individual soldier, it the result depends on the individuals (and always will)
In contrast, the 30 years in Germany was fought by troops that were often PAID by pillage. To make matters worse, the conflict had religious fuel (thus literally being one of the things that inspired the U.S. freedom OF religion).
Back on the U.S. front, the Indian Wars often got very brutal. In part, this was due to the nature of tribal warfare (when territory changed hands, the tribal fighting is as brutal as anything, and just because the U.S. Cavalry was one of the 'tribes' did not change that...)
One HUGE reason modern western militaries DESERVE massive and HUGE credit is for their adoption of modern military rules of conduct on the battlefield (a sort of chivalry...) as an ideal to be strived for.
One HUGE reason modern terrorist and (most) modern revolutionaries DESERVE massive and HUGE condemnation is their adoption of tactics that DELIBERATELY put modern militaries into impossible ethical/suicidal situations (willing Human shield being one example, suicide bombers being another, etc,....)
