Can you tell me why there are "Rules" to war and who actually abides by them?

LOL.

Dude I totally agree. I read Chris Kyle's book and he was talking about the "Rules of engagement". It is stupid to be honest. It is war. There should be no rules. I understand the women and children thing, but if a women or child was shooting at me and my men, I would shoot back. They have to confirm the kills and if you accidentally shoot a civilian you can go to jail over it. So stupid. If it was up to me, pull our troops out. If another terrorist attack happens, nuke the muslim country that did it. Simple as that. Save tons of money and American lives.

Sorry, I didn't answer the question. America abides them. The muslims don't.

Edit again: I like your name "Straight pride" ! I wonder why us straight people don't have our own flag. Do we go around flaunting that we are straight in other peoples faces? lol

They are just a standard that's convenient to use as a measure of how far you're willing to go.

Generally, they're things that are mutually beneficial, or thought to be. For instance, the Germans didn't typically machine-gun their Western Front prisoners because they thought they could reach an accommodation. Murdering prisoners would enrage the enemy and end that possibility, not to mention make them fight harder (hey, if you're going to die anyway, why not fight to the last bullet?).

Their Soviet prisoners, on the other hand, were treated just like the Jews: they were either killed outright or allowed to starve, because to the Nazis it was just a fight to the finish.

Another example of how the rules of war change the way wars are fought is the fact that there were no poison gas attacks in WWII. While the Germans and Japanese might have had no compunction about using poisonous chemicals, they also knew that their civilian populations were vulnerable to Allied attack, so announcing that they would follow the Geneva Conventions let the Allies know exactly what the Axis wanted the rules to be without any kind of in-war negotiations being necessary.

They were mostly introduced after World War II in an attempt to avoid some of the horrors of the two great wars. Basically, these are U.N. rules and are mostly codified in the Geneva Convention.

It says, for example, that you can't just execute an unarmed prisoner of war, and that some care must be taken to avoid damage to civilian infrastructure, such as hospitals and so forth. It also says that conquest is not a legitimate way for a country to expand its territory, that medical personnel are not a legitimate target unless they're involved in combat, etc...

And no, I don't think it's silly.

We live in an increasingly globalized world. Uranium ammo used in Iraq and the environmental damage it did will affect the population for generations to come, but ultimately, represents a degradation of the environment of the entire planet.

Maybe we should be working towards abolishing war, but as long as it exists, in a day and age where we have the power to destroy ourselves... we can't think like medieval warlords. That will lead humanity right off a cliff.

The idea is to stop invading countries from killing/raping innocent civilians. The Europe is the only continent that seems to be following those rules. Everyone else realizes that rules for war are completely unenforceable, and when the UN does catch them doing it, they only give those countries the political equivalent of a slap on the wrist. A lot of effort for nothing.