Depravity

In the 2014 movie, Lone Survivor, based on real events, Navy Seal Marcus Luttrell was leading a team of four Navy SEALs on a reconnaissance mission in the mountains of Afghanistan overlooking a camp where they believed Ahmad Shah, a leader of an Anti-Coalition Militia, was operating out of. As they were hiding beneath the trees and foliage on the mountainside, an old Afghanistan man tending a herd of goats with his grandson, stumbled across them, exposing their cover. Marcus and his team had a choice to make. Let the old man and his son go, in which case, the boy would most likely run down to the valley and alert the terrorists that a US SEAL team was on the mountain, or they could protect themselves, and kill the two unarmed civilians which would have violated one of the SEALs major rules of engagement.

In the West, we know that it is wrong, that it is evil to target and kill civilians in war, even if not doing so puts your own life at risk. So, Marcus and his team made the decision to let the old man and his grandson live and took their chances scrambling up the mountainside to the top where they attempted to rendezvous with a helicopter to fly them out of harm’s way before the terrorists could find them. The young boy made it down the mountain faster than the SEAL team made it to the top. Shah immediately unleashed a group of terrorists up the mountain after the SEAL team. Three other SEAL team members were killed in the siege, but miraculously, Marcus Luttrell survived.