The Military Medical Services

Many COs apply for noncombatant status because they think they can perform a humanitarian service in the medical corps. That's true in one way, but there's a big difference between military medicine and civilian medicine. Military medicine, according to the military manuals governing it, is concerned not with saving lives, but with conserving fighting strength.

This is perfectly logical. The goal of armies is to win military victories. In combat, soldiers are frequently wounded. If military doctors can save them, they may be able to fight again--and this would increase the military's combat efficiency. Saving lives and easing suffering are less important in combat medicine than conserving trained manpower.

The military medical services practice a form of triage, or medical sorting. The name, triage, refers to the World War I French system of sorting the wounded into three groups: the slightly wounded, who were treated and returned to duty; the more seriously wounded, who were evacuated behind the lines for treatment; and the hopelessly wounded, who were made comfortable and allowed to die. If medical resources are in short supply--as they are almost sure to be in any combat using modern weapons--military medical staff are required to favor those patients who can be returned to immediate duty rather than the more seriously wounded.

This is the reverse of practice in civilian medicine, where serious cases are treated at once, and minor cases later. Often, of course, medics, nurses, and military doctors don't follow these principles. But combat medicine can place you and other medical personnel in a very hard moral position. Can you be part of a system like this? That's your decision. But it's important for you to understand the differences between civilian medicine and combat medicine. If you don't, you might find you had a lot of trouble performing your duties as a medic.

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