New war technology allows kings to fight more directly, mostly leaving the peasants alone. By wretchardthecat.

The 2026 calendar. Maduro in January. El Mencio in February. Khamenei in March announces the new American way of war.

An unnoticed development in the history of conflict has taken place. For the first time in memory it is the kingpins, not the henchmen, who are dying first in wars.

The trend began with the famous pager attack on Hezbollah leadership in 2024 when the bigs had their command appliances blow up in their faces. The NPCs [non-playing characters] were relatively safe. It became more pronounced when Hassan Nasrallah was blown up, together with his gold bars and underlings, in an impregnable underground bunker.

The kings were dying first. …

The preponderance of elite deaths over the common is by design. At the commencement the US president “told members of Iran’s armed forces could either lay down their weapons and be given ‘complete immunity’, or “face certain death”. He also urged Iranian civilians to stay in their homes and prepare to overthrow the clerical establishment.” The quarrel is between the sovereigns, not the peasants. …

None of this should be read to justify war or trivialize it, but it is nevertheless a fact that changes in the technology of combat have made it far more economical and altogether less trouble to target the kingpins rather than the NPCs.

Such a pleasant change from WW2, when peasants died by the millions — e.g. Coventry, Dresden, Nanking, Hiroshima.