[Ads-l] Quote: Out of every 100 soldiers, 10 should not even be here, eighty are just targets . .. only one is a warrior (Probably not Heraclitus)

[James Landau]

There had been considerable discussion on how many soldiers actually fired their weapons in combat long before the 1984 quote you quoted.
Item: in 1947 S. L.A. Marshall published the book _Men Against Fire_ which included his own researches on the subject.   There has since been controversy over Marshall's conclusions, e.g. https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/5jl117/in_his_book_men_against_fire_sla_marshall_alleges/?rdt=56835

There has been research on this topic long before Marshall.  For example, after the battle of Gettysburg, thousands of rifles were found that had been loaded but never fired.  (A tour guide told me there were 37,000 such rifles found).  
James Landau
jjjrlandau at netscape.com

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