The Value of Civilian Lives

As the German military pays about $5,000 to every family that lost a member in a German-ordered airstrike in Afghanistan in September last year, Spiegel looks at the value of a dead civilian. “In the past, Germany has paid $20,000 to the family of an Afghan woman who was shot at a checkpoint, and $33,000 for a dead Afghan boy. The price has apparently gone down since then…Before, the Germans were seen as driving up prices in Afghanistan. The Kunduz bombing, Germany’s war trauma, its big case, is now a $5,000 case. Little more than a wartime fender bender, if you will.”