History TakingYouWithMe / RealLife

* UsefulNotes/WorldWarII inverted this. Western Allies often regarded this as [[WhatASenselessWasteOfHumanLife senseless spite]] in Germans and Japanese toward the end of the war. This is MoralMyopia as they found it easier to understand in those times when their own team did such things earlier in the war. Though they could at least say that the war wasn't so obviously lost for them at the time and in that context it [[CombatPragmatist served a purpose]] in weakening the enemy for future campaigns, putting a kink in his time schedule and so forth; and was therefore not ''just'' HonorBeforeReason , though the latter motive was not unknown among them either. Allies attributed it to fascist indoctrination(with a considerable degree of truth) when their enemies did it, though it can sound slightly ungracious from the comfortable context of peace. They did have a point; everyone wanted to go home to their families by then after all. In any case, it was another excuse to be angry at their enemies so no one seemed to mind. Considering this the influence of ThoseWackyNazis was not illogical in Germany at least. Before UsefulNotes/WorldWarII German soldiers were brave enough, but their governments were more willing to make terms, soldiers didn't fight any longer than [[GoodOldWays tradition demanded]], and [[HonorBeforeReason honor did not abolish reason]]. Furthermore, a number of [[GoodOldWays old-school German soldiers]] really preferred it this way even during World War II and were motivated by the Party's idea of [[IHaveYourWife encouragement]] to fight longer than they would otherwise have. In any case, it is less heroic when one considers that it was often more at the orders of people living in luxury who mainly wished to delay their appointment with the hangman, then at the will of those who were actually fighting.

* Nonlethal example: WebVideo/LowTierGod was permanently banned from competitive Street Fighter after making transphobic remarks about fellow player [=CeroBlast=]. Almost immediately after the ban was made official, he posted a video of [=CeroBlast=] using the N-word repeatedly during one of their streams, which led to them being banned as well.

* Several examples can be found in sports, one would be the final round of the [[UsefulNotes/AssociationFootball Danish Superliga]], where one of the matches were between Randers and Esbjerg in Randers, two teams struggling against relegation. Randers had originally said that they would not bring scores from other matches over the speakers, but when Lyngby got a 2-0 lead against Odense in the 80th minute (a result that meant Esbjerg were relegated for sure), Randers were leading 2-1 and the stadium speaker said what the score was in the other match. [[LaserGuidedKarma Tim Janssen, Dutch Esbjerg striker, scored in the 89th minute, relegating both teams]].

** The Soviets' 'Dead Hand' system was the best example of this: it made certain that in the event of a catastrophic attack crippling the government, nukes would be automatically fired at the United States and its allies. [[spoiler: It's most probably still in place today.]] Interestingly, the system was apparently set in the first place as a ''safety'' device because no matter how edgy or jingoistic the KGB, Party, or Military got (political life in the USSR after Stalin was a constant three-way tug of war), the system would ''only'' go off after a ''confirmed'' nuclear detonation ''and'' the chain of command had been cut.

** In modern air combat, this is what is theorized will happen should a fight between opposing fighters get into visual range. With the advent of "high off-boresight" missiles, a fighter pilot can fire on a target at his 3-o'clock or 9-o'clock rather than just directly ahead of him. Two opposing planes armed with these missiles will likely fire them at each other, resulting in a "mutual kill". In such an exchange, it's to your side's advantage if you sacrifice a cheaper plane to knock out an enemy's more expensive one, although, on the other hand, a cheaper plane is less likely to survive to make it into visual range.

* One of the hijacked planes to be used in the 9/11 attacks, United Airlines Flight 93, failed to reach its intended destination due to the passengers on board fighting back against the terrorists to regain control of the plane. After a struggle, the terrorists on board steered the plane down and crashed it into a field, killing themselves and everyone else on board. The passengers have since been commemorated for their HeroicSacrifice.
** The hijackers themselves were willing to die to cause as much destruction to their American targets as possible.

* The Russian folk hero [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivan_Susanin Ivan Susanin]] allegedly led a squad of Polish invaders into the frozen thickets to die along with him, after being hired to guide them to the residence of the Russian tsar they intended to assassinate. During World War 2 the deed was reenacted by another peasant, [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matvey_Kuzmin Matvey Kuzmin]]. The Nazis who occupied his village demanded he leads them around the Soviet defenses. He pretended to agree, but instead secretly sent his grandson to warn the Soviets, and then led the Nazis into an ambush. The Nazis were massacred, but not before their officer shot Matvey. He was buried with military honors and became the oldest holder of the Hero of the Soviet Union order.

* Sir Creator/TerryPratchett once stated that he planned on doing this to his Alzheimer's, via assisted suicide panels in the UK. Sadly, he died before he got the chance.

*** It is a rather sad subversion actually. A bee can sting another insect and kill it without any harm to itself, but to a bigger animal, its [[LastBreathBullet Last Breath Sting]] will most likely not be lethal.

** Honey bees have barbs on their stingers, which lodge in the body of their target and are ripped out of the abdomen of the bee while continuing to pump venom. Unfortunately for the honey bee, the injury caused by doing this is fatal and they die soon afterwards.
*** It is a rather sad subversion actually. A bee can sting another insect and kill it without any harm to itself, but to a bigger animal its [[LastBreathBullet Last Breath Sting]] will most likely not be lethal.

** The Soviets were masters on the ''taran'' attacks, ramming an enemy airplane with one's own. Exchanging a dated I-153 or I-16 fighter to a new Ju 88 is actually good deal, and there are always chances of parachuting.

** In modern air combat, this is what is theorized will happen should a fight between opposing fighters get into visual range. With the advent of "high off-boresight" missiles, a fighter pilot can fire on a target at his 3-o'clock or 9-o'clock rather than just directly ahead of him. Two opposing planes armed with these missiles will likely fire them at each other, resulting in a "mutual kill". In such an exchange, it's to your side's advantage if you sacrifice a cheaper plane to knock out an enemy's more expensive one, although on the other hand a cheaper plane is less likely to survive to make it into visual range.

*** It also makes the assassination plan much simpler and more effective: The hardest part of most assassination plans is the assassin's escape afterwards, and it is also the part most likely to cause the kill to not happen.
* The entire Philippine campaign in 1941 from the American point of view. American contingency plans, despite fifty years of preparation for war with Japan, couldn't figure out how to prevent the Philipines from being captured. Yet no one could abandon them as, if one is going to be an imperialist, one [[HonorBeforeReason should at least]] protect one's charges from other imperialists. In a strange sort of way it was an American version of Bushido. Be that as it may the Philipines took a long time and [[SpannerInTheWorks interfered with the Japanese schedule considerably]].
* [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jan_van_Speyk Jan van Speyk]] was a Dutch naval commander, who fought against the Belgian Revolution. In 1831, Belgians captured his boat, and demanded him take the Dutch flag down. He said "Rather to blow up then!" and fired a pistol into a barrel of gunpowder, destroying his boat, and killing dozens (including most of his own crew).

* Kashmir seperatists and Pakistani Taliban often launch suicidal attacks, with 'fedayeen' fighters, a small unit of 5-10 soldiers sent deep into enemy territory and attack targets with abandon until stopped and killed by the response.
** Islamic terrorism in general is infamous for this, to the point where many associate suicide bombings with Islam itself.

* The Russian folk hero [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivan_Susanin Ivan Susanin]] allegedly led a squad of Polish invaders into the frozen thickets to die along with him, after being hired to guide them to the residense of the Russian tsar they intended to assassinate. During World War 2 the deed was reenacted by another peasant, [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matvey_Kuzmin Matvey Kuzmin]]. The Nazis who occupied his village demanded he leads them around the Soviet defences. He pretended to agree, but instead secretly sent his grandson to warn the Soviets, and then led the Nazis into an ambush. The Nazis were massacred, but not before their officer shot Matvey. He was buried with military honors and became the oldest holder of the Hero of the Soviet Union order.

* UsefulNotes/WorldWarII inverted this. Western Allies often regarded this as [[WhatASenselessWasteOfHumanLife senseless spite]] in Germans and Japanese toward the end of the war. This is MoralMyopia as they found it easier to understand in those times when their own team did such things earlier in the war. Though they could at least say that the war wasn't so obviously lost for them at the time and in that context it [[CombatPragmatist served a purpose]] in weakening the enemy for future campaigns, putting a kink in his time schedule and so forth; and was therefore not ''just'' HonorBeforeReason , though the latter motive was not unknown among them either. Allies attributed it to fascist indoctrination(with a considerable degree of truth) when their enemies did it, though it can sound slightly ungracious from the comfortable context of peace. They did have a point; everyone wanted to go home to their families by then after all. In any case it was another excuse to be angry at their enemies so no one seemed to mind. Considering this the influence of ThoseWackyNazis was not illogical in Germany at least. Before UsefulNotes/WorldWarII German soldiers were brave enough, but their governments were more willing to make terms, soldiers didn't fight any longer then [[GoodOldWays tradition demanded]], and [[HonorBeforeReason honor did not abolish reason]] . Furthermore a number of [[GoodOldWays old-school German soldiers]] really preferred it this way even during World War II and were motivated by the Party's idea of [[IHaveYourWife encouragement]] to fight longer then they would otherwise have. In any case it is less heroic when one considers that it was often more at the orders of people living in luxury who mainly wished to delay their appointment with the hangman, then at the will of those who were actually fighting.
** It did not help that as early as Operation Torch, the Allies and Roosevelt in particular was vocal about an unconditional surrender. Not only did the call for no terms not work, there was also the leaked Morgenthau Plan (Splitting Germany up and turning it back into farmland) This revelation crossed over the lines and it was all that was needed to convince the Party, the Wehrmacht and common citizenry of Germany to fight until the very end.
*** Consider Germany's history. In UsefulNotes/WorldWarI they had performed as they had been expected to: Fight while there is hope, make peace when there is no more. When the German government asked for an armistice German troops stood in Northern France and were slowly withdrawing while still inflicting significant casualties. There were no foreign troops on German soil and it was dubious whether there would be in 1919 if the war had gone on. At Versailles Germany lost 10% of its people and 13% of its area; 80% of its iron ore, around 15% of its agriculture, etc. Probably the harshest peace terms any European nation had faced in a long time. And no imagine knowing that you have already fought well beyond reasonable time against an enemy who already hated you last time. Wouldn't you be willing to believe that there is genocide in the cards, too?
** One of [[SoreLoser Hitler]]'s [[VillainousBreakdown last orders]] was to destroy the public infrastructure of ''Germany'' since, in his SocialDarwinist mindset, [[YouHaveFailedMe Germany's defeat at the hands of Slavs and Anglo-Saxons meant that the Germanic Race was clearly inferior to them and not worthy to be the Master Race after all and as such did not deserve to exist.]] Albert Speer took on the responsibility for carrying it out, but didn't.

* In the very early moments of the Universe, just after the Big Bang, [[FusionDance quarks and antiquarks combined]] to form [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baryogenesis baryons and antibaryons]][[note]]What makes atomic nuclei (protons, neutrons, and their antimatter equivalent)[[/note]],that proceeded to annihilate themselves. We are made of the small percentage of matter that survived it[[note]]''Why'' was created more matter than antimatter is one problem still unsolved in physics, but as the laws of physics are known to affect particles and antiparticles differently, there are working hypotheses[[/note]].
* The death of "Pretty Boy" Floyd: when FBI agents tried to capture him, he retaliated with gun fire, [[MultipleGunshotDeath and even after being gunned repeatedly by the agents that he was facing off against]], he still managed to fatally wound two of them.

* Sir Creator/TerryPratchett has stated that he plans on doing this to his Alzheimers. It isn't a joke; he's lobbying to get assisted suicide panels in the UK.

** Sadly, Pratchett did not get the chance, dying of Alzheimer's related problems on March 12th, 2015.

* The Israeli "Samson Option"- if all hope is lost and Israel is about to be defeated, launch nukes at the responsible party or parties. ''All'' the nukes they have, no matter the consequences.

* Fighter pilots often [[RammingAlwaysWorks crashed their crippled planes into their intended target]]. The Japanese ''kamikaze'' intentionally set out to do this, flying planes packed with explosives specifically for that purpose.

* The Flight 93 passengers [[HeroicSacrifice knew what they to do to save Washington, D.C. from a group of terrorists]], but they also had this response to the terrorists when the passengers attacked them. [[ThisIsGonnaSuck They knew it'll end badly]] but they didn't care because they were bringing the terrorists with them.
** The hijackers themselves were using their own lives to cause as much destruction as possible.

** Sun Tzu sought victory, not death. When confronted by superior opposition, moving to ground that offered no escape wasn't meant to invoke this trope. It was meant to make it clear to your subordinates there was no way out but through, making them absolute hellions in defense. If there is no retreat, rout is impossible, and the enemy encountering your own unbreakable troops might well panic.

* The Russian folk hero [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivan_Susanin Ivan Susanin]] ostensibly lured a squad of Polish soldiers into the thickets of the forest never to be heard about again, after they hired him to guide them to the residense of the Russian tsar they intended to assassinate. During World War 2 the deed was reenacted by another peasant, [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matvey_Kuzmin Matvey Kuzmin]]. The Nazi who occupied his village wanted him to help them bypass the Soviet defences. He agreed but then sent his grandson to warn the nearby Soviet troops, and then led the Nazis straight into the ambush. The Nazi were slaughtered or captured, but not before their officer shot Matvey. He was buried with military honors and became the oldest holder of the Hero of the Soviet Union order.

* In one hand, galaxy clusters are ''very'' unhealthy for spiral galaxies like ours[[note]]Since, for example, interactions with the hot gas that fills the space between the galaxies on them strips the interstellar gas of a galaxy quenching star formation, but not before going out with a burst of newly made stars in some cases[[/note]]. On the other, when two spiral galaxies collide they get ''very'' messed up, including to form a lot of new stars before [[FusionDance merging]] to form a larger one. [[http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2001A%26A...377..745G Meet]] [[http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2005/u6697/ UGC 6697]], a system where it's believed two galaxies are colliding and wrecking themselves apart while falling into a galaxy cluster that is stripping their gas... at the same time they're making stars galore[[note]]ScienceMarchesOn. This is [[https://arxiv.org/abs/1707.06241 likely a single galaxy that on said infall had an interaction with a nearby smaller galaxy, suffering both enhanced gas stripping and star formation as a result]][[/note]]. An even finer example of that is the pair [[http://iopscience.iop.org/2041-8205/750/1/L23/downloadHRFigure/figure/apjl428464f2 F0237]] in the distant A2744 galaxy cluster, with two almost Milky Way-sized galaxies.

* In one hand, galaxy clusters are ''very'' unhealthy for spiral galaxies like ours[[note]]Since, for example, interactions with the hot gas that fills the space between the galaxies on them strips the interstellar gas of a galaxy quenching star formation, but not before going out with a burst of newly made stars in some cases[[/note]]. On the other, when two spiral galaxies collide they get ''very'' messed up, including to form a lot of new stars before [[FusionDance merging]] to form a larger one. [[http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2001A%26A...377..745G Meet]] [[http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2005/u6697/ UGC 6697]], a system where it's believed two galaxies are colliding and wrecking themselves apart while falling into a galaxy cluster that is stripping their gas... at the same time they're making stars galore.

* Most engagements, where one opponent is defeated but the winner later falls victim to wounds or damage, is an example of this trope. Such was the case of the German commerce raider ''Kormorant'' after her [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_between_HMAS_Sydney_and_German_auxiliary_cruiser_Kormoran battle]] with the Australian light cruiser ''Sidney'', with the TearJerker part being that all of ''Sidney'' crew died.

* UsefulNotes/WorldWarII inverted this. Western Allies often regarded this as [[WhatASenselessWasteOfHumanLife senseless spite]] in Germans and Japanese toward the end of the war. This is MoralMyopia as they found it easier to understand in those times when their own team did such things earlier in the war. Though they could at least say that the war wasn't so obviously lost for them at the time and in that context it [[CombatPragmatist served a purpose]] in weakening the enemy for future campaigns, putting a kink in his time schedule and so forth; and was therefore not ''just'' HonorBeforeReason , though the latter motive was not unknown among them either. Allies attributed it to fascist indoctrination(with a considerable degree of truth) when their enemies did it, though it can sound slightly ungracious from the comfortable context of peace. They did have a point; everyone wanted to go home to their families by then after all. In any case it was another excuse to be angry at their enemies so no one seemed to mind. Considering this the influence of ThoseWackyNazis was not illogical in Germany at least. Before WorldWarII German soldiers were brave enough, but their governments were more willing to make terms, soldiers didn't fight any longer then [[GoodOldWays tradition demanded]], and [[HonorBeforeReason honor did not abolish reason]] . Furthermore a number of [[GoodOldWays old-school German soldiers]] really preferred it this way even during WorldWarII and were motivated by the Party's idea of [[IHaveYourWife encouragement]] to fight longer then they would otherwise have. In any case it is less heroic when one considers that it was often more at the orders of people living in luxury who mainly wished to delay their appointment with the hangman, then at the will of those who were actually fighting.

*** Consider Germany's history. In WW1 they had performed as they had been expected to: Fight while there is hope, make peace when there is no more. When the German government asked for an armistice German troops stood in Northern France and were slowly withdrawing while still inflicting significant casualties. There were no foreign troops on German soil and it was dubious whether there would be in 1919 if the war had gone on. At Versailles Germany lost 10% of its people and 13% of its area; 80% of its iron ore, around 15% of its agriculture, etc. Probably the harshest peace terms any European nation had faced in a long time. And no imagine knowing that you have already fought well beyond reasonable time against an enemy who already hated you last time. Wouldn't you be willing to believe that there is genocide in the cards, too?

* Related to the above example is the thesis of the book Empire by Niall Ferguson, which argues that [[WinstonChurchill Churchill's]] entire strategy in [[UsefulNotes/WorldWar2 WWII]] was a kind of national self-sacrifice which involved exhausting the British Empire and probably causing its breakup, if only to deny the far more atrocious imperial powers of Japan and [[ThoseWackyNazis Nazi Germany]] an ultimate victory. In short, [[YouShallNotPass 400 years of the British Empire was expended in a last great hurrah to destroy perhaps the greatest evil the world has ever known.]] The Realm Abides.