Cannon fodder

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Cannon fodder is a harsh label for soldiers who are treated as disposable by those in charge. They are sent to fight with very long odds to win a bigger goal, like the trench battles of World War I. The term can also be used to separate infantry from other troops or to mark inexperienced soldiers as less valuable than veterans.

The word comes from the idea that soldiers are like food for enemy cannon fire. The notion of soldiers as something to be used up goes back to at least the 16th century. In Shakespeare's Henry IV, Part 1, Falstaff jokes about his small band of soldiers, and they are called “food for powder.” The exact phrase “cannon fodder” first appeared in 1814 in a French anti-Napoleon pamphlet by François-Réné de Chateaubriand, who criticized how conscripts were treated as “raw material” and “cannon fodder.” It later appeared in English in 1854 in a translated story by Hendrik Conscience, was published in The Morning Chronicle in 1861, and became popular during World War I.