Though we shouldn't have pity parties for troops, it's worth mentioning (in cases where they aren't, like, SS freaks) that some of them are alienated from a healthy understanding of the meaning of what they are doing and that is something that can be reversed and has even happened spontaneously, for example:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reading_Railroad_Massacre#16th_Regiment

There are many reasons for bootcamp being largely a process of traumatizing soldiers into seeing their targets as non-human and orders as unquestionable, and among them is that people have a tendency for compassion that can even emerge spontaneously and lead them to not carry out their job as butchers for the empire.

Just something I had been meaning to mention but didn't have a chance to.