>it's reasonable to use a method which tries to minimize 'friendly' casualties first and e'enemy' collateral damage second

That is a very broad statement. Would it apply to enemies using Chemical, Biological or Nuclear weapons?

> people (soldiers) were dying by the dozen daily

I don't think that you intend to, but it seems like you are counting only friendly casualties as people casualties.

> asymmetrical and unfair to a technological backward foe

Which would probably be all foes but one, if popular media is to be trusted with statistics. There is no country that spends asuch as US and that has been the case for a long long time I believe. So all foes are backward and hence a war, if the technology is the criteria of fairness, is going to be extremely unfair to them.