Mia Bloom, a professor at Georgia State University and an international security fellow at the think tank New America, says it's important to understand that although rape is a war crime, it is not something that is present in all wars.And danger can come from different directions. In one case
noted by The Guardian, a Ukrainian teacher had been dragged into the school library by a Ukrainian soldier who tried to rape her. She reported him to the police and the man was arrested.
"It's not just a normal part of war. Not all soldiers rape," Bloom tells NPR. Bloom and Cohen are both a part of the
Sexual Violence in Armed Conflict project, which collects data on the subject.
She says because there is variation between conflicts — some have rampant sexual violence, while others have little — there isn't a consistent theory of when and why rape is used in war.