U.S. drone pilot leaks footage reveals accidental killing of children and adults • Hacker News Board

Re: U.S. drone pilot leaks footage reveals accidental killing of children and adults

#231

Post by iJohnDoe » Wed, Aug 25, 2021, 4:14 PM UTC

Think about this for a second.

Your family is walking into Trader Joe’s or Whole Foods and all get killed by a missile from the sky. Or you send your children off to school and the school gets accidentally hit by a missile. Killed in an instant and the family of those victims listed above have no idea why and have zero recourse.

If this started happening on US soil on a daily basis, I wonder if more people would care. The top comment here is talking about the article text and AI vs. the topic of the article.

FTA - 3,797 we’re killed by drones. They were killed by drones they had no chance to defend themselves against.

Re: U.S. drone pilot leaks footage reveals accidental killing of children and adults

#232

Post by arminiusreturns » Wed, Aug 25, 2021, 4:26 PM UTC

secondaryacct wrote: post #230

squarefoot wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The worst part about the use of drones is not the collateral killing of civilians and their children; if done far away it has in the long run next to zero impact on the perception of the war among the attackers families. By using drones, the attackers are safe; their families won't mourn their beloved ones who won't return back from war zone, therefore they won't experience what war really is about, which has nothing…

One would say: why isnt Afghanistan sending drones to Phoenix or San Diego? What led to this country / group of combattant to be so behind. Im French and I live in China with a child born here. The two militaries I paid taxes to maintain are able to find ways to resist US aggression to a point where it would become really painful to treat us like they treated Afghanistan, and we are just as old as Afghanistan. At som…

This person actually just called for Afghanistan to request assistance from China in attacking the US... I don't even... wow...

Straight out of /r/sino

Re: U.S. drone pilot leaks footage reveals accidental killing of children and adults

#233

Post by tablespoon » Wed, Aug 25, 2021, 4:45 PM UTC

leesalminen wrote: post #227

tablespoon wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>>> The “war on terror” was not meant to stop terrorism. It was meant to fan the flames and give the US an endless war that can be fought for generations. And it worked. >> Source please. > Seems like plain old common sense to me. You’re never going to hear the US government say it. But that doesn’t make it untrue. It’s just an inconvenient truth. If that's "plain old common sense," so is QAnon . In reality they're b…

Framed another way “plain old common sense” could be better worded as “using critical thinking to form an opinion about the root cause of a geopolitical clusterfuck”. If people who have an opinion that differs from “sources” is now a Qanon believer then we’re in for a very rocky road ahead. It’s almost like we’re only allowed to have same opinion as our overlords who own the “sources” we venerate. That’s a problem. I…

> Framed another way “plain old common sense” could be better worded as “using critical thinking to form an opinion about the root cause of a geopolitical clusterfuck”.

Except that the opinion is question was not formed by critical thinking.

> If people who have an opinion that differs from “sources” is now a Qanon believer then we’re in for a very rocky road ahead. It’s almost like we’re only allowed to have same opinion as our overlords who own the “sources” we venerate. That’s a problem.

No, there's an important difference between having an a different opinion than "our overlords" and having an opinion that's a paranoid comic book fantasy.

> It’s not much of a stretch to believe that defense contractors lobbied lawmakers to extend a war that made them so much money. Certainly not enough of a stretch to compare it to Qanon.

That's the kind of claim you need evidence for, it's not something you just get to assume (unless you're fine with defective reasoning processes). Furthermore, even if it is true, it doesn't support the original outlandish claim that "The 'war on terror' was not meant to stop terrorism. It was meant to fan the flames and give the US an endless war that can be fought for generations." I wouldn't be surprised if that claim spawned from "9/11 truther" conspiracy theories.

Re: U.S. drone pilot leaks footage reveals accidental killing of children and adults

#234

Post by leesalminen » Wed, Aug 25, 2021, 4:55 PM UTC

tablespoon wrote: post #233

leesalminen wrote: post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Framed another way “plain old common sense” could be better worded as “using critical thinking to form an opinion about the root cause of a geopolitical clusterfuck”. If people who have an opinion that differs from “sources” is now a Qanon believer then we’re in for a very rocky road ahead. It’s almost like we’re only allowed to have same opinion as our overlords who own the “sources” we venerate. That’s a problem. I…

> Framed another way “plain old common sense” could be better worded as “using critical thinking to form an opinion about the root cause of a geopolitical clusterfuck”. Except that the opinion is question was not formed by critical thinking. > If people who have an opinion that differs from “sources” is now a Qanon believer then we’re in for a very rocky road ahead. It’s almost like we’re only allowed to have same op…

> That's the kind of claim you need evidence for

Where exactly would such “evidence” come from? Do you think the CEO of Raytheon would ever utter such a statement even if it were 100% true?

> Furthermore, even if it is true, it doesn't support the original outlandish claim that "The 'war on terror' was not meant to stop terrorism. It was meant to fan the flames and give the US an endless war that can be fought for generations."

I fail to see how anyone could believe that bombing people from the sky and invading a couple countries would win over favor from potential terrorists. In fact, it would seem the exact opposite is true. We should’ve spent the trillions of dollars using economic diplomacy instead. Now, one could argue honestly that our leaders are just complete idiots. I just happen to think they knew exactly what we were doing.

Re: U.S. drone pilot leaks footage reveals accidental killing of children and adults

#235

Post by 2OEH8eoCRo0 » Wed, Aug 25, 2021, 5:04 PM UTC

CapricornNoble wrote: post #192

2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> to phrase it another way, allied forces killed a third as many civilians as the actual Taliban > According to the United Nations, the Taliban and its allies were responsible for 76% of civilian casualties in Afghanistan in 2009, 75% in 2010 and 80% in 2011. Interesting. How do you get one third out of those numbers?

>>>How do you get one third out of those numbers? 25% / 75% = 1/3.

Strange phrasing. Sounds worse than: America and its allies were responsible for 20-25% of civilian casualties. The UN doesn't use that phrasing.

Re: U.S. drone pilot leaks footage reveals accidental killing of children and adults

#236

Post by loonster » Wed, Aug 25, 2021, 5:08 PM UTC

belorn wrote: post #85

cameronh90 wrote: post #11

Is it cynical to think this was intentionally leaked to boost support for withdrawing from Afghanistan?

The military method to define any male (and sometimes women) above a certain age as an combatant was leaked 2010. This is simply a reminder that the same indiscriminating warfare are continuing. If anything this article reminds me of domestic terrorists that define a certain demographic as being enemy combatants and then goes to indiscriminate killing spree. The major difference seems to be that the military personal…

In certain areas of operation, yes. Anyone found in that area is considered hostile. I have not seen anything that would imply that every male in the entire country is considered an enemy combatant.

Re: U.S. drone pilot leaks footage reveals accidental killing of children and adults

#237

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Aug 25, 2021, 5:14 PM UTC

CapricornNoble wrote: post #204

lifeformed wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe not malice but also not just simply accidents - more like negligence. We can't dismiss mistakes in war as simply a cost of doing business. > But one side tries it's best to be accountable and limit human suffering while still carrying out missions. Is that side really doing their "best"? I feel like a lot of these mistakes are avoidable with better procedures, training, and reducing being in situations where mi…

>>>We can't dismiss mistakes in war as simply a cost of doing business. When you are putting fallible human beings into the most stressful and demanding situations imaginable, it's unreasonable to NOT factor in a baseline level of human error. >>>I feel like a lot of these mistakes are avoidable with better procedures, training, What specific procedures would you like to adjust? Escalation of Force? Rules of Engageme…

[deleted]

Re: U.S. drone pilot leaks footage reveals accidental killing of children and adults

#238

Post by loonster » Wed, Aug 25, 2021, 5:20 PM UTC

2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote: post #92

torstenvl wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We didn't use this term in Iraq, so I wouldn't call it "military jargon for child" like the article does. It is common for units to come up with code words for various things, especially when the topic is emotionally charged or could be used for propaganda or intel. For example, almost nobody would use the term "FKIA" over the radio, even on a secure channel; they might say "flowers" instead.

River City = reduced comms = something very bad happened, probably KIA

Thanks. I never knew that River City = Reduced Comms. Sure I knew what it was and what it was for but never what the codeword was originally.

Re: U.S. drone pilot leaks footage reveals accidental killing of children and adults

#239

Post by sixothree » Wed, Aug 25, 2021, 5:28 PM UTC

dmos62 wrote: post #98

ricardobeat wrote: post #71

Having watched a few documentaries on the war, from multiple periods, my first thought was “who did they target with these drone strikes?” seeing as they usually had no idea who or where the enemy was. The answer is much worse than I could imagine: “a guy with a radio … which is reasonable grounds for suspicion”. Nothing accidental about it. These should be considered war crimes.

Checkout Ben Anderson's 2 part ~30 minute report from Afghanistan for Vice from around 10 years ago [0][1]. He was embedded with British troops and ANA during a patrol with a lot of gun fights. The British strafed an empty field, almost bombed themselves twice and once an Apache launched a Hellfire missile into a compound with British and ANA troops in it and hit a building where a family with small children were hid…

If it's a choice between malice and incompetence then I say incompetence is malice.

Re: U.S. drone pilot leaks footage reveals accidental killing of children and adults

#240

Post by tablespoon » Wed, Aug 25, 2021, 5:41 PM UTC

leesalminen wrote: post #234

tablespoon wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Framed another way “plain old common sense” could be better worded as “using critical thinking to form an opinion about the root cause of a geopolitical clusterfuck”. Except that the opinion is question was not formed by critical thinking. > If people who have an opinion that differs from “sources” is now a Qanon believer then we’re in for a very rocky road ahead. It’s almost like we’re only allowed to have same op…

> That's the kind of claim you need evidence for Where exactly would such “evidence” come from? Do you think the CEO of Raytheon would ever utter such a statement even if it were 100% true? > Furthermore, even if it is true, it doesn't support the original outlandish claim that "The 'war on terror' was not meant to stop terrorism. It was meant to fan the flames and give the US an endless war that can be fought for ge…

> Where exactly would such “evidence” come from? Do you think the CEO of Raytheon would ever utter such a statement even if it were 100% true?

Just some examples: a leak or confession. People do sometimes have changes of heart. But until you can actually provide evidence, you're just making up "facts" that are convenient to you.

Also, the CEO of Raytheon is very unlikely to be the person that determined what the "war on terror" was meant to do.

> I fail to see how anyone could believe that bombing people from the sky and invading a couple countries would win over favor from potential terrorists. We should’ve...

That failing is yours. There seems to be a lot of hindsight bias there, as well as some weird misunderstandings.

> Now, one could argue honestly that our leaders are just complete idiots. I just happen to think they knew exactly what we were doing.

It's far more likely that "our leaders" were high on "end of history" idealism, and spurred to hasty action by a traumatic attack, and are nearly as unable to accurately predict how a complex world will behave as the rest of us.