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Using rats to clear land mines in Cambodia

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Re: Using rats to clear land mines in Cambodia

#21

Post by midoridensha »

asdff wrote: post #17
Victerius wrote: post #2

I had several thoughts while reading this article. > Cambodia is contaminated with millions of unexploded ordnances dropped as cluster bombs by the U.S. during the Vietnam War. In addition, millions of land mines were buried throughout the country during a series of civil wars from the 1970s–1990s. Millions. I can't process numbers that large. I know what a million is, but I struggle to imagine what a million land mi…

There should be international laws where after wartime, governments are responsible for clearing out any leftover ordinances and must perform ecological cleanup. One would think the U.S. government would be in support of this because it would make wars too cost prohibitive for other nations, and the contracts would be an excellent profitmaking opportunity for the military industrial complex.

How exactly do you enforce such a law? If the victor refuses to follow the law, invade their country, set up a new puppet government, and put them on trial?

Re: Using rats to clear land mines in Cambodia

#22

Post by midoridensha »

conradev wrote: post #8
Victerius wrote: post #2

I had several thoughts while reading this article. > Cambodia is contaminated with millions of unexploded ordnances dropped as cluster bombs by the U.S. during the Vietnam War. In addition, millions of land mines were buried throughout the country during a series of civil wars from the 1970s–1990s. Millions. I can't process numbers that large. I know what a million is, but I struggle to imagine what a million land mi…

A better idea is to just get rid of mines entirely: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ottawa_Treaty

These treaties are largely useless because certain large powers refuse to sign them. Sure, it's nice if Switzerland or Norway signs such a treaty, but that doesn't exactly change anything.

Re: Using rats to clear land mines in Cambodia

#23

Post by midoridensha »

btilly wrote: post #20
defrost wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mines and bombs can be complex objects, especially bombs that are intended to not immediately explode and thus deny access | use up human resources due to the poised threat. Even as far back as WWII bombs from aircraft included booby trapped "anti personnel" bombs with secondary fuses hidden back to kill bomb disposal experts. In the case of your concern, bombs can be released with "chemical burn safeties" (for examp…

How the bomb disposal experts first learned their craft is insane. https://www.amazon.com/Danger-Uxb-Heroic-Story-Disposal/dp/0... has the story. Short version, the person working with the bomb would call out what they saw, then do what the partner said. The partner had a book and was out of the blast radius. They recorded it all, and if the bomb blew up would write down not to do THAT again! Eventually they learned…

The way to do that safely (for your own people) is to use enemy POWs to disable the bomb.

Re: Using rats to clear land mines in Cambodia

#24

Post by themodelplumber »

asimjalis wrote: post #16

They should use AI driven mini robots that go around and blow up mines.

They should develop smart plants with a distributed root system, an overabundance of shoots, a preference for seeking mines, and a high threshold for shoot pain.

This would also prepare us with countermeasure systems control for when the AI tries to take over.

Re: Using rats to clear land mines in Cambodia

#25

Post by asdff »

midoridensha wrote: post #21
asdff wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There should be international laws where after wartime, governments are responsible for clearing out any leftover ordinances and must perform ecological cleanup. One would think the U.S. government would be in support of this because it would make wars too cost prohibitive for other nations, and the contracts would be an excellent profitmaking opportunity for the military industrial complex.

How exactly do you enforce such a law? If the victor refuses to follow the law, invade their country, set up a new puppet government, and put them on trial?

Sanction them until their oligarchs turn on the executive.

Re: Using rats to clear land mines in Cambodia

#26

Post by asdff »

idontwantthis wrote: post #19
asdff wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There should be international laws where after wartime, governments are responsible for clearing out any leftover ordinances and must perform ecological cleanup. One would think the U.S. government would be in support of this because it would make wars too cost prohibitive for other nations, and the contracts would be an excellent profitmaking opportunity for the military industrial complex.

That only makes any sense if the government that laid the mines still exists after the conflict and wasn’t entirely insane in the first place. Read about the Khmer Rouge.

Arms need to come from someplace. In the case of the Khmer Rouge, those landmines were made by the chinese government 1. Sanctions could therefore land on china for not accounting for mines they created. For the case of governments that truly have no responisble parties remaining afterwards, say the land is littered with IEDs, then the UN should have funds set aside to go towards these efforts, just like how they have funds going to other humanitarian efforts. But when its possible its best to charge the offending governments if they are still around than to have the world subsidize them.

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_mines_in_Cambodia

Re: Using rats to clear land mines in Cambodia

#27

Post by raisin_churn »

I would prefer to use US senators who refuse to ratify the Mine Ban Convention. They won't need any particular skills or training, just have them wander around possible UXO sites until they find one with their foot. The great thing about this is, US senators are a 100% renewable resource.

Re: Using rats to clear land mines in Cambodia

#28

Post by midoridensha »

asdff wrote: post #25
midoridensha wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How exactly do you enforce such a law? If the victor refuses to follow the law, invade their country, set up a new puppet government, and put them on trial?

Sanction them until their oligarchs turn on the executive.

I don't think I've seen any examples in real life of this actually working, even though it seems to be the normal enforcement mechanism.

Re: Using rats to clear land mines in Cambodia

#29

Post by asdff »

midoridensha wrote: post #28
asdff wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sanction them until their oligarchs turn on the executive.

I don't think I've seen any examples in real life of this actually working, even though it seems to be the normal enforcement mechanism.

IMO because they don't sanction nearly enough

Re: Using rats to clear land mines in Cambodia

#30

Post by ggm »

African giant pouched rat. Cheek pouches. (not marsupial). Poor eyesight so the sniffing is presumably evolutionary advantage for the niche they'd normally occupy.

Given enough time, I wonder what other social adaptive qualities could emerge in a species like this? Domestication of dogs and cats had huge longterm upsides for both species and humans. Most rats by number are now co-occupants of human space but by species I'd be less sure. I had no idea how big the genus is until I dived into the rabbit hole.

(If you like large rats, look out for the Rakali or water-rat: web footed, and quite large. They live in the lake of Canberra amongst other places. I don't think they are trainable or economically exploitable beyond nature tourism. They are very very cute. Like Otters sort-of, but .. rats)

These pouched rats are very cute. And doing amazing work.

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