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NY Times releases military surplus gear data on GitHub

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Re: NY Times releases military surplus gear data on GitHub

#91

Post by [deleted] »

partacus wrote: post #88
munificent wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a meaningless comparison unless you account for population differences. Per capita would be useful to show.

Do you really think per capita works in this situation? It's not like your average citizen can pick up a surplus grenade launcher. Breaking down geo-politically would be more useful. But grabbing per capita values from bjterry and going by party... Senator Avg per Capita Democrat $4.14 External (VI, PR, ..) $33.19 Independent $9.07 Republican $7.21

[deleted]

Re: NY Times releases military surplus gear data on GitHub

#92

Post by bjterry »

munificent wrote: post #83
partacus wrote: post #72

Sorted from most greedy to least, wow, look at Florida: State Amount FL $252,801,365.49 AL $117,321,970.75 TX $93,960,116.66 CA $92,199,594.55 TN $88,036,810.05 GA $74,258,127.54 IL $63,856,929.46 SC $49,446,894.25 MI $43,557,552.29 IN $43,153,872.84 OH $41,066,993.83 KY $38,672,666.63 PR $37,712,132.94 AZ $37,173,754.35 OK $26,113,459.50 NM $25,077,905.94 NY $24,920,353.44 VA $24,257,646.82 NJ $24,075,459.47 WA $23,…

That's a meaningless comparison unless you account for population differences. Per capita would be useful to show.

Here it is per capita: https://gist.github.com/BJTerry/d9392dc1d494cad052ef

Re: NY Times releases military surplus gear data on GitHub

#93

Post by dragonwriter »

greedo wrote: post #82
amcnett wrote: post #14

I was surprised to see a number of mine-resistant vehicles associated with very rural counties in Washington State. Not being completely sure whether a mine-resistant vehicle was a tank or not, I googled the term and came across this article: http://news.yahoo.com/as-wars-wind-down--small-town-cops-inh... Choice quote from the article: “Here’s the thing,” Shellmyer says. “Washington, Iowa, has 8,000 people. We have a…

Operational costs will prevent most of the MRAPs from seeing any use. 6MPG is horrible, and fuel costs are a big budgetary item for most public safety departments.

> Operational costs will prevent most of the MRAPs from seeing any use.

Or, alternatively, MRAPs will provide the justification for greater budget demands.

Re: NY Times releases military surplus gear data on GitHub

#94

Post by baddox »

greedo wrote: post #82
amcnett wrote: post #14

I was surprised to see a number of mine-resistant vehicles associated with very rural counties in Washington State. Not being completely sure whether a mine-resistant vehicle was a tank or not, I googled the term and came across this article: http://news.yahoo.com/as-wars-wind-down--small-town-cops-inh... Choice quote from the article: “Here’s the thing,” Shellmyer says. “Washington, Iowa, has 8,000 people. We have a…

Operational costs will prevent most of the MRAPs from seeing any use. 6MPG is horrible, and fuel costs are a big budgetary item for most public safety departments.

Does the federal government not provide funding for their operation as well?

Re: NY Times releases military surplus gear data on GitHub

#95

Post by dredmorbius »

dublinben wrote: post #18
amcnett wrote: post #14

I was surprised to see a number of mine-resistant vehicles associated with very rural counties in Washington State. Not being completely sure whether a mine-resistant vehicle was a tank or not, I googled the term and came across this article: http://news.yahoo.com/as-wars-wind-down--small-town-cops-inh... Choice quote from the article: “Here’s the thing,” Shellmyer says. “Washington, Iowa, has 8,000 people. We have a…

If we're lucky, those massive armored vehicles will be parked behind the station, and left to deteriorate. They're so expensive to operate, small departments are loathe to actually use them. If we're unlucky, we get the events in Ferguson, MO.

Some years back I was in the position of managing a few systems for a nonprofit. It had been awarded equipment through a donation program. Some of this was usable. Some ... was not. One particular item turned out to be such a white elephant that it was literally more sensible to try to sell it and replace it with something more economical. Which other branches of the nonprofit were doing, though I never convinced the GM of ours to do.

Equipment that's not actually usable isn't an asset.

(And yes, I'm keeping this all pretty intentionally vague.)

Re: NY Times releases military surplus gear data on GitHub

#97

Post by ianstallings »

ianstallings wrote: post #35
geetee wrote: post #24

What in the world do police need parachutes for?

Don't give them any ideas!

What I don't get about this is, this is a non-hacking topic. An outside discussion. So why is my post, obviously in jest, inappropriate?

Re: NY Times releases military surplus gear data on GitHub

#98

Post by lotsofmangos »

staunch wrote: post #46
ceejayoz wrote: post #39

One county on the map has ~16k population and 640 military surplus assault rifles. If they're equipped with 30 round magazines, they can shoot everyone in the county without reloading once.

No, they couldn't shoot more than a few people before thousands of armed citizens made them stop. To help clarify things: the city of LA has 10,000 police officers and 1,000,000+ armed citizens.

You already have the National Guard out in Missouri, and they have Blackhawk helicopters which have chain guns as their standard armament.

The idea that in the US civil militias could really hold their own against the state is an absurd fiction.

Unless significant portions of the armed forces defected to join an uprising and managed to take their equipment with them, then it would be very one sided.

The militias will have hand guns and rifles, the state has everything up to and including nukes.

There is a probably apocryphal quote attributed to Isoroku Yamamoto, that if you tried to invade the mainland US, there would be a rifle behind every blade of grass. Isoroku Yamamoto was born in 1884.

War has progressed since then.

Satellites can look behind every blade of grass and let you know where the rifles are, then you can send in the drones while you sit back in your bunker and sip tea.

Re: NY Times releases military surplus gear data on GitHub

#99

Post by lotsofmangos »

dredmorbius wrote: post #95
dublinben wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If we're lucky, those massive armored vehicles will be parked behind the station, and left to deteriorate. They're so expensive to operate, small departments are loathe to actually use them. If we're unlucky, we get the events in Ferguson, MO.

Some years back I was in the position of managing a few systems for a nonprofit. It had been awarded equipment through a donation program. Some of this was usable. Some ... was not. One particular item turned out to be such a white elephant that it was literally more sensible to try to sell it and replace it with something more economical. Which other branches of the nonprofit were doing, though I never convinced the…

Let me guess. Was it actually a white elephant?

Re: NY Times releases military surplus gear data on GitHub

#100

Post by lotsofmangos »

zrail wrote: post #2

This is awesome. Not really sure why they chose to release it as an XLSX document on GitHub, but it'll work!

Is interesting that this has made itself on here and not been flagged yet.

I have noticed that HN normally has an aversion to issues that are directly to do with contemporary politics outside the realm of telecoms, patents and copyright and I wonder if this seems more of an acceptable discussion for the site, given the wider issues raised, purely because the material being discussed is up on Github.

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