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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

#121

Post by enraged_camel »

staunch wrote: post #110
amcnett wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Disorganized pseudo-infantry (i.e. pissed off individuals with guns) will always be inferior to organized paramilitary forces with armor.

Not with popular support it's not. For proof that the opposite is actually true see Vietnam/Iraq/Syria/Gaza/Egypt, etc.

No, please stop spreading this ignorant nonsense.

Most countries in the Middle East have mandatory military service. If they get invaded by a foreign force, they can raise local militias very quickly from people who not only already own guns, but also have received significant training in their usage and can get organized quickly due to the time they spent in military.

In contrast, most Americans don't know how to hold a gun, much less fire one. And even those who are serious about guns have not actually been part of any military, or even a militia. Frankly, they would get mowed down by any sort of organized force in very quick order.

Re: NY Times releases military surplus gear data on GitHub

#122

Post by Game_Ender »

jaredstenquist wrote: post #96

The DOD gives this shit away (to our rural towns and cities) so they can consider it in use and order more from contractors, which gives more cash to the lobbyists and contractors. Rinse and repeat. It's very straightforward.

On MRAP front the military is getting rid of them for a good reason. They ordered the initial batch very quickly and ended up several different platforms [0]. None of them fit the bill perfectly and having several variants made logistics and vehicle operations difficult. They then did a real procurement program and ended up purchasing several thousand M-ATVs. The surplus MRAPs went into this law enforcement give away system [1].

0 - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MRAP#MRAP_deployment

1 - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MRAP#Post-war_reductions

Re: NY Times releases military surplus gear data on GitHub

#123

Post by staunch »

enraged_camel wrote: post #121
staunch wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not with popular support it's not. For proof that the opposite is actually true see Vietnam/Iraq/Syria/Gaza/Egypt, etc.

No, please stop spreading this ignorant nonsense. Most countries in the Middle East have mandatory military service. If they get invaded by a foreign force, they can raise local militias very quickly from people who not only already own guns, but also have received significant training in their usage and can get organized quickly due to the time they spent in military. In contrast, most Americans don't know how to ho…

How ignorant can you be not to know that there are 21+ million U.S. military veterans? More (better trained) soldiers than there are males in Iraq.

The claim that Americans don't know how to use guns is in the laughable category.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Number_of_guns_per_capita_by_co...

Re: NY Times releases military surplus gear data on GitHub

#124

Post by lotsofmangos »

staunch wrote: post #123
enraged_camel wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, please stop spreading this ignorant nonsense. Most countries in the Middle East have mandatory military service. If they get invaded by a foreign force, they can raise local militias very quickly from people who not only already own guns, but also have received significant training in their usage and can get organized quickly due to the time they spent in military. In contrast, most Americans don't know how to ho…

How ignorant can you be not to know that there are 21+ million U.S. military veterans? More (better trained) soldiers than there are males in Iraq. The claim that Americans don't know how to use guns is in the laughable category. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Number_of_guns_per_capita_by_co...

There are 11.6 million veterans below the age of 65, which is a fair amount of trained soldiers, though that doesn't say anything about sides.

Also, merely counting guns per capita tells you very little as some people have lots of guns. You have ~ 40% of households with a gun and ~ 70% of people between the ages of 15 and 64.

This translates to ~ 80 million people of military age with access to firearms, and assuming that most veterans are in the households that have guns, up to an eighth of them trained to a high standard.

Now this, if it rose up and could be commanded as a single force, would be the largest military in the world, in terms of forces. However the only circumstance that I could see that even partially happening would be in response to an external military invasion.

What is far more likely a scenario if the US becomes unstable is a complicated civil war started by a state attempting to secede, the federal government reacting, then more states getting involved. In that case you never get one big force, just lots of smaller state forces with the military not wanting to get involved at all, but at most trying to act in a peacekeeping role and making sure that the big guns stay locked up.

One thing to keep an eye out for, as I have said elsewhere, is that the military equipment given out is partly going to pro-secessionists in local and state police forces and it may be worth considering that the police in Missouri may not be merely incompetent in the way they are currently reacting to events.

Re: NY Times releases military surplus gear data on GitHub

#126

Post by ithought »

superuser2 wrote: post #73
guimarin wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't think they 'actually spend $20k on a hammer, $30k on a toilet seat, do you'[1]? If this is not an error, I think we just found the best justification I've seen for making all budgets/purchases etc. in government publicly available via API, as this and the ones below are amazing finds. [1] http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0116629/quotes?item=qt1534129

Not to excuse it all, because I'm sure there's plenty of waste and fraud, but sometimes militaries/governments need things that are more robust than the seemingly just-as-good civilian alternatives. Why doesn't Curiosity run on a Dell Inspiron? Why can't the President drive a used Honda Civic? Why can't the drone programs just retrofit toy helicopters? (Hint: there are good answers to all of these questions.) I've al…

As another point, the book Burning Money from the Chairman of Reagan's Committee on Cost Control, J. Peter Grace:

"The Federal government is Burning Money and it is your money. An actual case. One day the US Navy decided to buy a hammer, the kind you buy for $7 at the corner hardware store. To the $7 cost of the hammer, add: $41 to order the hammer and figure out how to use it. $93 to make sure the hammer worked. $102 for "manufacturing overhead. " $37 to make sure there were spare parts for the hammer. $3 for packing the hammer for shipment. $90 for the contractor's general administrative costs. $56 for the finder's fee. $7 for the capital cost of money. The U.S. Navy ended up buying a $7 hammer for $436, and who paid for it? You."

http://www.paperbackswap.com/Burning-Money-Waste-J-Peter-Gra...

Re: NY Times releases military surplus gear data on GitHub

#127

Post by nknighthb »

poulsbohemian wrote: post #51
barsonme wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I live in Puyallup, Washington and we've received (what I believe to be) an MRAP. (It looks like one, but I've yet to see it outside of the building so I haven't gotten a very good look at it.) It's housed in the police/fire station downtown. Puyallup is a "city" of just under 40,000. Our crime isn't even too horrible ( http://www.piercecountycrimedata.org/NeighborhoodCrime/index... ) But we have an MRAP. It might be…

I live in Walla Walla and I don't see our MRAP in the NYT spreadsheet, but here's the article: http://union-bulletin.com/news/2014/apr/16/walla-walla-swat-... . Absolute madness.

Y'know, there was a SWAT callout to Burbank in the last month or so for a guy who surrendered by the time they were entering the area. I distinctly heard one of the WWPD officers mention getting "the vehicle" just after they started acknowledging the pages.

Someone should ask if they actually drove that thing all the way to Burbank and back.

Re: NY Times releases military surplus gear data on GitHub

#128

Post by dmourati »

NPR covered this military surplus program. The most frightening fact was the typical local law enforcement agencies must agree to "use it or lose it" with the acceptance of the gear. This sets up a perverse incentive and encourages local PD to misuse military hardware or forfeit it back to the federal government.

Re: NY Times releases military surplus gear data on GitHub

#129

Post by orf »

dandelany wrote: post #89
orf wrote: post #81

AL,CHEROKEE,4930-01-442-9106,"DRUM,HOSE REEL",1,Each,1630.97,2013-06-20 AL,CHEROKEE,5120-00-222-2220,"MALLET,RAWHIDE ",3,Each,50.31,20120518 CA,LOS ANGELES,3530-DS-SEW-ING0,"INDUSTRIAL SEWING MACH, MOBILE TEXTILE",2,Each,0,2014-02-19 Stop this madness.

Really? The dataset contains a record of tiny towns receiving MRAPs, but for some reason your biggest concern is LA getting a sewing machine? Why is this a problem?

It was sarcastic, I thought that was pretty obvious?

Re: NY Times releases military surplus gear data on GitHub

#130

Post by ianstallings »

ianstallings wrote: post #97
ianstallings wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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?

See? No one can answer me as to where I went wrong. Just down votes. I am seriously confused. I could say the same exact comment on another thread and get voted up. Please, TELL ME, what I said wrong. Don't just down vote.
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