21–30 of 71 posts
I think wars in the future will be about who's better at computer science. It will be programmers vs programmers, and computer literacy will become the new military service and a national security interest
"Oscar Wilde issued a memorable prediction of the war of the future: "A chemist on each side will approach the frontier with a bottle."
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2003/12/22/the-ring-and-t...
One has to wonder how much of military "tech" is simply fake. Until its use is demonstrated in war (which i absolutely do not advocate, and is known to affected by propaganda as well), all the incentives from weapons' manufacturers and buyers are to exaggerate features and effectiveness. The main victim is the gullible public, who funds the military-industrial complex with taxes.
It serves another purpose: Deterring potential enemies and giving confidence to allies. For example, the US has contributed to international peace East Asia for generations in part by having underlying muscle available. And today, if the US military tech was removed, I have a hard time imagining that alliances with Japan, S Korea, and others, not to mention Taiwan's freedom, would survive.
If that's a contribution to international peace, I hate to imagine what you'd think was a contribution to regional instability.
Even on a modern level, I think it's arguable that the 90's gulf war, and then the 2000's one, were the drivers behind a massive up-arming amongst states around the world that saw themselves as on the US's potential 'regime change' hitlist. It's often touted as a reason for China's massive arms buildup, for example.
I think emp warfare (actually already quietly a thing) is going to be the in between for stuff like drones...
I hope the new generations of children are being taught old school survival skills, because they are probably going to need them.
One of the best books on the post nuclear world that I reference often is The Shield of Achilles, and one of the conclusions that sticks with me is that there will be a rise in corporate power and a fall of nation state power.
Fight club was right after all... "planet Starbucks" indeed.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
What. The US spent 20 years fighting goat herders with AK-47s, and lost. The CCCP did the same and also lost, albeit they left actually left when they realized is was a mess (with a little help from CIA, sure). There are other obvious examples. Economic might is a major determinant in how well you can prosecute a war but it is by no means the only thing that matters.
Mujahideen that turned into Taliban were literally trained by the CIA. Calling them goat herders is either ignorance, racism, or pushing whatever agenda you're trying to push. Unless you're specifically speaking of the lowest caliber grunts of their infantry, in which theirs are nearly the same as ours. Mostly uneducated cannon fodder. But yes, the US completely intentionally drew out the 20 years of war to put money…
>Calling them goat herders is either ignorance, racism, or pushing whatever agenda you’re trying to push.
I’m accurately describing the people I personally fought in this war. Good to know it’s racist to accurately describe them.
> Unless you're specifically speaking of the lowest caliber grunts of their infantry, in which theirs are nearly the same as ours. Mostly uneducated canon fodder.
I actually laughed out loud at this.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
What. The US spent 20 years fighting goat herders with AK-47s, and lost. The CCCP did the same and also lost, albeit they left actually left when they realized is was a mess (with a little help from CIA, sure). There are other obvious examples. Economic might is a major determinant in how well you can prosecute a war but it is by no means the only thing that matters.
Mujahideen that turned into Taliban were literally trained by the CIA. Calling them goat herders is either ignorance, racism, or pushing whatever agenda you're trying to push. Unless you're specifically speaking of the lowest caliber grunts of their infantry, in which theirs are nearly the same as ours. Mostly uneducated cannon fodder. But yes, the US completely intentionally drew out the 20 years of war to put money…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
What. The US spent 20 years fighting goat herders with AK-47s, and lost. The CCCP did the same and also lost, albeit they left actually left when they realized is was a mess (with a little help from CIA, sure). There are other obvious examples. Economic might is a major determinant in how well you can prosecute a war but it is by no means the only thing that matters.
Mujahideen that turned into Taliban were literally trained by the CIA. Calling them goat herders is either ignorance, racism, or pushing whatever agenda you're trying to push. Unless you're specifically speaking of the lowest caliber grunts of their infantry, in which theirs are nearly the same as ours. Mostly uneducated cannon fodder. But yes, the US completely intentionally drew out the 20 years of war to put money…
It was entertaining seeing how the CIA taught the 2021 Taliban proper trigger discipline compared to the fingers resting on the trigger of a machine gun photos of the early 2000s. Shades of Kipling there.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Even if 90% of military tech is fake (and I think "fake" more usually means "we think it works, but turns out it doesn't"), the other 10% can completely tip the scales in a war, to disastrous effect (to the loser). History has a lot of examples of technology which seemed preposterous until it completely turned the tides of battles or wars (radar, tanks, mustard gas, atomic bombs...) Drone warfare is pretty clearly in…
Yeah, I’ve been waiting for a full reading of last year’s Armenian/Azerbaijani conflict but haven’t seen anything that runs down the full event. Any links? Thus far I’ve found some YouTube or other video clips. Looking for a more technical exploration of how that tech was used.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
unless you live on the moon, it should be clear by now that the afghanistan occupation's main objective was to enrich contractors. the mission was accomplished.
I was there, so believe me I’m plenty familiar with the grift that went on. But your characterization of economic might Uber alles is not accurate, which was my point.
To me, it's very clear. Drone warfare will be the next big thing after a nuke, and ICBM. Probably it's the only thing which can shift the power poles from the current nuclear states.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Mujahideen that turned into Taliban were literally trained by the CIA. Calling them goat herders is either ignorance, racism, or pushing whatever agenda you're trying to push. Unless you're specifically speaking of the lowest caliber grunts of their infantry, in which theirs are nearly the same as ours. Mostly uneducated cannon fodder. But yes, the US completely intentionally drew out the 20 years of war to put money…
Unless those mujahideen were time travelers, no they were not the same taliban I was fighting when I was there. I’m well aware of the early history of how the Taliban developed as a CIA proxy war against Soviet Union. It had little to do with who we were fighting when we were actually there. It’s a Reddit-tier reductionist reading of history to laugh it off as “you were fighting the people CIA trained”. >Calling them…
I'm saying that today's Taliban receive training by yesterday's Taliban/whatever tribal spinoffs came from that who were trained by the CIA.
Is that anything like the direct US Military/CIA training? No, but the tribal knowledge of what was learned doesn't just disappear, it gets passed down.
Do you think it wasn't at all passed down? I too have more than one friend in the marines that went on multiple deployments mid 2000's-2010's. They seem to think it's a fairly reasonable argument.
I see no point in the goat herders comment. We don't refer to our basic infantry as former "factory laborers", "retail workers", "hamburger flippers", or "highschool dropouts" - all occupations I've seen go into the army, and end up as actively deployed infantry.
I don't know though. If you want to say the hamburger flippers got blown up by the goat herders IED, feel free.