5 ms·
In general, no; we sell a lot of equipment to countries that we might otherwise be protecting with our own hardware and personnel at great cost. Selling the eq
by elihu 6y ago
In general, no; we sell a lot of equipment to countries that we might otherwise be protecting with our own hardware and personnel at great cost. Selling the equipment is cheaper.
It is weird that we sell F-15s to Saudi Arabia.
- hindsightbias 6y agoThe prince's checks cash, but they're dilettantes when it comes to warfighting. So no worries. [1] Iraq 1 & 2 [2] Yemen
- DaiPlusPlus 6y agoIt is worrying if you're, say, an avionics SWE in that industry. I could realistically see myself working on military tech with the expectation and understanding that they would be deployed (i.e. will kill people) with goals that I support in some way. I'd be mortified if I learned that weapons I worked on were being used the way I hear Saudi Arabia is using them - it's enough to make me want to preemptively sabotage my own work if I was working in that industry :/
- hindsightbias 6y agoNo one at LockMart, Boeing, Northrop or whomever makes bombs today is losing any sleep over it anymore than all those Linux contributors here who made the NSA’s or Facebooks infrastructure be the best it can be.
- DaiPlusPlus 6y agoThere are differences between being a general contributor to Linux vs. intentionally working on deterrent systems (strategic nuclear weapons systems) vs. working on "regular" munitions and weapon systems though.