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Silicon Valley wants to power the U.S. war machine
- emreb 5y ago"Thirty-six countries have endorsed the goal of a treaty banning autonomous weapons" Only those who do not have it wanna ban it. Why would anyone with the technology ever want to disadvantage themselves?
- toxik 5y agoThere was a time when nuclear disarmament was actually happening. That is passed now, of course.
- TeMPOraL 5y agoIncentives were aligned better there, though. Disarmament happened only to the extent it didn't threaten the MAD doctrine, and it reduced ongoing maintenance costs for everyone involved.
- JumpCrisscross 5y ago> Disarmament happened only to the extent it didn't threaten the MAD doctrine, and it reduced ongoing maintenance costs for everyone involved. The U.S. and USSR were the only countries embracing MAD. The other nuclear powers embraced flavors of what we now call minimal deterrence [1]. (Think it's helpful to know deterrence theory has options other than MAD.) [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minimal_deterrence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minimal_deterrence
- AlgorithmicTime 5y agoFew countries have obtained nukes only to later relinquish them. South Africa did, because the outgoing government didn't want to hand nukes to its successor government. Ukraine, well, see how that worked out. Kazakhstan, Belarus... seems ok for them so far.
- nix23 5y agoYes, same with ABC-Weapons. Why would anyone with the technology ever want to disadvantage themselves?
- hobs 5y agoBecause of the inevitable destruction of the human race from an ever escalating set of wars.
- throwaway0a5e 5y agoOn the other hand, those who have weapons tend to want to keep them out of the hands of whoever their subjugating or oppressing. See the history of domestic arms control in damn near any country for examples.
- bogantech 5y agoHaven't Silicon Valley companies had trouble getting their activist staff to work on any government projects? Especially anything connected to the military. They're perfectly happy to help out regimes the US would come up against in a military conflict are these the the people you want unseating the MIC?
- ng12 5y agoNo, there's just a vocal minority on Twitter that would like you to think that.
- moocowtruck 5y agonot only that, a long line of people that are skilled an waiting to replace them
- apetwo 5y ago[flagged]
- b112 5y agoIf the US is a war machine, with all the power it has and barely uses, what on earth do you call oppressive regimes, warlords, totalitarian states, genocidelists, and others? Bah. Just because the US isn't perfect, doesn't make it a war machine. The British Empire was a war machine, more than the US has ever been!.
- nix23 5y agoWait...can you name another country who was involved or started more wars then the US in the past 80 years? https://www.thenation.com/article/world/america-war-machine/ https://www.thenation.com/article/world/america-war-machine/ >>Eisenhower warned the nation against the threat of the military-industrial complex
- b112 5y agoAh. Involved. You know, the US does do peacekeeping, and does at times invade for actual humanitarian reasons. But I guess those are bad things too, and war making.
- spacechild1 5y ago> does at times invade for actual humanitarian reasons. For example?
- aynyc 5y agoKorean War, Grenada, first Iraq war, Somalia, Panama (depending on your view of conspiracy), Haiti, Bosnia, Kosovo.
- nix23 5y agoAh yes the humanitarian Korea War who hasn't heard of that one, the peace mission in Vietnam and Myanmar not to forget, and the first Iraq was a great point for Human rights...what a human loving war-machine the US is. But the US "forgot" to sign the "Convention on the Rights of the Child": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Convention_on_the_Rights_of_the_Child https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Convention_on_the_Rights_of_th...
- bserge 5y agoCyber "war". Everything's war these days. Homeless people? War on the poor. Misgendering? Social justice war. Someone told me to shut the fuck up? Speech war. Diarrhea? Toilet war.
- rado 5y agoDidn't the military start Silicon Valley?
- overthemoon 5y agoThat is the argument of Yasha Levine, author of Surveillance Valley.
- joezydeco 5y agoYes. https://steveblank.com/secret-history https://steveblank.com/secret-history
- rattlesnakedave 5y agoGood. For all of its faults, I can’t think of another country that I would like to have military supremacy.
- reidjs 5y agoAgreed. Which country’s ”war machine” would you prefer Silicon Valley powered??
- Clubber 5y agoSwitzerland. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swiss_neutrality https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swiss_neutrality
- mc32 5y agoYou have to imagine Switzerland with 100MM and then think about it. So, Indonesia, Nigeria, Russia, India, Brazil, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Japan, Mexico… Which one would you prefer to wield the sword other than the US. How would Pakistan feel if India were the hegemon, and vice versa? Use your imagination. In order to be a hegemony you need to be able to sustain that. You can say: I grant thee Andorra or Singapore hegemony over the world. You rule. That’s like giving a toddler in a village a Kalashnikov. It’ll ‘rule’ for an hour till it can’t feed itself and then the brute wrests it away while it sleeps.
- mhb 5y agoFrom 1943 Switzerland stopped American and British aircraft, mainly bombers, overflying Switzerland during the Second World War. On numerous occasions during the war, Allied aircraft trespassed on Swiss airspace; mostly damaged Allied bombers returning from raids over Italy and Germany whose crews preferred internment by the Swiss to becoming prisoners of war. Over a hundred Allied aircraft crews were interned and placed in ski resorts which were left abandoned due to the lack of tourists after the outbreak of war. They were to be held in there until the war had ended.[20] At least 940 American airmen attempted to escape into France after the invasion of Normandy, but Swiss authorities intercepted 183 internees. Over 160 of these airmen were incarcerated in a Swiss prison camp known as Wauwilermoos, which was located near Lucerne and commanded by André Béguin, a pro-Nazi Swiss officer. The American internees remained in Wauwilermoos until November 1944 when the U.S. State Department lodged protests against the Swiss government and eventually secured their release.
- jacknews 5y agoSometimes, I think the best thing America could do to improve it's long term military ecosystem and capability, is to bomb all it's business/MBA schools. Or relocate them to China. When you need to 'get shit done' you really need to focus on the shit, not on how you can best profit from it.
- q1w2 5y agoIt's ironic that you mention China. Chinese military intelligence is routinely contracted by Chinese businesses to conduct industrial espionage. Chinese military efforts in the South China Sea are all about controlling shipping and oil extraction - for profit. Chinese military control of Hong Kong was important to control that financial capital and the in/out flows of cash from China. Chinese military threats to Taiwan are important because of the vast wealth and industrial knowledge base in Taiwan. We live in a new era, where gov't, finance, and tech, are increasingly consolidating power to form super-national power structures.