4 ms·

>unsafe and unprofessional I mean we're essentially at war with Russia, how safe and professional should they really be with our tech?

iancmceachern 4y ago
And the comment about the environment is ironic. There is nothing more unfriendly to the environment than war, than the military industrial complex. A lot of the US' dominance over world military power has to do with our ability to deliver vast amounts of oil and gas to fighting groups anywhere in the world. Many other nations have the firepower, but not the logistical mite to support it and therefore rely on us. This is all to say, war burns a lot of oil, even in peace.
benj111 4y ago
Is this not an act of war by itself?
- abudabi123 4y ago
  The day on the calendar is the middle of Mar
  - youainti 4y ago
    Is that a reference to Shakespeare, i.e. "beware the ides of march"?
    - t-3 4y ago
      Either that or Mars, the god of war, who gives the name.
  - azangru 4y ago
    The ides, you say?
- epolanski 4y ago
  Flying surveillance aircraft in the black sea? Russia is at war with Ukraine and receives intelligence from US and UK 24/7 that surveillance aircraft is not there defending the coasts of Turkey or Romania.
  - benj111 4y ago
    So if a us ship were in international waters monitoring North Korea and passing on the Intel to South Korea, it would be ok for North Korea to sink that ship? This was in international waters. The drone had every right to be there.
    - epolanski 4y ago
      Not arguing that it had every right, from what we're told at least, I see no precise coordinates. Just that it seems far fetched that downing a surveillance drone is an act of war.
- LorenPechtel 4y ago
  No, because it wasn't intentional. They were harassing the drone and made a mistake.
  - localplume 4y ago
    [dead]
  - voakbasda 4y ago
    The harassment was intentional. Making a “mistake” during an intentional act does not suddenly wipe away that root intention.
  - ericmay 4y ago
    We don’t know that it was or wasn’t intentional. Harassing the drone is a problem to start with, running into it intentionally or not an extension of the core problem. Whether it was an accident or not probably isn’t much of a difference. Safer to assume it was intentional since we’d never get the truth out of the Russians. Good news is that incidents like this will increase US military support for Ukraine.
  - Ruthalas 4y ago
    According to the article: >Several times before the collision, the Su-27s dumped fuel on and flew in front of the MQ-9 in a reckless, environmentally unsound and unprofessional manner. That seems more intentional than a simple fly-by anyway.
- reneherse 4y ago
  I'd say it's an act of aggression, but the line of "act of war" is still further off given the fact it was an unmanned aircraft. Hopefully the RF will think twice before similarly harrassing an American pilot, which would be much closer to, if not crossing, that line.
- icegreentea2 4y ago
  Because Russia has not explicitly declared war or hostilities, or taken any actual redlined actions, it's up to the US to define if they consider this an act of war or not. It's an obvious provocation, and it's absolutely not in the US (or NATO's) interest to be drawn in in this manner and time. So instead you get this passive-aggressive shit talk.
- yamtaddle 4y ago
  This stuff's not black-and-white, and a lot of it comes down to how the two sides choose to perceive it. A bunch of stuff done by both the US and Russia has been an "act of war" against one another and their respective treaty-bound allies, over the last couple decades—in other circumstances, we've (the US) certainly chosen to regard actions smaller-scale than our support for Ukraine as acts of war against us. But, if neither side wants it to be an act of war, it's de facto not. The notion of an "act of war" is largely a pragmatic political tool. To the extent that they exist legally, they're invoked so haphazardly and selectively by e.g. the UN that it would be difficult to justify regarding the rules about "legal" and "illegal" war justifications as, per se, any kind of definitive guide for declaring what is and is not a "real" act of war. Which means we're left with "both sides say it's not, so... it's not". [EDIT] To be clear, if one or the other had chosen to regard this as an act of war, there may be room to debate the truth and justice of that position, or how we might interpret that stance based on international law and precedent—but neither (apparently) did, so it's rather moot. Yes, it probably could be so-regarded with some justification. Yes, there'd be room to, not without reason or basis, counter that a war asset providing intelligence to an adversary in a war is already engaged in war, regardless of who's operating it, et c., et c. It joins dozens of other actions as kind-of unrealized "acts of war".
  - benj111 4y ago
    Oh absolutely, it's all about realpolitik. We've already seen how far the west will go to avoid a war with Russia, so I wasn't expecting this to bring about a declaration of war. But if this were a manned aircraft, that would be a major thing. The question is, what's the important element here. It isn't necessarily the killing, if a plane were shot down, and the pilot ejected without harm it would still be a major thing, so there must be some element of, attacking a foreign nations military hardware is a no-no. But then the rhetoric doesn't seem to match that.
- mrguyorama 4y ago
  Back in the Korean war, US fighters shot down actual Soviet pilots in supposedly North Korean planes. Both sides kept it hush hush because nobody wanted a full war.
gorkish 4y ago
One would think the pilot would be professional enough not to fly a manned aircraft into a collision with an unmanned aircraft. Such an extreme display of ineptitude speaks enough on its own; the USAF statement reads pretty tongue-in-cheek to me. Edit: This appears to be the most opposed/downvoted comment I seem to have ever made on HN without anyone producing a counterargument.
genman 4y ago
We are not at war with Russia. At best we are in proxy war with China.
- albatross13 4y ago
  Oh, good. Here I thought we had given hundreds of billions to Ukraine for a war against russia, must have been for their upstanding daycare programs.
  - genman 4y ago
    Oh, shut up with this BS. There are no hundreds of billions given and giving military aid doesn't mean that we are in the war. Unless of course you are some Russian troll spreading their fake news here. This we are war with NATO is a message to common Russians just to make then feel warm from the inside and not feel ashamed how their army is getting slaughtered by "inferior khohols". At the same time they are fed with high amount of genocidal propaganda. We are doing too little to put end to this genocidal war against Ukrainians. I believed that "no more again" actually means something.
    - idiotsecant 4y ago
      I mean...we are clearly in a proxy war with Russia. We are dumping a huge amount of resources into ensuring that they lose their conflict with Ukraine, or at least win a pyrrhic victory that will destabilize the regime. You can argue whether it's a good use of resources or not (I think it is a good use of resources right now) but it's clearly silly to argue that the US is not doing this.
      - genman 4y ago
        The definition of proxy war is quite specific. It requires that a third party is waging war at the instigation or on behalf of us. This is not true. Russia attacked Ukraine and Ukraine is defending itself on its own. We only provide necessary assistance for it to do so. Of course these arguments come up that try to rationalize this support in many ways but it doesn't matter. Ukraine doesn't continue to fight to please us but because it is an existential matter for itself.

iancmceachern 4y ago

And the comment about the environment is ironic. There is nothing more unfriendly to the environment than war, than the military industrial complex. A lot of the US' dominance over world military power has to do with our ability to deliver vast amounts of oil and gas to fighting groups anywhere in the world. Many other nations have the firepower, but not the logistical mite to support it and therefore rely on us. This is all to say, war burns a lot of oil, even in peace.

benj111 4y ago

Is this not an act of war by itself?

abudabi123 4y ago
The day on the calendar is the middle of Mar
- youainti 4y ago
  Is that a reference to Shakespeare, i.e. "beware the ides of march"?
  - t-3 4y ago
    Either that or Mars, the god of war, who gives the name.
- azangru 4y ago
  The ides, you say?
epolanski 4y ago
Flying surveillance aircraft in the black sea? Russia is at war with Ukraine and receives intelligence from US and UK 24/7 that surveillance aircraft is not there defending the coasts of Turkey or Romania.
- benj111 4y ago
  So if a us ship were in international waters monitoring North Korea and passing on the Intel to South Korea, it would be ok for North Korea to sink that ship? This was in international waters. The drone had every right to be there.
  - epolanski 4y ago
    Not arguing that it had every right, from what we're told at least, I see no precise coordinates. Just that it seems far fetched that downing a surveillance drone is an act of war.
LorenPechtel 4y ago
No, because it wasn't intentional. They were harassing the drone and made a mistake.
- localplume 4y ago
  [dead]
- voakbasda 4y ago
  The harassment was intentional. Making a “mistake” during an intentional act does not suddenly wipe away that root intention.
- ericmay 4y ago
  We don’t know that it was or wasn’t intentional. Harassing the drone is a problem to start with, running into it intentionally or not an extension of the core problem. Whether it was an accident or not probably isn’t much of a difference. Safer to assume it was intentional since we’d never get the truth out of the Russians. Good news is that incidents like this will increase US military support for Ukraine.
- Ruthalas 4y ago
  According to the article: >Several times before the collision, the Su-27s dumped fuel on and flew in front of the MQ-9 in a reckless, environmentally unsound and unprofessional manner. That seems more intentional than a simple fly-by anyway.
reneherse 4y ago
I'd say it's an act of aggression, but the line of "act of war" is still further off given the fact it was an unmanned aircraft. Hopefully the RF will think twice before similarly harrassing an American pilot, which would be much closer to, if not crossing, that line.
icegreentea2 4y ago
Because Russia has not explicitly declared war or hostilities, or taken any actual redlined actions, it's up to the US to define if they consider this an act of war or not. It's an obvious provocation, and it's absolutely not in the US (or NATO's) interest to be drawn in in this manner and time. So instead you get this passive-aggressive shit talk.
yamtaddle 4y ago
This stuff's not black-and-white, and a lot of it comes down to how the two sides choose to perceive it. A bunch of stuff done by both the US and Russia has been an "act of war" against one another and their respective treaty-bound allies, over the last couple decades—in other circumstances, we've (the US) certainly chosen to regard actions smaller-scale than our support for Ukraine as acts of war against us. But, if neither side wants it to be an act of war, it's de facto not. The notion of an "act of war" is largely a pragmatic political tool. To the extent that they exist legally, they're invoked so haphazardly and selectively by e.g. the UN that it would be difficult to justify regarding the rules about "legal" and "illegal" war justifications as, per se, any kind of definitive guide for declaring what is and is not a "real" act of war. Which means we're left with "both sides say it's not, so... it's not". [EDIT] To be clear, if one or the other had chosen to regard this as an act of war, there may be room to debate the truth and justice of that position, or how we might interpret that stance based on international law and precedent—but neither (apparently) did, so it's rather moot. Yes, it probably could be so-regarded with some justification. Yes, there'd be room to, not without reason or basis, counter that a war asset providing intelligence to an adversary in a war is already engaged in war, regardless of who's operating it, et c., et c. It joins dozens of other actions as kind-of unrealized "acts of war".
- benj111 4y ago
  Oh absolutely, it's all about realpolitik. We've already seen how far the west will go to avoid a war with Russia, so I wasn't expecting this to bring about a declaration of war. But if this were a manned aircraft, that would be a major thing. The question is, what's the important element here. It isn't necessarily the killing, if a plane were shot down, and the pilot ejected without harm it would still be a major thing, so there must be some element of, attacking a foreign nations military hardware is a no-no. But then the rhetoric doesn't seem to match that.
mrguyorama 4y ago
Back in the Korean war, US fighters shot down actual Soviet pilots in supposedly North Korean planes. Both sides kept it hush hush because nobody wanted a full war.

gorkish 4y ago

One would think the pilot would be professional enough not to fly a manned aircraft into a collision with an unmanned aircraft. Such an extreme display of ineptitude speaks enough on its own; the USAF statement reads pretty tongue-in-cheek to me. Edit: This appears to be the most opposed/downvoted comment I seem to have ever made on HN without anyone producing a counterargument.

genman 4y ago

We are not at war with Russia. At best we are in proxy war with China.

albatross13 4y ago
Oh, good. Here I thought we had given hundreds of billions to Ukraine for a war against russia, must have been for their upstanding daycare programs.
- genman 4y ago
  Oh, shut up with this BS. There are no hundreds of billions given and giving military aid doesn't mean that we are in the war. Unless of course you are some Russian troll spreading their fake news here. This we are war with NATO is a message to common Russians just to make then feel warm from the inside and not feel ashamed how their army is getting slaughtered by "inferior khohols". At the same time they are fed with high amount of genocidal propaganda. We are doing too little to put end to this genocidal war against Ukrainians. I believed that "no more again" actually means something.
  - idiotsecant 4y ago
    I mean...we are clearly in a proxy war with Russia. We are dumping a huge amount of resources into ensuring that they lose their conflict with Ukraine, or at least win a pyrrhic victory that will destabilize the regime. You can argue whether it's a good use of resources or not (I think it is a good use of resources right now) but it's clearly silly to argue that the US is not doing this.
    - genman 4y ago
      The definition of proxy war is quite specific. It requires that a third party is waging war at the instigation or on behalf of us. This is not true. Russia attacked Ukraine and Ukraine is defending itself on its own. We only provide necessary assistance for it to do so. Of course these arguments come up that try to rationalize this support in many ways but it doesn't matter. Ukraine doesn't continue to fight to please us but because it is an existential matter for itself.