5 ms·

Everything about modern warfare is for the rich kids.

by chm 13y ago

angersock 13y ago
http://www.kipling.org.uk/poems_arith.htm http://www.kipling.org.uk/poems_arith.htm To a point, sure, but the prior to drones an unwilling population could make it costly indeed--politically--for an occupation force to hold ground. With drones, though, there's no longer a blood cost associated with oppression.
- walshemj 13y ago
  How exactly does a drone replace boots on the ground - bipedal robots at the moment are fabulously expensive corporate toys - I doubt that asimo is going to be replacing a squaddie anytime soon
  - angersock 13y ago
    There are numerous examples of simple tracked vehicles armed with weapons. It does not take much imagination to see how those combined with larger drones (tanks, humvees), artillery, or aircraft could be used.
    - walshemj 13y ago
      Um real warfighting isn't like anime where cute chicks in tight fitting catsuits fight with giant robots. Tracked vehicles have the dalek problem how do you go inside a building/cave to engage the enemy - watch black hawk down how do you replace a seal team or ranger brick with robots And any military tracked vehicle is not simple one of the main reasons that MBT's still have 4 man crews is they need the fleshy meatbags to keep the bugger running.
      - angersock 13y ago
        how do you go inside a building/cave to engage the enemy That would be where the airstrikes and artillery come in, right? any military tracked vehicle Think smaller, like on the order of one of the Talon defusal robots ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foster-Miller_TALON http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foster-Miller_TALON ). ~ real warfighting Here's really the root of the problem. Thousands of years ago, real warfighting consisted of men in centuries and phalanxes, piking each other to death--it wasn't sporting to, for example, ambush a legion as it marched through a forest and cut them down ("Quintili Vare, legiones redde!"). A century and a half, "real warfighting" involved massed troops lining up across from one another and firing in volleys while ignoring civilians--it wasn't sporting to, for example, raze towns and crops and destroy railroad tracks in order to demoralize the enemy. Two decades ago, "real warfighting" involved massing mechanized infantry, achieving air superiority, and engaging regular forces until their ruler surrendered. The problem is that this notion of "real warfighting" is constantly changing. Once upon a time, real warfighting didn't involve violating neutral national borders and airspace and dropping munitions on civilians without having clear proof of the target or its strategic value. That is clearly no longer the case, as we've seen with the drone strikes that have been carried out. We can't ignore the probability that one day, "warfighting" will mean a text sent over IRC to an automated artillery battery to target a village and fire for effect, because the little killbots saw their one target disappear into a place with stairs.
  - PeterisP 13y ago
    Well, technically a message to village elders "We're watching you through airborne drones - if you'll give support or food to guerillas, we'll bomb your kids" would be somehow analogous to boots on the ground enforcing the same compliance.
- rainmaking 13y ago
  The population could make it costly by exploiting the weakness of state-of-the art armies of the time, hence partisans. Today the population can make it costly by exploiting today's army's weaknesses, hence IEDs. Future populations can make it costly by exploiting future army's weaknesses, which will probably involve a lot of hiding and striking from where robots can't go, and possibly cracking systems. Speaking of which, has anyone here played Deus Ex? Rewiring big drones surrounded by large amounts of troops to reverse their friend/enemy detection was the most fun I had in months. Not that this is funny in real life, but the game is great at exploring how fighting that includes supersuits and drones could work.
waps 13y ago
Drone warfare, low-level warfare and terrorism would be the exceptions. Right now for drone warfare the software is too difficult to write (hard to believe. Hooking up opencv face recognizer to a robot that can aim a rifle is not hard). That will change. Not soon, it'll take maybe a decade. But it will change. Oh and ... dumb question ... who enforces any rules that are decided upon during war ? Without that component we might as well legislate the ethics of solar flares ... Right now there are tons of countries that are either in blatant violation of things like human rights and guilty of war crimes, and no-one's getting persecuted. Not just in problem countries like Iran or North Korea, there's plenty in Africa, Saudi Arabia would be another obvious example, even South America. Only in very specific cases does anything seem to happen ... it seems to me more of a pr-campaign than an actual attempt at enforcement. Not that having zero practical use or effectiveness has ever stopped anyone from legislating, but why not legislate something equally fictional, but more fun ? Let's legislate traffic lights for faster-than-light travel ! Or let's demand something be done about fictional abuse of Indonesian babies ! Won't somebody think of the children ? Let's legislate that no-one can award the "worst dressed sentient being in the universe" prize to the same character more than 6 times in either prose or poetry. Also it seems prudent to preventively outlaw Vogon poetry. These seem like more productive endeavours.
- xerophtye 13y ago
  I agree that "making laws" isn't necessarily a solution, but it lays the foundation of future debates. This topic would no doubt involve a ton of debate and it would be VERY useful if it materializes into international law. "Why" you ask? Well because when someone violates it, there would be no question of whether this is right or wrong. We wouldn't have to go through the whole above debate all over again, just to come to a consensus that this was evil. You could just cite the law and (hopefully/in an ideal world) prosecute. Ps: They still might be able to cirumvent drone strikes by saying that by defintion of war agreed upon in the first geneva convention, it isn't war. so this rule doesn't apply. I hope they think of this when making the law
- xerophtye 13y ago
  in line with the mention of the Geneva Convention in my other post, i just remembered something. I am not sure how legally correct this is it, but someone brought it up in a Model UN that govt officials who sanction drone strikes can NOT be tried for war crimes because they aren't technically Soldiers. If this is true, wtf? The rules seriously need major revision in sight of modern tech
true_religion 13y ago
Everything about warfare has always been stacked for the rich. Honestly, how could wealth disparity exist if didn't gain the rich the power to defend their wealth against those who would want to take it?

Everything about modern warfare is for the rich kids.

by chm 13y ago

Everything about modern warfare is for the rich kids.

http://www.kipling.org.uk/poems_arith.htm http://www.kipling.org.uk/poems_arith.htm To a point, sure, but the prior to drones an unwilling population could make it costly indeed--politically--for an occupation force to hold ground. With drones, though, there's no longer a blood cost associated with oppression.

walshemj 13y ago
How exactly does a drone replace boots on the ground - bipedal robots at the moment are fabulously expensive corporate toys - I doubt that asimo is going to be replacing a squaddie anytime soon
- angersock 13y ago
  There are numerous examples of simple tracked vehicles armed with weapons. It does not take much imagination to see how those combined with larger drones (tanks, humvees), artillery, or aircraft could be used.
  - walshemj 13y ago
    Um real warfighting isn't like anime where cute chicks in tight fitting catsuits fight with giant robots. Tracked vehicles have the dalek problem how do you go inside a building/cave to engage the enemy - watch black hawk down how do you replace a seal team or ranger brick with robots And any military tracked vehicle is not simple one of the main reasons that MBT's still have 4 man crews is they need the fleshy meatbags to keep the bugger running.
    - angersock 13y ago
      how do you go inside a building/cave to engage the enemy That would be where the airstrikes and artillery come in, right? any military tracked vehicle Think smaller, like on the order of one of the Talon defusal robots ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foster-Miller_TALON http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foster-Miller_TALON ). ~ real warfighting Here's really the root of the problem. Thousands of years ago, real warfighting consisted of men in centuries and phalanxes, piking each other to death--it wasn't sporting to, for example, ambush a legion as it marched through a forest and cut them down ("Quintili Vare, legiones redde!"). A century and a half, "real warfighting" involved massed troops lining up across from one another and firing in volleys while ignoring civilians--it wasn't sporting to, for example, raze towns and crops and destroy railroad tracks in order to demoralize the enemy. Two decades ago, "real warfighting" involved massing mechanized infantry, achieving air superiority, and engaging regular forces until their ruler surrendered. The problem is that this notion of "real warfighting" is constantly changing. Once upon a time, real warfighting didn't involve violating neutral national borders and airspace and dropping munitions on civilians without having clear proof of the target or its strategic value. That is clearly no longer the case, as we've seen with the drone strikes that have been carried out. We can't ignore the probability that one day, "warfighting" will mean a text sent over IRC to an automated artillery battery to target a village and fire for effect, because the little killbots saw their one target disappear into a place with stairs.
- PeterisP 13y ago
  Well, technically a message to village elders "We're watching you through airborne drones - if you'll give support or food to guerillas, we'll bomb your kids" would be somehow analogous to boots on the ground enforcing the same compliance.
rainmaking 13y ago
The population could make it costly by exploiting the weakness of state-of-the art armies of the time, hence partisans. Today the population can make it costly by exploiting today's army's weaknesses, hence IEDs. Future populations can make it costly by exploiting future army's weaknesses, which will probably involve a lot of hiding and striking from where robots can't go, and possibly cracking systems. Speaking of which, has anyone here played Deus Ex? Rewiring big drones surrounded by large amounts of troops to reverse their friend/enemy detection was the most fun I had in months. Not that this is funny in real life, but the game is great at exploring how fighting that includes supersuits and drones could work.

waps 13y ago

Drone warfare, low-level warfare and terrorism would be the exceptions. Right now for drone warfare the software is too difficult to write (hard to believe. Hooking up opencv face recognizer to a robot that can aim a rifle is not hard). That will change. Not soon, it'll take maybe a decade. But it will change. Oh and ... dumb question ... who enforces any rules that are decided upon during war ? Without that component we might as well legislate the ethics of solar flares ... Right now there are tons of countries that are either in blatant violation of things like human rights and guilty of war crimes, and no-one's getting persecuted. Not just in problem countries like Iran or North Korea, there's plenty in Africa, Saudi Arabia would be another obvious example, even South America. Only in very specific cases does anything seem to happen ... it seems to me more of a pr-campaign than an actual attempt at enforcement. Not that having zero practical use or effectiveness has ever stopped anyone from legislating, but why not legislate something equally fictional, but more fun ? Let's legislate traffic lights for faster-than-light travel ! Or let's demand something be done about fictional abuse of Indonesian babies ! Won't somebody think of the children ? Let's legislate that no-one can award the "worst dressed sentient being in the universe" prize to the same character more than 6 times in either prose or poetry. Also it seems prudent to preventively outlaw Vogon poetry. These seem like more productive endeavours.

xerophtye 13y ago
I agree that "making laws" isn't necessarily a solution, but it lays the foundation of future debates. This topic would no doubt involve a ton of debate and it would be VERY useful if it materializes into international law. "Why" you ask? Well because when someone violates it, there would be no question of whether this is right or wrong. We wouldn't have to go through the whole above debate all over again, just to come to a consensus that this was evil. You could just cite the law and (hopefully/in an ideal world) prosecute. Ps: They still might be able to cirumvent drone strikes by saying that by defintion of war agreed upon in the first geneva convention, it isn't war. so this rule doesn't apply. I hope they think of this when making the law
xerophtye 13y ago
in line with the mention of the Geneva Convention in my other post, i just remembered something. I am not sure how legally correct this is it, but someone brought it up in a Model UN that govt officials who sanction drone strikes can NOT be tried for war crimes because they aren't technically Soldiers. If this is true, wtf? The rules seriously need major revision in sight of modern tech

true_religion 13y ago

Everything about warfare has always been stacked for the rich. Honestly, how could wealth disparity exist if didn't gain the rich the power to defend their wealth against those who would want to take it?