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If a Drone Strike Hit an American Wedding We'd Ground Our Fleet

• ck2 13y ago
  I think it is time for a world-wide ban on armed drones, period. Just like we have international treaties for other horrible things like mustard gas. Do all the reconnaissance you can get away with. But I don't want a tired, overworked, morally disconnected 20-something sitting in a trailer somewhere in the US, pulling a trigger to kill unquantifiable targets anywhere in the world. Or any other country doing it to anyone else for that matter.
  • deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
    • hazz 13y ago
      This piqued my interest. The 1993 Chemical Weapons Convention, which outlaws the production, stockpiling and use of chemical weapons, was signed by the United States on the same day it was opened, January 13th 1993 [1]. It came into force in 1997. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_parties_to_the_Chemical_Weapons_Convention http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_parties_to_the_Chemical...
      • knome 13y ago
        I was cast into doubt by the same comment. The United States military does not make use of even things like pepper spray as a non-lethal weapon specifically because of being a signatory of treaties against use of any chemical warfare.
        • drzaiusapelord 13y ago
          Pepper spray is useless in a combat situation. Wind and other factors mean that it could benefit your enemy more than you (same with other chemical weapons). Also, why bother when we have flash-bang grenades, sonic weapons, and white phosphorous. Not to mention, in war deadly force is authorized under even the most trivial of circumstances. Why pepper spray a guy and take a risk when you can shoot him and not take a risk?
          • roel_v 13y ago
            If civilian police uses mace for small-scale arrests during riots, MP's could do the same thing for example during protests around embassies in non-war-but-dangerous circumstances. Except they don't. I don't think the GP was suggesting dropping pepper gas bombs, or using mace cannons while storming an enemy outpost.
            • drzaiusapelord 13y ago
              Then the military can call in the civilian authorities if its not a military matter and they can use whatever methods they deem appropriate. This isn't some kind of wonderful humanitarian gesture by the US military, its just proper role separation. If the shit hits the fan, its deadly force. You don't roll out soldiers for fun. They're trained to kill, not be cops.
    • JOfferijns 13y ago
      This is simply not true, the US has both signed and ratified the Chemical Weapons Convention [1], though it still has to destroy some of their stockpile [2]. [1] http://www.opcw.org/about-opcw/member-states/ http://www.opcw.org/about-opcw/member-states/ [2] http://edition.cnn.com/2013/10/11/us/u-s-chemical-weapons/ http://edition.cnn.com/2013/10/11/us/u-s-chemical-weapons/
  • ars_technician 13y ago
    Why does it matter where the operator is? How about a ban on killing unquantifiable targets? Modern fighter pilots can be just as overworked and have about the same risk of dying from being shot at.
  • mikeash 13y ago
    I don't really understand the outrage over drones specifically. This constant bombing of foreign countries is terrible, but I don't understand why the "drones" part of it is also considered bad. Why is a tired, overworked, morally disconnected 20-something sitting in a trailer somewhere in the US worse than a tired, overworked, morally disconnected 20-something sitting in a cockpit of an F-16?
    • kitsune_ 13y ago
      As mentioned in other comments in this thread: From a political point of view, drones are much more attractive than traditional methods. You won't see the corpses of dead Americans being dragged through Mogadishu with drones. You won't see captured pilots being paraded in front of a camera with drones.
      • mikeash 13y ago
        We won't see captured pilots being paraded in front of a camera with regular piloted aircraft either, not ones flown by the US against any likely current target.
        • kitsune_ 13y ago
          I suggest googling F117 and Serbia.
          • mikeash 13y ago
            I suggest googling "how to make points in a less irritating and confrontational way than telling people that you suggest googling something". In any case, I remember it fairly well, no need to look it up. Which current likely target is a heavily-armed state with a strong air defense system? (North Korea is a possibility, although I have to wonder just how good their air defenses are these days. It also strikes me as a target where drones would be a great idea if it ever comes down to a shooting war.) I'd also like to note that the F-117 shootdown didn't involve the pilot being captured, much less paraded in front of a camera, although he certainly could have been.
  • walshemj 13y ago
    As opposed to a wired fighter jock inbound in a fast mover who has only one pass before he bingo's and might have .5 seconds to decide if he should abort or not - having less pressure will result in better decisions.
  • daigoba66 13y ago
    I'm not necessarily disagreeing with the concept of banning armed droned, but I don't think the operators actually get to pick and choose the targets. I don't think the operators have much discretion at all. Those orders, especially orders to fire, likely come from a commanding officer. The same probably applies to fighter and bomber pilots too, though they may have more discretion when it comes to defending the aircraft.
• altcognito 13y ago
  No, we'd insist that every wedding have a security drone to protect that wedding from other drones. When you ground drones, then only the terrorists have drones.
• badman_ting 13y ago
  It's okay when we do it.
  • wil421 13y ago
    Its not illegal when we do it. We are the government. Do as we say not as we act.
  • Shivetya 13y ago
    Lets be honest here, if Bush were doing this the press and every damn Democrat in Congress would be up in arms and demanding halts and immediate investigations. so a better title would be, If Bush were President we'd ground out fleet.
    • saucetenuto 13y ago
      If only. All the links I can find are behind paywalls, but do a search for "drone wedding" from 2004 to 2007, and then become sad.
    • Kequc 13y ago
      Bush continually did much more heinous shit on a constant almost daily basis than just a semi-accidental strike somewhere. So no, not really. Republicans are the ones halting congress in every single way and doing what you just suggested. It is the entire point of the party. Regressivism is extremely easy, just fight against any changes and if someone ever actually manages to change anything your platform is to change it back. Republicans and Democrats do not do the same thing, I am so tired of hearing about this.
    • mikeash 13y ago
      Really? My recollection of most of the Bush administration was that the Democrats were complete and total doormats for him. They basically laid out the red carpet for him to invade Iraq, which was far worse and far less justified than drone strikes.
      • dopamean 13y ago
• josefresco 13y ago
  Weddings and funerals are actually targeted specifically because those events are two that even highly sought-after targets attend despite the dangers. Also, the subsequent funerals for those killed at the targeted wedding would then be targeted as well. You can either agree or disagree, but if you feel the target is accurate based on your intelligence the venue doesn't really matter IMHO. Civilians will be killed no matter if it's a wedding, funeral or some other random day. Would we have cared if bin Laden was attending a wedding?
  • gaius 13y ago
    Yes. Have you forgotten that we are supposed to be the good guys?
    • josefresco 13y ago
      We (speaking as a US citizen) are not the good guys any more than we're the bad guys, we're just guys doing our best to protect the interests of the country as a whole. Just as one day the Japanese were the bad guys and are now one of our closest ally's, morality and the high ground change as time and circumstances change.
      • gaius 13y ago
        How do you think murdering civilians indiscriminately on the off-chance that there may be a terrorist amongst them advances your national interests? How well did that approach work in Vietnam?
      • unethical_ban 13y ago
        They're not the bad guys anymore because they're not bombing and invading countries. They're good guys because they're peaceful with us and supply us with goods and services. The morals of bombings and war didn't change. Their behavior changed. So yes, we could be the "good guys" if we stopped spying and shooting at every foreign nation. We could be the "good guys" if we stopped spying on every citizen, and stopped creating a domestic military force out of municipal police.
• walshemj 13y ago
  But America isn't a failed state with a UN task force in place and it is not common practice to take large amounts of weapons to a wedding. This is a ASB (alien space bat) type of argument as used in many a sea-lion argument "obviously Hitler could have invaded the UK" (only if the ASB's destroyed the royal navy from orbit)
• k-mcgrady 13y ago
  Not all that surpising. As was made clear during the Snowden leaks the USG doesn't consider human beings who aren't US citizens to have the same rights as Americans.
  • wil421 13y ago
    This is what I find the most troubling. I used to think the US was trying to still spread democracy worldwide but apparently internally they feel if you are foreign that means there arent any laws as to what we can and cant do.
    • coldtea 13y ago
      Democracy is grown (locally), not "spread" by foreign intervention. The US didn't become a democracy itself by getting invaded. If anything, it was the opposite, it threw away the external power controlling it.
    • ixnu 13y ago
      What happens when a nation's revolutionary document becomes counterrevolutionary? "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."
      • Codhisattva 13y ago
        There are two opposing views of the Declaration and the Constitution. One view considers these documents to be the expression of the inclusive rights granted to the citizenship. The other view considers these documents to be the definition of the extents and limits of federal and state powers. The first view currently prevails but that was not always the case. Under the second view you can not waive your right to remain silent, or waive your right to unreasonable searches. In other words, being Mirandized doesn't grant the right. It's simply informing you of what you always have.
    • iaskwhy 13y ago
• wil421 13y ago
  I dont know which is tarnishing the American image worse the use of drones strikes or the Snowden leaks. What happens when our allies start to even say enough is enough.
  • CalRobert 13y ago
    They get droned into submission.
  • cyphax 13y ago
    As someone not from the US, I despise what the NSA does (warrantless spying), but it's not even in the same league as these drone strikes. Not even close. I don't understand why the rest of the world is OK with this. I really don't.
  • knieveltech 13y ago
    Ideally? A round of war crimes trials for the sociopaths responsible for this nightmare.
  • pmr_ 13y ago
    Exactly this. I'm not a US citizen and I can not remember the last time someone spoke about the United States as something we should emulate or as a country we should support. Political panels with topics like "Are the US still our allies?" are popping up around me and I personally wouldn't affirm that statement. There is an overall feeling of meddling in other people's affairs associated with most US actions nowadays. Germany already has declined participating in the attack on Iraq, but still provides plenty of passive (possibly also some active, even though that would be illegal) support (logistics, allowing air bases) and most people still perceive it as the right action. It is hard to find recent surveys on the topic and especially Transatlantic Trends seems to refuse to ask the question if Europe should continue to support US military actions further and focuses mainly on the NATO (neither drone strikes nor the Iraq War are NATO operations).
• forktheif 13y ago
  It continues to baffle me why the fact they're drones matter in the slightest. They're not autonomous, they're flown by pilots who just happen to not be sitting in the aircraft they're flying. Manned aircraft have killed huge groups of innocent civilians more than once, but apparently that's fine because the pilot was sitting in the aircraft.
  • morsch 13y ago
    Who says that it does matter? I think the reaction would have been very similar if a manned aircraft had bombed the wedding party. Do you have any recent instances of mass civilian casualties resulting from a "conventional" bomb strike that got ignored?
  • kvinnako 13y ago
    Would you think we can apply this same argument when it happens to be an american wedding?? Hell no. drones or no drones, we will definitely have some policy changes and definitely some heads will roll.
    • danielweber 13y ago
      If the United States had firebombed Denver instead of Dresden, yes, the US government would have made sure it didn't happen again.
  • wcummings 13y ago
    When we declare war on Yemen you'll be right. This is more akin to the bombings in Cambodia.
    • pekk 13y ago
      The use of manned bombers has occurred in "police actions" over and over
      • wcummings 13y ago
        Yeah, it worked so well subduing MOVE! [1] But in all seriousness, this isn't police action, its a foreign power. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MOVE#1985_bombing http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MOVE#1985_bombing
• headgasket 13y ago
  we've always been at war with terror
• sethbannon 13y ago
  The way America is conducting the war on terror is both self-defeating and morally repugnant.
  • bluedino 13y ago
    It's very easy to not agree with the way the US government handles these sort of things, but you have to give them the benefit of the doubt that they are not doing this for shits and giggles. It might seem nationalistic to some but it reminds me of a quote from "A Few Good Men" - Son, we live in a world that has walls, and those walls have to be guarded by men with guns. Who's gonna do it? You? You, Lt. Weinburg? I have a greater responsibility than you could possibly fathom. You weep for Santiago, and you curse the Marines. You have that luxury. You have the luxury of not knowing what I know. That Santiago's death, while tragic, probably saved lives. And my existence, while grotesque and incomprehensible to you, saves lives.
    • throwaway2048 13y ago
      saves whose lives, and why should a few of "our side" be more valuable than many of the "bad guys" (which happen to include entire families including innocent women and children)? It should be noted as well that the entire premise of the film wasn't "the ends justify the means" but rather the exact opposite. People can do great evil while believing that every action they take is fundamentally correct and for some kind of nebulous greater good.
      • dkersten 13y ago
        Unrelated, but I really hate the phrase "innocent women and children". What about the innocent men? Or the non-innocent women?
    • lbebber 13y ago
      Eh, saves lives inside, disregards lives outside. I know it's a complicated matter, but that reasoning can't be used to justify atrocities such as this one.
    • 13y ago
• zacinbusiness 13y ago
  It's not about stopping terrorists, it's about sending a message.
  • markyc 13y ago
    which message is that? "come and get us, it's getting too quiet around here and people are starting to question their leaders"?
  • waxjar 13y ago
    What would that message be? "We are barbaric so you better watch out"?
    • zacinbusiness 13y ago
      No, the message is "This is how much we treat innocent civilians who have done nothing wrong, so stop to think about how we treat people that we actually dislike." It's nothing more than a form of terrorism, primarily against the American people.
      • waxjar 13y ago
        I'm either misunderstanding you or you haven't read the article at all.
      • zacinbusiness 13y ago
        @Waxjar - I'm saying that these drone strikes are not accidental. That they did not kill innocent people by accident. And that the point of the U.S. drone fleet has got nothing to do with stopping terrorists and that, in fact, the very existence of the U.S. drone fleet is itself an act of terror because it exists for no real purpose other than to frighten people who make the U.S. government angry.
        • pekk 13y ago
          Doesn't this definition make the existence of any military deterrent "an act of terror"?
• belorn 13y ago
  > Five of those killed were suspected of involvement with Al Qaeda, but the remainder were unconnected with the militancy, Yemeni security officials said." > The New York Times reported in 2013 that the Obama Administration embraced a disputed method for counting civilian casualties, which in effect counts all military-age males in a strike zone as combatants. So 5 people were of military-age and male? Given a size of 22 people, it sound reasonable. I wonder how many were children.
  • dopamean 13y ago
    The business of considering all military-age males as combatants is really not all that surprising to me. I live in New York and here, in some neighborhoods, the police consider all minority males 14-40 (I really have no idea of the top end) to be suspected criminals worthy of a random search while simply walking down the street. This is the way we treat people. We deem one group of people to be a threat and they immediately lose their rights. Edit: I seemed to have forgotten that it is black and hispanic males in New York who are stopped.
    • jellicle 13y ago
      Not white males.
      • dopamean 13y ago
        I don't know how I left that bit out. Edited.
    • khafra 13y ago
      > We deem one group of people to be a threat A minority male between 14 and 40 is more likely to mug someone than a 70 year old caucasian woman; that's not something made up by racist conservatives. But if there's such a thing as rights, they must apply even to higher-threat demographics. One interesting exercise is thinking about base rates of mugging, and likelihood ratios for mugging, and discerning your own personal "4th amendment suspension" breaking point for each percentage.
• locusm 13y ago
  I wonder if the blow back from this in 10 years will be worse than the propping up of despots and dictators for the last 50.
• deleted 13y ago
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• deleted 13y ago
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  • almost 13y ago
    I think it meant if an american drone strike hit an american wedding.
    • Zigurd 13y ago
      And that's where both the press and government seem to have a blind spot. Flying a drone autonomously for thousands of miles has been done in university-level projects, years ago. How long before some cheap drone launched from heck knows where drops a small explosive on a government building in the US? What will we do? Launch a global war, lashing out against an unknown assailant? Put drones over our skies to hunt unknown Bad Guy drones? Drone warfare is the worst kind of undeclared war: It's highly prone to backlash, but so cheap it is irresistible to politicians and military leaders.
• robobro 13y ago
  We might pull out of other countries, but we'd pull over our own for sure then. "Well, we can't keep other countries safe... so we'll have to keep our own."
• rikacomet 13y ago
  Terrorism is a idea, it cannot be killed with bullets or drones. The Terrorist we know today are a pretty much related to those people who were supported by American Intelligence agencies in the mid70-80s, against the soviet. The "Barbarians" among those folk were given advanced weapons, that America possessed, those weapons might be outdated, and America may have a upper hand, but that is only a matter of time. Sadly, this has became a chicken and egg problem. The circle of REVENGE is a continuous one, you kill more people innocent or not, you sprout a new rebellion. They will eventually hurt you back, today or tomorrow. and the process will continue.. presidents, prime ministers would come and go by. The only way to stop this is to actually STOP. Stop interference in ways like espoinage, drone strikes, killing of "Suspected" militants.. never given any right to appear before court.. everything. The root problem is the so called intelligence that does more than just collect information about "suspected" enemies. Someone has to rise up and stop it. for both sides, perhaps it escape us humans sometimes, the very fact "those who are hurt are the ones who can forgive or take revenge." Thats about there it is to this. Really sad to hear about that nameless bride/groom & family. May they R.I.P.
• nraynaud 13y ago
  And just to make drive a little bit the point home: there are quite a few people suspected of terrorism in the US, like one French spy who blew the rainbow warrior, quite a few people from Viña del Mar, US citizen who passed through ESMA in Bs As, probably a few assassins from the mossad etc. And if a pressure cooker is a weapon of mass destruction, I'm pretty sure a hellfire is, too.
• senthilnayagam 13y ago
  friends and family of the innocent killed won't be friendly with americans ever
  • rokhayakebe 13y ago
    You can bet that someone in that group is already making plans for revenge, 10 years from now, when everyone has completely forgotten this incident ever happened.
• jds375 13y ago
  So true. It's hard to justify the United States calling themselves the "police of the world" when their actions are so hypocritical sometimes.
• danbruc 13y ago
  Now go and explain the difference between this incident and a terror attack without using the fact the the former has been carried out by a state while the later has been carried out by civilians.
  • Goladus 13y ago
    A terror attack would have deliberately targeted the wedding convoy because it's a soft target and because of the fear it would inspire among civilian non-combatants.
• belorn 13y ago
  It is articles like this that asks the reader to pierce media bias, and take a honest look at a conflict. If an Qaeda militant had gone to US city and bombed a wedding where they suspected harbored US officer, how would that play out? 22 injured, 17 killed by Qaeda militants in boston. Terrorists mistakenly targeted a wedding, trying to go after 5 US officer. If there were no propaganda in media, surely this would play out identical as this drone strike. No world leaders expressing their condemnation of the attacks, condolences, and solidarity. Military strikes kills huge groups of innocent civilians all the times in wars, so nothing to write about.
• pesenti 13y ago
  I don't understand why commenters don't actually discuss Obama's argument. He has the following options: - Do nothing - Use drones - Use conventional weapons which, he argues, would have more collateral damage - Put troops on the ground and be perceived as an invader. So either you should argue that these are not the options or you should argue that he did not pick the right one.
  • scarmig 13y ago
    You make do nothing sound like it's a bad thing. Is it really so terrible not to bomb wedding parties?
  • mythealias 13y ago
    Lets see our options are 1: do nothing, 2: involve the military through use of force. I wonder what happened to plain old diplomacy. I guess that is too slow and seems ineffective. So is training the locals to fight their war. After all they all live in dark ages and only know how to use stones and sticks to fight. But we cannot put forward these options to general public so we are left with just two. Even then I feel that more than Obama or any other politicians or military official it is the general public to blame. The public wants democracy but does not understand that democracy does not work out of the box. One needs to get involved to make it work properly. It is a good system but needs fixes. The problem with democracy is it treats my stupidity same as your intelligence and my apathy same as your concern. And as long as people like me hold majority there is not much others can do.
  • michaelt 13y ago
    He has loads of options other than that. Use some imagination. - Employ soft power / carrots instead of sticks such as foreign aid and literacy education. - Take actions that make people hate you less instead of more. - Equip/arrange for the locals or neighbours to do your dirty work. - Get a UN vote saying whatever you want to do. - Arm the government, conditional on a transition to democracy over the course of ten years. - Employ targeted bombings only on terrorist training camps, not on weddings. - Convince, bribe or threaten local cultural and religious leaders to guide their followers away from whatever you want them away from. - Divide the country along race, religious or class grounds and install a minority government that serves your interests. - Place bounties on the heads of people you want killed and increase the payout until the free market takes care of things for you. - Just let them take care of their own internal political issues and wait for the terrorists to reach the US or one of its allies before whacking them. - Increase employment rates and workloads so people are too busy/tired to devote attention to trying to destroy america. - Free bread / circuses / fast food / TV. - Drugs in the water supply. - Nuke the whole place as a warning to others. - Adopt a realistic foreign policy that admits the inevitability of civilian deaths, occasional bad apples engaging in torture and executing prisoners etc. and just agree to monitor and set realistic targets regarding the number of civilian deaths etc. - Do something low impact and ineffective and let the next president deal with it.
• squozzer 13y ago
  I wouldn't count on it. The US govt has enough media lapdogs who would shout down any calls to ground the fleet. I predict we won't have much longer to wait before the hypothesis is tested.
• rthomas6 13y ago
  I strongly agree with this article, but is this the kind of article that belongs on HN? Is this political article really part of some new trend or otherwise noteworthy, or is it just an editorial that most of us agree with?
  • davidw 13y ago
    It doesn't, according to the guidelines: http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html "Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon. Videos of pratfalls or disasters, or cute animal pictures. If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic." There's nothing intellectually gratifying about this story - it's an "outrage story". That doesn't mean it's not important, just that it's not HN material.
• rayiner 13y ago
  > Does anyone believe that, if not for our lethal drone program, the United States would've sent the Air Force or ground troops to fire on this wedding party? The premise of the article is non-sensical. If we didn't have drones, would the airforce be bombing targets in Yemen? Undoubtedly.
• njharman 13y ago
  > A U.S. drone mistakenly targeted Drones aren't autonomous. They don't target anything. Weapons officers do. Besides being plain wrong and bad reporting, dehumanizing (attributing it on the drone) shifts responsibility and makes it seem like problem is solvable by "fixing" drone or by grounding them.
• fit2rule 13y ago
  "Let us hit you with this stick, because if we start hitting you with the bigger stick, all the other ants will come teaming out of the woodwork and then there will be a real war going on". This kind of argument just makes me want to violently throw up. There is absolutely no honor in using a remote drone to kill people from a distance. It is among the most despicable things a human being can do to another human being. How about we make America take a really honorable position and say this to our American military friends: you are not allowed to kill anyone unless you've attempted, directly, to communicate with them - in their language - and discussed the reasons for their hostility directly, person to person. Only after this has occurred, and all other efforts to resolve the persons aggression, is the right to kill granted. I'm sure we'd see all those fascist US military personnel take another look at their chosen career path if they did, indeed, have to use the mighty power of American technology, to communicate and make direct peace with the targetted individuals instead of decapitate them, fill them with lead, murder their children, injure and maim their relatives, disfigure the strangers who were simply in the area, at the wrong time ..
• peter303 13y ago
  Sure. I believe it was a wedding too. Thats what the other side always says to obtain sympathy.
• clarkmoody 13y ago
  I seem to recall that the Obama Administration was going to restore America's image with the rest of the world -- the image that was presumably destroyed by W.
  • mikeyouse 13y ago
    Yeah, that actually happened though; http://m.static.newsvine.com/servista/imagesizer?file=joemyxterB1AD4281-20BF-BBAD-4540-4E89367326B5.jpg http://m.static.newsvine.com/servista/imagesizer?file=joemyx...
• deleted 13y ago
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• Codhisattva 13y ago
  s/American/Christian/
• kyleblarson 13y ago
  Can a Nobel peace prize be rescinded?
• holograham 13y ago
  A great book to read on the decline of violence in the world: The Better Angels of our Nature: Why Violence has Declined by Steven Pinker. The Hacker News community should like it as it focuses on the stats and facts rather than anecdotal stories the media slings. The main thesis: Violence (in nearly every form) has been on a precipitous decline in the modern era. War deaths (and civilian causalities) are at all time lows and still declining. http://www.amazon.com/The-Better-Angels-Our-Nature/dp/0143122010/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1387212392&sr=8-1&keywords=better+angels+of+our+nature http://www.amazon.com/The-Better-Angels-Our-Nature/dp/014312...
  • pantalaimon 13y ago
    Now would you say there would be more or less violence if the US stopped killing people on foreign soil?
    • holograham 13y ago
      Loaded question for sure :) You're asking me if the US's geopolitical and military operations currently are increasing or decreasing total violence in the world. A tremendously complex question to answer accurately. My answer (opinion) is this: On the whole I think the US has contributed to a decline in total violence in the world. Not to say there haven't been bad decisions along the way. Advances in military tactics and foreign aid policies have been aimed to decreased violence. As for an exact figure, that is impossible to know. How many future wars were averted when the US won the nuclear arms race? How many civilian casualties are minimized with each advance in precision bombing over the last ~75 years of military aviation? How many wars have been averted through foreign political action (aid, coups, treaties, etc)? Obviously those are unmeasurable in each discrete instance but the book I referenced above provides some aggregate statistics which, when correlated the US's rise as a world power, show a huge decline in worldwide violence (and not just in 1st world countries).
      • peterkelly 13y ago
        They should keep doing the stuff that reduces violence. That's all good. They should stop doing the stuff that increases violence. Like this incident.
• ivanca 13y ago
  A weeding bus was destroyed in a terrorist attack and many innocent civilians were killed! Wait... no, it was done by the USA military so it's not terrorism, totally cool, nothing to see, carry on.
• thebiglebrewski 13y ago
  Ok, although I fundamentally tend to disagree with much of American military policy - if there were people on that bus who had ties to Al Qaeda and american intelligence knew this...and those people were to cause further destruction if they weren't killed...then I just don't know. I kind of imagine this like all of those movies about drug cartels where these incredibly rich families are leading semi-normal lives and then during a normal family event like a wedding, are attacked by the rival drug cartel. It sucks and looks really bad, but if you got involved in something illegal like Al Qaeda or the drug trade on a massive scale...didn't you kind of bring it on yourself? Either way, more evidence needs to be shown for these kinds of attacks and why they are necessary?
  • peterkelly 13y ago
    They could have waited until after the wedding, when the Al Qaeda suspects were apart from the non-suspects, avoiding the risk of collateral damage. Just a thought.
    • thebiglebrewski 13y ago
      Maybe, maybe not. We don't have all the intelligence...I guess we just have to hope that was the best call given the circumstances. Not saying that I'm happy that this happened though
• jl6 13y ago
  If you are an American taxpayer, you can withdraw your support by giving away to charity all of your income above your personal tax allowance.
• baddox 13y ago
  I don't see why the author thinks we would ground our fleet. Police routinely and deliberately kill innocent people in the US, and we don't "ground our police force."
  • acjohnson55 13y ago
    We might, if the police stormed a wedding and killed over a dozen people.
    • baddox 13y ago
      I think you're being naive about what police in the US can do with very little resistance or punishment (especially internal). Remember things like: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kent_State_shootings http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kent_State_shootings http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jackson_State_killings http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jackson_State_killings http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waco_siege http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waco_siege
• Rogerh91 13y ago
  The day that we realize that all human beings are worthy of the same fundamental protections we take for granted, and act on this impulse, will be a great one indeed.
• MattyRad 13y ago
  Would anybody be surprised, even sympathetic, if the families of the deceased joined Al Qaeda as a direct result of this? Americans killed their friends and family on a sacred day, and nothing would be more appropriate than seeing they pay for it. Such an atrocity is almost comical when you think that the reason it occurred was to stop Al Qaeda, ends up bolstering it. It's appalling on so many levels.
  • acjohnson55 13y ago
    This certainly seems to be the way it plays out in countless ethnic and sectarian conflicts. I suppose my government is just arrogant enough to believe it's always going to be faster to the drone trigger than the terrorists are at reaching their objectives. I don't think it's a sustainable approach.
• yodsanklai 13y ago
  Concretely, at our level, what could be done to prevent those things from happening? voting doesn't seem to be working (esp. for those of us who aren't american). The problem is that our democracies are broken. Most people aren't well informed or unconcerned, and those who are don't have enough weight to make a difference. Maybe we could find a way to make our democracies functioning better via public discussion on the internet. We could imagine some kind of big political forum where logical reasoning would be enforced. Critical thinking would be encouraged. Rhetoric would be banned. Facts would be checked, politician would confront the public and each other on long and deep debates. Decisions would be taken collectively...
  • GFischer 13y ago
    It's a fine dream. I've read about a few politics startup attempts but they disappeared off the face of the earth quickly (though I did see some guys asking for funding recently). It would be nice if some could share their stories, where they failed and what they did well. Some people will always have more clout than others. Even here on Hacker News you have people with (I believe deservedly) more weight than others.
• swamp40 13y ago
  The anti-American rants on here are disgusting. Nobody's calling this a mistake except the media. 5 Al Qaeda dead, 5-10 people sitting next to an Al Qaeda member also dead. Intelligence even pointed out which 4 cars out of the 11 car convoy contained the Al Qaeda members. If you think there is no war going on over there, the 52 civilians slaughtered by Al Qaeda on Dec. 5 in a Sana'a hospital would disagree with you. Check out how Al Qaeda operates here at the 56 second mark, where one of them casually lobs a grenade into a crowd of civilians during the Dec. 5 attack: http://www.guns.com/2013/12/14/graphic-cctv-footage-militant-attack-yemeni-hospital-video/ http://www.guns.com/2013/12/14/graphic-cctv-footage-militant... The US drone strike was a direct response to the Dec. 5 massacre by Al Qaeda.
  • peterashford 13y ago
    What's your talley of innocent people killed in drone strikes and as "collateral damage" by the US. Do the people affected by those atrocities have the the right to act "in direct response" against the US? If this revenge motive justifies the US, does it not also justify the terrorists?
  • josephlord 13y ago
    America's new moral standard? Better than Al Qaeda. We should be striving for much better standards if the west is to have any moral authority. Not as bad as Russia, China or Al Qaeda is not good enough. Then there are practical issues that indiscriminate attacks are liable to create as many enemies as they kill as sons, brothers and fathers are bereaved and decide to join the fight. [Edit: I'm British not American and I'm not saying Britain is any better but I really hate the "we aren't as bad as something really bad" as a defence for either country's actions. We should do better].