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U.S. drone strike kills 30 pine nut farm workers in Afghanistan
- mikelyons 7y agoHow do we address the underlying selfishness that causes this?
- tibbydudeza 7y agoI think Americans we are about numb to these headlines as another mass shooting compared that to the reaction of civil society in Germany when a SUV "only" killed 4 people in Berlin.
- wruza 7y agoNow imagine “U.S. drone strike kills 30 pine nut farm workers in France” and feel the difference (which is non-existent). Then it goes on tv and reads the list of this morning’s evil men who must be stopped.
- olliej 7y agoFor it to matter to the USG is has to be "X drone strike kills 30 pine nut farmers in [some US state]"
- zapita 7y agoWe already know that the current US administration and senate majority does not care about the lives of their own citizens either. Mass shootings, police brutality, the stoking of hate crimes and the absence of a modern social safety net, withholding support to domestic climate refugees, inadequate industrial regulation, are directly killing many US citizens right now. Those deaths could be prevented but our government willingly chooses not to. The normalizing of imperialistic murder abroad is not an anomaly; it is a core part of US identity. The US itself is a product of imperialistic murder, its crowning achievement even. To this day US soldiers deployed abroad use the term “indian country” to designate occupied territory where they conduct counter-insurgency operations. That term dates back to counter-insurgency operations conducted by the very same institution against Native Americans until 100 years ago. What was once abroad is now domestic - such is the nature of empire.
- olliej 7y agoYou’re misunderstanding. If X was not the USG, then the USG would care and probably go to war with any countries potentially related to, or sounding similar to, X
- peterkelly 7y agoor "X drone strike kills 0 people but damages an oil processing facility in Saudi Arabia"
- sneak 7y agoI’d go with “secretary of defense guns down thirty civilians with a machine gun in Times Square”. Why these mass murderers are allowed to flourish in our society is a continuing source of dismay for me.
- devoply 7y agoBecause freedom and democracy. Wars of attrition for political purposes are nothing but state sponsored terror by another name. More than 16,000 dead and 30,000 injured. Talk about Afghan 9/11 ever year for the past 10 years probably 20 to 40 on which way you are counting. Who destabilized the country? Was it the Soviets or was it the Americans?
- dathinab 7y agoBoth, what you mean is who keeps it instabil. But that's also not as simple as just looking at US drone strikes. Though they are a non small reason due to the mental trauma they caused in a lot of people in some regions, which IMHO is likely to caused more people to radicalize.
- dominicr 7y agoOr imagine "Taleban drone strike kills 30 farmers in Oklahoma". There would be a reaction!
- cies 7y agoOr Yemenis kill 30 Saudi date farm workers in Saud. Or, God forbid, Iran kills 30 Saudis in Saud. We've been exposed to so much propaganda that we instinctively know what is "worse", and who is "allowed" to kill without due process.
- throwaway66920 7y agoI think you’re conflating morally worse with practically worse. It’s not propaganda to note that certain countries attacking each other spell out graver consequences
- cies 7y agoThat fact that you distinguish between morally worse and "practically worse" make me thing you are already under the influence of the propaganda. But it does not mean you are right: Afganistan cannot attack the US over 30 dead civillians, the US can attack Iran for some Saudi property destruction by Yemenis who are being raped by Saudi using US weaponery on them.
- cies 7y ago> But it does not mean you are right I meant: But it does not mean you not are right
- oAlbe 7y agoYeah? And why is that? Is it that certain countries' farm workers' lives are worth more than certain others? It sounds to me that the propaganda got you too.
- throwaway66920 7y ago
- est 7y ago> Now imagine “China drone strike kills 30 Muslim workers in Xinjiang” FTFY
- rqs 7y agoMaybe not the right time and place to being this up, but I personally believe that such illegal activities conducted by the U.S. is hurting people of other nations who is fighting for their own democracy. Just imagine China start to playing news such like this in those concentration camps, free golden material for showing people how rightful it is to follow the lead of CCP I'd say. While it is true the U.S. is benefiting from it's strong global influence, but it is also true that nobody wants to be threatened. If the U.S. don't want to be the good guy in this game, at least don't be the bad one.
- mieseratte 7y agoAs much as I would love the US out of Afghanistan, there’s a war on over there. Yours is a disingenuous comparison.
- alpaca128 7y agoA war where the US were totally forced to participate, of course, like always...
- kmjg88nvf8 7y agoSo do you care about the civilians, or not? It seems possible US engagement saves more civilians than it kills. At least that is presumably the general idea.
- megous 7y agoUnlikely. There were massacres during the Taliban rule outside of war, but it was at much lower scale than in the current war, and US only helps taliban grow by its intervention, it seems, if you look at the numbers of fighters. It's not like killing a person with certain beliefs stops the beliefs from spreading.
- kmjg88nvf8 7y agoSo you think it would be OK to live under Taliban rule? They didn't come into power by democratic elections, it seems. Also, killing people with beliefs does stop beliefs from spreading. How much of Afghanistan do the Taliban control these days, anyway?
- megous 7y agoQuite a lot: https://thedefensepost.com/2019/05/01/afghanistan-resolute-support-taliban-territory-control/ https://thedefensepost.com/2019/05/01/afghanistan-resolute-s... The idea was that "possible US engagement saves more civilians than it kills", and I was reacting to that, as it is very doubtful. I didn't say it would be ok to live under Taliban. But there are other weird islamic countries, where I wouldn't want to live either. Do you propose US making war there, too?
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- zupzupzup 7y agoAll animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.
- dkraft 7y agoRight. It all depends on who believes the fake news.
- whiddershins 7y agoNow imagine “France knowingly harbors 911 terrorists.” “French leaders take credit for car bombing which kills 23 civilians.” There’s a historical reason for this discrepancy.
- brosinante 7y agoThe US "knowingly harbored" nazi war criminals.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- rob74 7y agoThat's still no excuse to indiscriminately kill civilians - unless you deliberately want to increase the support for the terrorists...
- wruza 7y agoThere is a historical reason for everything. Who attacked US in the first place? It is not even reachable from countries they ‘democratized’, except for caribbean guys.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- megous 7y agoAfghanistan didn't do that, taliban did.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- pnako 7y agoAfghanistan does not harbor 9/11 terrorists. The 9/11 terrorists were all from Saudi Arabia, they did not learn how to fly in a cave in the Afghan mountains and their funding did not come from a financial center in Kandahar; Bin Laden was found hiding in Pakistan. That war is absurd and should have stopped a long time ago. It's just fueling more terrorism. All western countries should leave the middle east, for good, forever (except maybe the odd ship to secure shipping lanes and stuff like that, but you get my point).
- rayiner 7y agoI’m pretty sure there aren’t people in France trying to establish a violent worldwide theocracy, and even if there were, the French government would have a handle on it/not be complicit. We don’t conduct missions in Afghanistan for funsies. We do it because there is no State we can lean on to stamp down on the extremists.
- harshalizee 7y agoOh you mean like how the US government has a handle on it's own homegrown extremism?
- rayiner 7y agoAs someone from a Muslim country that’s battling extremists—your false equivalence is ignorant, and your ignorance is dangerous.
- captain_price7 7y agoAs a muslim from a Muslim country, how so?
- rayiner 7y agoExtremists in Bangladesh are locally organized, capable of coordinated attacks, and part of an international movement. Extremists in the US are neither of those things. Often, Incidents in the US are chalked up to “white national extremists” based on nothing more than some murdered having searched such websites. There used to be an organized extremist threat in the US back when the KKK was active, but that was crushed. What’s left is remnants. That’s not true in Bangladesh. Extremists systematically killed journalists a few years ago. Before it was banned, the Islamist party got 3 million votes in national elections. Extremism is being bankrolled from foreign countries through schools that teach such views. There is a deep well of support for such views among the people—1/3 of Bangladeshis believe that people who leave Islam should be executed. And, finally, there is a real risk of extremists taking over the State, as happened with Pakistan and Afghanistan. None of that is true in the US. People who say “hurr durr but Republicans are a white nationalist party” do so out of ignorance, because they have no idea what it’s like to have extremists actually threaten your democracy. And their ignorance is dangerous. It’s dangerous to a world that needs US leadership to overcome extremism. Their false equivalency and apologism undermines the people in countries like Bangladesh who continue to fight for liberal democracy and the rule of law.
- Roboprog 7y agoWhy are we there? What’s the threat, again? I forgot.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- CapricornNoble 7y ago>>>Why are we there? 1. So the CIA can smuggle heroin to big pharma, and fund black projects. (largely unsubstantiated position) 2. To occupy overland energy routes, disrupting the ability of China to build infrastructure linking to Iran. The whole One Belt/One Road thing is intended to construct an alternative to China's very vulnerable maritime lines of communication, reducing the risk of a resource import blockade by the US Navy. They can't get a oil or gas pipeline from Iran if the A-stan government is in the back pocket of the US, and US military bases sit astride the route. 3. To present the risk of a 2nd front (1st front = Iraq, Persian Gulf), boxing in Iran. Not a major jump-off point for a land invasion (due to logistical constraints) but could serve as basing for aviation assets and special operations raids into the parts of Iran on the eastern side of the Zagros Mountains. Personally, I don't think any of those reasons is valid for staying there. >>>What’s the threat, again? I forgot. Basically we've spent decades playing whack-a-mole, attacking symptoms instead of root causes. And one of those root causes is....our mole-whacking kills far too many innocent civilians.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- discordance 7y ago"We were always at war with Eurasia"
- yakshaving_jgt 7y agoWhile I appreciate the reference, I don't think it applies here.
- 7y ago
- torstenvl 7y agoThis is deeply tragic. I wish the story gave more details. Based on the provincial governor's statement, it sounds like U.S. forces were relying on the Afghan government's intelligence assessment. I also wish news sources would be more careful about suggesting that there are autonomous killer robots in the sky. The drone didn't target anything. A remote pilot did, based on information he/she was provided.
- tehjoker 7y agoThe US can't sustain casualties and maintain any popular support for the war or the reputation of the military, so they use remote control killing machines on people the media don't care about. Unless you have people on the ground (and even then!) you can't really be sure of your intel. This media strategy allows them to not care about the quality of the intel. While the power of the state is still terrifying, it is vastly weaker than during the Vietnam era.
- hyperdunc 7y agoIt's both typical and disingenuous to name an attack after the instrument rather than the agent that wields it. Truck attacks, drone attacks, knife attacks - one might be forgiven for thinking these objects have developed minds of their own. Or perhaps the insinuation is that most humans themselves are mere instruments of the cultures and institutions they're embedded in.
- stargazing 7y agoCan someone explain to me how the US military is still unable to distinguish pine nut farmers from IS Jihadi terrorists? Where is all this advanced military tech I keep hearing the US military is developing that people are mistaking for aliens?
- hatchershoes 7y agoThe world's largest, most expensive military does not make mistakes. If they admit a mistake, it's to cover up something far more nefarious.
- uh_yikes 7y ago... Have you ever met anyone in the US military?
- arcticfox 7y agoEvery organization in the world makes mistakes all the time.
- saagarjha 7y agoI’m assuming the grandparent comment is sarcasm.
- tempodox 7y agoYou mean, like Facebook “admitting” to a “bug” that “leaked” user data after they'd been caught red-handed?
- 2rsf 7y agoYes, someone can but you'll need security clearance for that. If we assume this was not intentional, then the two most probable causes are human or technical or any combination of both. A drone can't land, open Skype and allow an interrogator to speak with the locals in their language- it flies high, have limited visibility and the interpretation of the incoming data is based on prior intelligence. If you look at the pictures you'll see that pine nut farmers looks the same as IS Jihadi terrorists, both use civilian clothes and sometimes they are actually the same person.
- mikhailfranco 7y agoThe US is resolutely fighting the War on Pesto ! (They ran out of other things to fight.) They arrest people who share pesto recipes, or search for pesto on the web. New technology is deployed to detect and suppress the Improvised Pesto Dishes found in roadside cafes, especially the deadly Rocket Pesto. There are small Caribbean islands where Pestofarians openly consume pasta with pesto. The Colombian Green Pesto Cartel has entered a bloody feud with the Red Pesto Brigades. However, I understand some US states are legalizing pesto now.
- pvaldes 7y ago... and nobody will go to jail for this
- alkibiades 7y agowe need accountability for this. it can't just be like "oops"
- gcatalfamo 7y agoThis is how you create terrorists. What do you think the children and friends feelings towards the US will be from now on? People get radicalized for much less than that.
- draugadrotten 7y agoTheir feelings will be affected and rightly so, it is a tradegy. However the feelings of a few people about an error can not be the single parameter to decide if drone strikes are used. War have casualties. What about the feelings of the children and friends after 9.11, Charlie Hebdo, Bataclan, Nice, Stockholm, Trèbes, Paris, Liège and Strasbourg? I could go on. Of the 24 jihadist attacks in the EU in 2018, 10 occurred in France, four in the United Kingdom, four in the Netherlands, two in Germany and one each in Belgium, Italy, Spain and Sweden. In 2017, a total of 62 people were killed in ten completed jihadist attacks in the European Union, according to Europol figures. The number of attempted jihadist attacks reached 33 in 2017. If a single drone strike is how you create terrorists, what is being created in Europe?
- EliRivers 7y agoI think that there is an inherent difference between drone killings and atrocities committed by people. The drone killings are anonymous, out of the sky, with no idea who the guilty party is besides a nebulous "USA" or "the West"; a vacuum of information besides a robotic, faceless apology in a press release (that is itself just more insult, more humiliation), and the knowledge that a foreign country can reach out and murder people living next door to you without consequence. The humiliation and rage and sense of powerlessness and living every day knowing that they'll do it again and nobody will do anything about it simply festers. These are key ingredients in growing terrorists. This is how you make terrorists. Humilation and anger and a sense of powerlessness and that the perpetrator will face no justice. When some idiot boy shoots up an office in Paris there's a guilty party, a reckoning with a body (or an arrest), a name, an investigation and professional state employees actively going after someone, actively pursuing justice (very different to the state doing no more than shrugging and saying "yeah, that's the USA for you, they murder you and your neighbours, nothing we can do about it"). There is a qualitative difference; the key ingredients above aren't present. Even if the terrorist gets away, it's recognised that it was an individual(s) and that they are being pursued; someone is seeking justice on your behalf. If a single drone strike is how you create terrorists, what is being created in Europe? On the face of it, not terrorists.
- newnewpdro 7y agoThis is an excellent way to cause more terrorism, well done Team USA.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- zed88 7y agoAmerican exceptionalism means they will get away from it easily as 'collateral damage'.
- concordDance 7y agoNot that this isn't a tragedy (and/or mass murder depending on your viewpoint), but I don't think hackernews is the right venue for this. Hackernews should try and keep to tech and away from politics or its quality will continue to degrade. For instance the comments here are mostly not saying anything that hasn't already been said a thousand times before (is this just outrage porn?).
- paganel 7y ago> , but I don't think hackernews is the right venue for this I would think the same, but then you’ve got things like project Maven which is very closely related to things like US drone strikes and which definitely deserves its place on HN. For example in this particular case, I’d be interested to know how the initial identification has been made from aerial views alone (I suppose they were based on aerial views) that those nut pickers were the bad guys (when in fact they weren’t): was it a manual recognition task? An automatic one? (i.e. image recognition). Again, this pretty much looks like a false positive issue with great “chances” of having been caused by an automatic process, so it definitely has its place on HN.
- concordDance 7y agoI'd agree with you if a noticable proportion of the comments so far had any discussion of the technical aspects, but they don't. (Two out of the 40 comments could maybe be considered discussing the technical aspects and yours goes into the most depth)
- paganel 7y agoYeah, I left my comment before reading the rest of the conversation in here, you’re correct on that one
- aedron 7y agoI would agree, but there is a technological angle with the use of drones. Unfortunately it is certain to devolve into a political discussion.
- malicioususer11 7y agopine nuts, opium, same difference. :3
- petre 7y agoBoth the Taliban and the US are killing innocent civillian bystanders. This is more and more common with drone strikes. It was konwn that it's pine nut picking season and the governor of the province was informed. There was wither miscomunication or the US forces simply ignored the fact and launched the strike anyway. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-afghanistan-attack-drones-letter/letter-detailing-civilian-presence-failed-to-prevent-deadly-afghan-drone-strike-idUSKBN1W431P https://www.reuters.com/article/us-afghanistan-attack-drones... The Taliban were all too coward to plant a car bomb in the proximity of the government intelligence department building, so what they did was to plant it next to a nearby hospital. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/09/killed-car-bomb-attack-afghan-province-zabul-190919042138106.html https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/09/killed-car-bomb-attac...
- kome 7y ago16000 civilians death so far in Afghanistan. The life of countless families broken for nothing. Yankee go home.
- ArtRichards 7y agoI wonder what the reasoning for this attack was. When they pulled the trigger, were they attempting to target a specific individual or groups? The article mentions that groups of IS were alleged to be using the fields for training. What kind of calculation of civilian casualties or risks goes into this decision? How do citizens of the US/Nato countries understand what that calculation is, or is that policy effectively out of the control of the populace at large, vested only in the wartime decisionmakers? Will there be any discussion of this or justification, or is that beyond the reporting responsibilities of the AP?
- richardw 7y agoIf Afghanistan mistakenly killed 30 Americans there would be hell to pay
- randunel 7y ago> If the Afghan military killed 30 Americans on US soil FTFY
- coldtea 7y agoNothing to see here, there were not first world victims!
- tim333 7y agoIt would be an interesting experiment for the US military to try stop killing people. It would mean that if you say had a bunch of ISIS guys going to kill civilians like they did in Iraq you'd have to find a non lethal way of stopping them like drones with tasers or maybe diplomacy / bribery. It would be an interesting tech challenge to make non lethal AI drones say that could stop a traditional military. Or maybe like the non lethal terminator in Terminator 2 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i3XJxWwYx58 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i3XJxWwYx58
- pgreenwood 7y agoOn a side note it's very interesting to re-watch Rambo III, where he teams up with local jihadists in Afghanistan to fight the occupying Soviets in the area. Hollywood propaganda at its finest, but brutally ironic today.
- dkraft 7y agoTIL; 30 Afghans killed today were not pine nut farmers, but its somehow insulting to the survivors.
- zxcvbn4038 7y agoNotice the wording - the drone targeted the workers. The drone didn’t make a decision and target the workers, the drone pilot targeted the workers, and whomever was standing behind them gave the order to launch the missle. The whole “I’m just doing what the computer said” defense only works in movies.
- igravious 7y agoImagine being the person (even if you had little personal autonomy in the matter) who pulled the trigger or pressed the button. Imagine finding out what you had done. Would it break you?
- yardie 7y agoProbably not. Have you heard the rhetoric from some of our veterans and citizens. The victims were brown. Most likely they went home, slept soundly, thinking it was a good day, god and country, etc.
- zxcvbn4038 7y agoI suspect it’s more along the lines of not wanting to be the guy who killed the least number of people that week because you have to buy the first round come Friday night.
- trymas 7y agoSomeone should correct me if I am wrong, but military training is mostly about obeying orders and desensitizing about what's going on the receiving end of your actions. I have watched Restrepo on Netflix and found one thing interesting, that biggest thing soldiers have missed in their civilian lives is the adrenaline/joy rush of a shoot-out, no matter how dangerous it is. Paradoxically most of the interviewees are clearly suffering from some levels of PTSD, because probably you cannot be trained for when you see your friend's body/face to be blown apart. It would be interesting to hear from someone in the military or someone with military psychology training knowledge, how this works. Seems that soldiers are fine with killing "the enemy", but seeing death of your friends gives you (understandably) PTSD.
- nullc 7y agoHas the US government issued a public apology yet?
- mothsonasloth 7y agoAlexander and his successors tried to hold Afghanistan but they failed after three centuries. The Mongols tried and failed. The Arabs tried and failed. The Mughals tried and failed. The British tried and failed. The Soviets tried and failed. NATO tried and...... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invasions_of_Afghanistan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invasions_of_Afghanistan
- pvaldes 7y agoWould be really so unthinkable a high army charge going to the area to make in place a public televised apology to those people, asking how can help alleviate this disaster, and returning the families a little dignity at least? And please journalists, stop referring to the people as "tribal this" or "tribal that". To always focus on that point is unnecessary and disrespective. A father is a father in any part of the world.
- amingilani 7y agoRelated: Pakistan body count[0]. "Whether it is a suicide bombing or an attack by a flying drone, for me it's the same: a Pakistani got killed." I posted this site a few years ago, but it didn't get attention, but I'm glad to see the community is finally outraged over drone strikes. [0]: http://pakistanbodycount.org/ http://pakistanbodycount.org/
- waffle_ss 7y agoThe site doesn’t differentiate between terrorists and civilians killed, so I don’t get the point? It’s not like Pakistan is running low on terrorists or the state intelligence service ISI isn’t sponsoring their activities.
- amingilani 7y ago> The site doesn’t differentiate between terrorists and civilians killed It does[0]. > It’s not like Pakistan is running low on terrorists or the state intelligence service ISI isn’t sponsoring their activities. I don't know how to respond to that, since there isn't a question in there, just a belligerent statement. I suppose the best way is to simply not engage. [0]: http://pakistanbodycount.org/definitions.html http://pakistanbodycount.org/definitions.html
- waffle_ss 7y agoI saw the definitions page but my point is about the tally number which seems to be conflating everything together[1] (adding dead terrorists into the tally), which I think is disingenuous. Compared to, for example, https://www.iraqbodycount.org https://www.iraqbodycount.org, which only counts civilian deaths (which I assume based on the name is the inspiration for this page). [1]: http://pakistanbodycount.org/drone_attack.php http://pakistanbodycount.org/drone_attack.php
- amingilani 7y agoTrue, and I don't know what the rationale behind their specific motivation is, but if I were to make a website, I'd do the same. That's not to say that they shouldn't be more transparent about their methodology. The truth of the matter is that there's very little known about the people that actually die in these strikes. There is a fair amount of confusion on whether the deaths reported to be terrorists are actually terrorists. Some say they are not especially since the dead are never charged. There are also reports that the Pakistani military straight-up calls civilians terrorists[0] but these are heavily contested by the military[1] itself. If you had a dataset which was heavily reported to be mislabelled, what would you do? Personally, I'd do the same but perhaps add a better explanation. [0]: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-48139648 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-48139648 [1]: https://www.dawn.com/news/1486313 https://www.dawn.com/news/1486313
- derpherpsson 7y agoJust keep bombing somewhat random people, year in and year out. Are we at the 2nd decade of this yet? This way I promise no one will join the rebells. Why would anyone join the rebells just because their families are slaughtered? That's absurd. (Irony.) There comes a time when YOU would strap on a bomb belt. Just imagine that They killed half your family and then goes on telling you they will continue doing it...
- benjaminbrodie2 7y ago> There comes a time when YOU would strap on a bomb belt. Just imagine that They killed half your family and then goes on telling you they will continue doing it... I don't think this is quite enough to push people over the ledge. If what killed half my family is someone who does not try to justify his actions morally, someone who I can therefore morally compare to a tiger or bear, I wouldn't strap on a bomb belt. But if the killer tries to tell the world he's eradicating evil, and the world high five with them, ...
- mikejb 7y ago> There comes a time when YOU would strap on a bomb belt. Just imagine that They killed half your family and then goes on telling you they will continue doing it... It's not that hard to imagine - after 9/11, people did enlist themselves to go and start shooting at others, sometimes with the consequence of dying themselves, believing it is for the greater good.
- stunt 7y agoToday I saw the BBC's "Bitter Lake" documentary. It explains why Afghanistan is so fucked up. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-p0z6iHGzdE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-p0z6iHGzdE
- darkr 7y agoDon't get me wrong, I love an Adam Curtis film as much as the next guy, but... His films should be interpreted as you might interpret a Malcolm Gladwell book: An entertaining, insightful, witty, and educational way of telling a story that the author wants to tell, supported by hand-picked facts and part-truths, whilst ignoring other information that might reveal a more well-rounded story.
- whiddershins 7y agoI wonder why, even though we generally try to be skeptical of the news, I’m not seeing many comments here that question whether what this article is saying is even accurate. How exactly does the reporter know which people are IS fighters? Is there some notion that militants don’t ever also farm? Also in these comments there seems to be a huge double standard. The idea the United States might accidentally kill some civilians is somehow morally outrageous, but the regular and deliberate targeting of civilians by the Taliban and the IS as they attempt to completely destabilize the Afghan government is taken as somehow normal?
- esailija 7y ago> How exactly does the reporter know which people are IS fighters? Is there some notion that militants don’t ever also farm? Guilty until proven innocent, right?
- dullgiulio 7y agoI think the parent is saying "how do reporters have better intel than the military?" Then of course it might be the case here that civilians were targeted, by mistake or on purpose. But the parent point is quite valid.
- justin66 7y agoA more apt question: why does the parent think the reporters claim to have better intel than the military? It is baffling how poorly many people here read.
- zapnuk 7y agoThe double standard come from the fact that the USA is usually held to higher standards than terror organizations. But you are correct, killing civilians with drones isn't much different compared to other acts of terror.
- whiddershins 7y ago
- rayiner 7y agoMisleading: > JALALABAD, Afghanistan (Reuters) - A U.S. drone strike intended to hit an Islamic State (IS) hideout in Afghanistan killed at least 30 civilians resting after a day’s labor in the fields, officials said on Thursday. Officials here seems to refer to unnamed tribal “officials.” The US and Afghan defense ministry officials cited a few paragraphs before that did not say anything about civilian casualties.
- techsin101 7y agoThis is simply what made to the news.. war crime for which no one will be held accountable, double standards.
- mikhailfranco 7y agoMore news from the War on Pesto ... Only the government has the right to produce pesto. You cannot store pesto in a bank safety deposit box (in fact, all safety deposit boxes will be banned). You cannot enter or leave the country with more than 10,000 paper promises of pesto. Anyone who buys, or sells, or consumes pesto will be tracked, and suspicious patterns will be assigned to their Social Pesto Score. The rule of Civil Pesto Forfeiture: the police assume anyone in possession of pesto is engaging in criminal activity. The pesto will be confiscated without any charge, and the onus will be on the pesto owner to litigate to prove that the pesto was obtained legally. Food banks will charge a fee for dispensing or receiving pesto. Storage of pesto at a food bank will require a negative interest fee. Futures trading in precious metals for pesto does not need any store of physical metals. Any trade in precious metals for pesto is legally regulated by the Federal Government, but those laws will not actually be enforced. Pesto lost in boating accidents will be assumed to be still in the owners possession for tax purposes. The government reserves the right to create as much pesto as necessary for the culinary welfare of the nation. The government decrees that the supply of pesto shall be 2% more than is normally consumed. The excess of pesto will result in too much pesto being included for normal baking transactions, and the value of pesto stored under the mattress will decline. The production and use of crypto-pesto will be studied by the government in a slightly perplexed manner. For the moment, they do not understand why anyone would want to buy crypto-pesto that cannot be eaten with physical pasta. All transactions on the condimentchain will be monitored by the government. Eventually they will ban crypto-pesto, because they still don't understand it, but they suspect it threatens their monopoly on printing pesto promises.
- Phillips126 7y agoI have kids and live in a rural U.S. town. I fear "normal" things such as drugs, school/gun violence, sex predators, etc. This... this is next level. I couldn't even fathom what it would be like if missiles rained from the sky at faster-than-sound speeds - from another country no less. You could say: "There aren't terrorists in rural U.S. towns," but I'd argue that isn't the case anymore with all the mass shootings, racial hatred, and so on. The world is in such a sad state.
- rikelmens 7y agoIt appears to be 70, rather than 30.