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Silly String Goes to War Against IEDs
Luban Doyle writes "In an age of multimillion-dollar high-tech weapons systems, sometimes it's the simplest ideas that can save lives. Which is why a New Jersey mother is organizing a drive to send cans of Silly String to Iraq.
American troops use the stuff to detect trip wires around bombs, as Marcelle Shriver learned from her son, a soldier in Iraq."
New slogan? "Iraq: It's a Party Over There!"
They're also using bees. (Seriously). Silly string and bees.
Infra-red emmitting diode?
Intermittent Explosive Disorder?
Institute for Educational Development?
Institution of Engineering Designers?
Innovative Electronic Designs?
I'm sure they once called these "booby traps". What's the obsession with acronyms?
Why isn't the government providing the tools the military needs.
Additionally there should be a significant discount if they make a nice large contract
That's a really ingenious use of Silly String. I just hope it continues to work.
Its for the war on iraq!!
If they don't accept it they're TERRORISTS!
:x
Um, they hire a private pilot? Like it says in the article?
biopowered.co.uk - catalytically cracking triglycerides for home automotive use since 2008. Just say no to big oil!
"IED-like device" supposedly found near Cincinnati
"MIT betrayed all of its basic principles."
OK call me overly sensitive, I usually am against Political Correctness, but this is a serious issue. DEADLY serious.
I'm glad this low tech method of booby trap detection is being used. My nit however is in leading the article with the "It's Funny, Laugh" icon.
There is a humorous element in using a humorously named children's toy for sure, but I still chafe at the juxtaposition of the Monty Python foot with something that is in actuality so far removed from humor.
Letter To Iran
Let's make it in olive green and sell it for ten times as much!
You have to love email forwards disguised as news articles.
This has been floating around for years -- I first saw it as a piece promoting British Special Forces ingenuity. Our very own Bruce Schneier mentioned it (and the suppressed Cockeyed piece) around this time last year.
Read TFA. The Postal service won't ship it by air.
Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups.
No, I'm not kidding.
The simple truth is that interstellar distances will not fit into the human imagination
- Douglas Adams
This was mildly interesting when it was reported about the SAS ages ago.
It's like Napalm in a can! "I love the smell of Silly String in the morning!" Surfs Up!
In fact, I'm going to teach that to our guys tonight.
Who'd've thunk I'd pick up a tactical tip from Slashdot?
DG
Want to learn about race cars? Read my Book
Seriously, silly string can be used during skirmishes as well.....has anyone ever gotten an eye-full of that stuff? Hurts like hell....
Quite a bit of assembly required, actually....
Isn't this the 2nd time war and toys have crossed paths? IIRC Silly Putty was made by accident in WW2, attempting to make an explosion. While no explosive was made, the designers pressed it on a newspaper photo and went "but hey! Look what you can do with Hitler's face!"
Let's look for other toys with the word "silly" in them to see if they are usful in military applications. I'm betting now there's some research funds diverting towards it.
In todays politically correct society where there is a fear of lawsuits and an assumption that any word that can be taken in a childish context will be. For example in my organization: Primary Management System was renamed because the acronym was PMS. The Financial Unit reports were renamed because some manager couldn't ask for the F-U reports with a straight face. And most recently a data translation application had its name changed because someone tried to pronounce the acronym as "La-tee-dah-tol".
-Rick
"Most people in the U.S. wouldn't know they live in a tyrannical state if it walked up and grabbed their junk." - MyFirs
Now that would be silly... The thing is supposed to be well visible so it detects booby traps. Making it camouflage-colored is hardly going to improve its performance. Again, it would be so fitting... "Silly String in stupid format for an idiotic war!"
Victims of 9/11: <3000. Traffic in the US: >30,000/y
I would think that this tactic would be harder for insurgents to get around... the tripwire needs to be there to work after all. You could make the tripline super sensitive, so the string itself sets it off, but that would put the soldiers further from the blast when it happened. Also, setting a super-sensitive tripline would hopefully kill a few more terrorists while they're setting it up.
The insurgents' next tactics will probably involve laser-armed proximity mines like in Star Wars: Jedi Knight 2. It's cool though, you just jump really high to minimize damage, then hit F5 a few times to heal...
"Silly String?"
Couldn't we at least change the name to Freedom String-In-A-Can?
If Nalgene water bottles are outlawed, only outlaws will have Nalgene water bottles.
We used to use a metal coat hanger.
Untie the hook part and strighten it up. Make a finger loop at the top and curve it slightly at the bottom. Hold in font of you when walking, you will notice when it contacts something trust me.
The use of silly string is hardly enviromentally friendly and I see that US forces did not learn of the even cheaper trick from the Brits. Perhaps you dont have metal coat hangers in the US who knows.
I still think tin upon tin of silly string will amount to lots of $$$ though.
Ibbo
Linux user #349545 (GNU/Linux)iD8DBQBAzWjX+MZAIjBWXGURAmflAKCntuBbuK
silly string is not only hours upon hours of annoying fun, but also highly flamable...looks like we've just discovered world's greatest weapon, now availabe at the local toys 'r us....i think i've just cut the US military budget by $50 trillion www.popculturepundit.com
The BSharps can put that whole "poisonous" thing behind them and start producing the silly string again!
Monstar L
How sweet. It is just that attitude that will win the world over and stop populations waging gorilla wars against the US. Oh wait...
I was being sarcastic, but I'll bite...
How can we claim the moral high ground if we don't follow the Geneva conventions?
If we're not bound by the Geneva conventions, then why arent Afghanistan and Iraq Neutron-Bombed already?
"The military is reluctant to talk about the use of Silly String, saying that discussing specific tactics will tip off insurgents."
It isn't the soldiers fault they're fighting a pointless war that their leaders forced them into.
Sure it is. They could always stand up against those politicians who are sending them over there.
Would that then make silly string an IIEDDD?
improvised improvised explosive device detection device
Umm. Not to editorialize but... How do terrorists "meat" us in the meadow? Sounds, uh, like something we don't want them to do.
I'm glad to see something I have always considered to be completely useless and extremely annoying at the office come to such constructive use. Way to go American ingenuity!
So could you, should you be a citizen of the United States.
Except in military usage, it wouldn't be called "silly". (This, besides being pejorative and politically incorrect, might infringe upon trademark.)
Expect instead "long-chained nontoxic polycarbon semi-liquid fast drying compound."
Also, some of your information seems to be missing. Accounting forwarded the following rejection notice:
Please supply
Department
Cost Code
Category type
Expected use rates for prepaid asset scheduling
Routing number
Authorized sign-off official
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
Osama don't surf.
Also, soldiers put condoms and rubber bands around their rifle muzzles to keep out sand.
That particular trick dates back to world war 2.I think there was a 60 Minutes story on this back about a year ago, but you'd think I could find it? The following link should be good enough.
Called the Cooper Sling. Kind of interesting. At the time of the story, the military was apparently "still investigating" how well it worked, even soldiers were already buying them themselves.
Sure, just like the "conscripts" in the Napoleonian wars volunteered. Face it, when you have a "choice" between poverty/joblessness and the army, you "choose" the army. This doesn't make you a moron. It is unfortunately a sensible "choice..."
They volunteered to serve the United States and to defend the country, a very honorable thing to do. However, their leader, the commander in chief aka the president, let them down. He led them astray believing that they were protecting american by getting rid of "WMD's" when the real reason they were sent to Iraq is to secure US oil interests in the middle east.
I got nothin'
And if the officers sent in a requisition, and someone pushed it through, I can see the headlines:
Pentagon spends millions on children's toys
Military awards no-bid contract for toys
Millions of cans of toys bought, unable to track
Military fails to provide tools to troops, uses toys instead
You are 100% right about the edge of irregulars being able to use whatever works. However, clearly our troops are just as smart and figured out how to improvise, and away go the cans of silly string. So it's being done voluntarily by people on the home front, so what, that just makes them wonderful patriots. What is with the statist notion that it is only okay if it goes through taxes and government procurement.
The biggest problem is that we have two generations of reporters that believe their job is to undermine the government, and that that is an example of freedom of the press.
Take the body armor issue... Our troops have some older body armor, and there is a dispute as to which ones to replace. If the government replaced EVERYTHING, we'd be screaming about waste from throwing out our perfectly good 2 year old body armor that we spent billions on. In addition, the guys in the cities don't want the bulkier armor, and were refusing to wear it, so the Pentagon, sick of the bad PR, REQUIRED the use, even for units that didn't want it.
The anti-government press goes beyond reporting problems so that they can be fixed, and tries to play gotcha with our government. So government officials play CYA, instead of doing the right thing. It's a HORRIBLE mess, and it will take more than an emergency requisition of silly string to fix it.
And they probably call Band-Aids(TM) adhesive bandages and refer to Ping Pong(TM) as table tennis. What a bunch of idiots!
Avoid Missing Ball for High Score
Do you have any idea what you say. How exactly do you think the muslims behave ? Fortunately, the quran provides prescribed behavior for soldiers in these cases. So we only have to behave better than islamic terrorists' behavior, described in the quran. That would mean behaving better than :
... repeat ... (for an illustration on video of this ... there ARE videos of the armenian genocide)
1. raiding entire villages with superior power killing everyone and anyone we find until the street goes quiet
2. collect all remaining adult (older than 8 or so) men, have them dig their own grave in the center of the town, then shoot them, make the survivors close the graves and dig another trench
3. distribute all surviving women among the soldiers (double the allotment of a normal soldier to any commander that commands more than 10 people) to use "any way they see fit"
4. leave the raped women and children to die in the desert if the soldiers doesn't marry them, then occupy their houses and shoot any that dare return (which is VERY unlikely to happen because of the desert sun)
See "khaybar" in the quran.
I think we can manage to behave a LOT better than the islamists by killing anyone that even raises a finger to the soldiers without thinking twice and we'd STILL have the moral high ground.
Actually if you were to look at history, you'd find that it would definitely stop them quite quickly. Illustrations abound, even in recent history, even in the last few months.
See "somalia" and what's happening over there.
Avoid Missing Ball for High Score
How can we claim the moral high ground if we don't follow the Geneva conventions?
If we're not bound by the Geneva conventions, then why arent Afghanistan and Iraq Neutron-Bombed already? Because that would be counter-productive in the long run. The factions the US is fighting want to demonize the US in the eyes of the local populace. If the US glasses a couple middle east nations, it would simply strengthen extremist support.
Not to mention the response that the global community would have to such an act.
The war isn't about cheap oil. The war in Iraq is about (among other things) access to oil. It's contradictory to the interests of western oil companies for oil to be cheap.
And, yes, you are overly sensitive. Most issues are serious to one person or another. You may find one issue amusing, but others will not and vice versa.
...was the scene in Shelob's Lair from the LOTR movies. Seriously.
I wonder, could we make something akin to "Silly String" that could fire huge globs of a gooey, rubbery, net-like substance that could be used to immobilize people?
I figure, if anybody out there knows, or has tried this, they're probably on Slashdot...
I disagree. Lowering yourself to the worst level of the enemy is hardly a way to create a stable long term solution. Sure you may get a temporary decline in fighting if you massacred everyone in sight, but you create more seething hatred towards you. It is only a matter of time before that comes and bites you in the ass.
Also actions like that have an effect on how well you can conduct diplomacy. For example why should some other country accept that it is wrong to torture and butcher civilians if that what you are doing?
Don't know why this triggered. :) But it recalls me back to more devious dungeon masters who built traps so that when you found it you were basically screwed.
Things like using 10 foot poles to trigger traps which have been set 10 feet back from where the trigger is.
In this case I can see the tripwires changing. Rather then catgut (fishing line) have a weaker string that reacts to the chemicals in silly string so when its sprayed the bomb goes off.
It had to be said... :-)
"Not an actor, but he plays one on TV."
I like that idea better.
With silly string you leave a trail that you were there, plus some slight noise.
With cotton string there is no evidence, and it is quieter.
I see. If you truly believe the statement you just made, please explain why Japan is a stable nation-state with no obvious animosity towards the US (quite the reverse) these days.
Why will "they" not torture and butcher civilians ? Quite simply because "they" will no longer be in power, and reasonable people will have taken their place, SLOWLY (as in over 20-30-40 years) taking over the function of the occupying force. As happened in Japan and Germany.
So simply put. Why will "they" believe it is wrong to butcher civilians ? Because they BELIEVE it is wrong to butcher civilians. The islamists, the muslims, do not believe it is wrong to butcher civilians (as evidenced a hundred times over by stuff like 9/11 and dozens of other incidents), so they NEED to be replaced. Allowing hundreds of thousands of people to die, as america has done in iraq, because americans are afraid to kill a single innocent is madness, and completely immoral.
> When talking about risks and countermeasures, it pays to be specific.
So, when talking to a bunch of slashdotters, the extra detail implied by the acronym 'IED' vs 'booby-trap' (or even just 'trap') has some kind of pay-off?
Like, some slashdotter out there may die trying to detect trip wires on a non-IED bobby-trap in his back yard?
Seriously, unnecessary precision in your speach can cause more confusion than it resolves.
It should be noted that protection of foreign economic interests of the United States is a valid, publicly acknowledged function of the US Armed Forces. Defending US citizens from attack is not their only function.
I am a geek attorney, but not your geek attorney unless you've already retained me. This is not legal advice.
OK, so someone modded me as troll. I am not trying to troll - I'm just pointing out that if you are going to join the military, you should at least have some kind of realistic idea as to what you are signing up for. If someone signed up because they wanted to be in a war, that's fine. That's what they got.
I'm not saying I wouldn't be willing to volunteer to join the military under the right circumstances. If I was around during WW II, I probably would have enlisted because the war was a just cause and the leadership (at least most of the leadership) wanted to really win the war. That isn't what is happening in Iraq. The US doesn't have a strategy to win the war and the smartest people around aren't sure how to even go about winning the war.
So, unfortunately, our soldiers are just there to be targets for the insurgents. I don't see how that benefits anyone. The only question is, like in vietnam, how long are we going to stay there until we finally admit that we can't win and we leave and let whatever happens happen.
Avoid Missing Ball for High Score
Marcelle Shriver said that since the string comes in an aerosol can, it is considered a hazardous material, meaning the Postal Service will not ship it by air. But a private pilot who heard about her campaign has agreed to fly the cans to Kuwait _ most likely in January _ where they will then be taken to Iraq.
Que Deus te de em dobro o que me desejas
[May God give you double that which you wish for me]
For some reason, I just pictured a girl with gigantic tits jumping up and down on a trampoline followed immediately by Admiral Akbar yelling "it's a trap!"
fun times.
So, ehh.. Can we infer that Booby Traps are trademarked?
If J.K.R wrote Windows: Puteulanus fenestra mortalis!
Also I don't think someone who makes such ludicrous (and dangerous) generalizations as: The islamists, the muslims, do not believe it is wrong to butcher civilians (as evidenced a hundred times over by stuff like 9/11 and dozens of other incidents), so they NEED to be replaced is in a position to make a rational argument.
Or smart enough. A lot of schools will give you money just for having a high enough GPA in high school or a high enough score on the ACT/SAT. Hell, most state funded schools will give you a hefty scholarship for being valedictorian or salutatorian of your graduating high school class. You don't need to be rich or have federal aid to get into a good school, and not all good schools are ridiculously expensive.
Everything I say is a lie. Except that... and that... and that, and that, and that, and that... and that.
Using every day objects and the sort is pretty commonplace on the battlefield. Back during the Napoleanic war soldiers used to piss down the barrels of their guns to clean them out. In World war I, allied soldiers brought bathtubs with them into the trenches, and would launch them with catapults into the enemy trenches. The Germans and Turks had developed completely different bathtubs at the time, and were terrified of the Allied tubs. This always led to a horrendous panic in the German trenches, which would almost always be followed by a push across no mans land by the allies. It's said that the Dardanelles could have been taken, had Churchill been provided with adequate bathtubs. During World War II allied soldiers brought white makeup along with them so if they ever got caught they'd paint themselves up like mimes. When the Germans tried to question them and saw the white makeup they just let them go, knowing that there'd be absolutely no way they could get a mime to talk. Then during the Korean war soldiers made good use of old coffee grounds. Since the North Koreans knew soldiers always drank a lot of coffee, if they found old coffee grounds they assumed there was a base near by and retreat. In the first Iraq war American soldiers used to bring soccer balls along with them. At the outbreak of the war almost all of Iraq's soccer balls were destroyed in a freak smoke stack toppeling. When ever the Americans got in a serious fire fight, they'd just lob their soccer ball into the frey and all the enemy soldiers would just stop and try to get it, which usually ended quite badly for the enemy. Unfortunatley Iraq was able to build up a tremendous stock pile of soccer balls since the first war, so the strategy doesn't work any more.
It's quite remarkible how such common things can prove to be so useful. I think it's overall a great testimant to human ingenuity in time of war.
I don't own a snook, and if I did I wouldn't leave it cocked.
I suppose IED is safer to use here, because for most slashdotters, the B-word resolves to a null-pointer. We don't want slashdotters dumping core because of an access violation.
If J.K.R wrote Windows: Puteulanus fenestra mortalis!
A year ago (November 2005) there was a flurry of military silly string articles (LifeHacker, Schneier, others) all leading back to a cockeyed.com article, which quoted a soldier saying they used it for locating tripwires. The site didn't leave the content up for long, but it's preserved at the Internet Archive.
Thanks for your utterly unhelpful commentary. You could say the same thing about the 9/11 hijackers too ya know =D
Actually the pope has made multiple statements opposing the war in Iraq, and has been generally a voice for peace in recent history. In fact, many Catholic organizations, such as the Catholic Workers have actively opposed US wars.
Yet it is still a choice. I'm as proud as hell for our boys over there, and am thankful that they made the choice to do so (regardless of the circumstances surrounding said choice).
Your metaphor between Napoleon and Bush is interesting though... I'll have to think more about that!
It was professional killers that created the country that allows you to say stupid stuff. So don't get to high brow, slick.
And it doesn't matter what country tyour in, that holds true.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
I believe the best solution would be human-like robots driving Humvees. The bombers won't be able to tell them from the real thing, and the cool part is that after the Humvee is blown up, the robot can calmly climb out of the wreckage, detect the heartbeat of the insurgent hiding in the bushes 50 meters away, and go rip him to shreds.
If that's not technically feasible yet, they can at least stick an insurgent prisoner in the back seat of every vehicle in the convoy, or maybe tied to the roof where he's nice and visible. They blow up a vehicle, they'll know they're taking out one of their own in the process.
it's = "it is"; its = possessive. E.g., it's flapping its wings.
"But then he could just cast an anti-anti love spell spell... spell"
Cunt Caps?
When we were first given our hats, the TI says "These used to be called cunt caps. You are not allowed to use that term."
It never would have occured to me to call it that, but afer he said that, "cunt cap" is the first thing that pops into my head.
That was 22 years ago, hopefully that has changed.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Maybe they can do aerial dispersion over a large area to show up trip mines. The military could pay for R&D of a silly string bomb or artillery shell.
Prov 9:8 Do not rebuke mockers or they will hate you; rebuke the wise and they will love you.
While I debate the reasoning you put forth here (pretty much the whole world's intelligence thought that he had WMD's hidden or was making them)....securing oil interests is NOT the worst thing in the world.
I was listening to a recent George Carlin rant....about being scared at what would happen if the electricity suddenly went out. Never mind the darkness...just what about all the prisons opening up...and all those guys coming out looking for 'entertainment'....etc. I can't find a good link to it now, but, it was recently broadcast on HBO. It sure gave me a nightmare scenario as to what would happen if our energy in the US were to be cut off. Talk about a societal meltdown....
Sure...I know it sounds bad about fighting wars for oil, etc....but, if they didn't and the oil gets cut off, think real hard about what state your life would go to then.
Food for thought....
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
"(pretty much the whole world's intelligence thought that he had WMD's hidden or was making them)."
thats not true, and many countries doubted out intellegence. AS it turned out our intelligence didn't think there were in WMDs as well.
Remember France? should we be sending them a public apology?
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Note to soldiers: You can stick a needle in the nozzle of a can of shaving cream, use a lighter to melt and form the nozzle around the needle, and then remove the needle to have a higher volume, much cheaper form of silly string. I think this would work just as well to detect tripwires.
So we spent a half-trillion dollars and what looks like a half-trillion more to totally fail to secure our oil interests in a nation that has only a few billion dollars in oil exports a year.
Play Command HQ online
Playtex(tm)
Trust neocon apologists to bring you the latest in retroactive justification for the Iraq war. The United States didn't have any economic interests in Iraq to protect. Were we going in to protect our economic interests in Israel? Are they safer now?
There are no trails. There are no trees out here.
Links to news reports that back that statement up? From before the US invaded Iraq??
And they probably call Band-Aids(TM) adhesive bandages and refer to Ping Pong(TM) as table tennis. What a bunch of idiots!
Well, since they (the gov't) granted the use of those trademarks, why shouldn't they use them? Or maybe take them away, if there's any complaints.
Avoid Missing Ball for High Score
Hate to tell you this, but..
They are forcing Navy & Air Farce types into combat positions, due to the shortage of Army & Marine types.
Which means I have started talking up the Coast Guard to my son, even though they are being forced to do things just as immoral as the other services, just less dangerous.
Ah, well. He may decide to go to college. or Canada.
Note: As a Service Connected Disabled Vet, I feel I have an obligation to comment on this.
Why, yes, I AM a Pagan Libertarian.
I hate to be a cliche, but one of the reasons I joined (in addition to it being a family tradition) was to defend your right to have that opinion. Which, by the way, I agree with: The Draft is unconstitutional, and I would have, I think, gone to jail (well, canada actually) if drafted.
Why, yes, I AM a Pagan Libertarian.
... and send over some Twister
tone
If Iraq was the only source of oil in the world then I *might* accept that argument as valid. However, this isn't even close to being true, and, anyway, we don't need to be using as much oil as we're using today. If we'd all drive cars that are, say, 50% more efficient than today, live in homes that utilize passive solar heat, reform ancient zoning regulations so that stores don't have to be 10 miles away from homes, and build more nuclear and renewable power plants, we'd reduce oil consumption a lot.
-b.
I'd say anyone going to Iraq is equipped with a Slinky and some Super Balls
tone
If that were the real reason, the US could've just made a sweetheart deal with Saddam Hussein the way the French did, and saved a lot of trouble.
Part of the hardcore faithful who believed in Apple long before it was cool again to do so
For what it's worth, The maker of the Silly String brand, Just for Kicks Inc. is in Watertown, N.Y., about a 10 minute drive from Fort Drum, home of the 10th Mountain Division. http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/agency/army /10mtn.htm
http://www.drum.army.mil/sites/about/hist-10mtn.as p
And, no, we should not have invaded Iraq. We knew it then, we know it now.
If she is so motivated, perhaps a better use of her time is to organize a political group to put pressure on her representatives and bring the troops home...but that wouldnt' make the news now would it.
Avoid Missing Ball for High Score
As it turned out there WERE WMD's. Granted, the news about WMD's came across as a joke and almost everyone shrugged it off as nothing, but THERE WERE WMD's.
Although reporters made light of the "weapons of minor dicomfort", there remains the fact that Saddam had these weapons all along. They were in his possession since the time they were deadly.
Now tell me what technology we have that can identify the difference between a weapon of mass destruction and a "weapon of minor discomfort" at range (not to mention without knowing where they're at) and I'll hop on board calling Bush a liar and a murderer like the morally superior left does.
I was against the invasion of Iraq from the start. But not because I did not think there were WMDs, or because the UN was against it, or because I thought Saddam was an ok guy, or any of the other reasons mentioned. But now that we're there I am against just pulling out. Because a failure in Iraq would be (will be) devistating to the US. We will be visibly weak to our enemies and our words will be empty and without power, unable to enforce threats we make against those who threaten us.
US beaten by little old Iraq. Think of it.
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
No. Just because many people and their nations have done so since the dawn of civilization does not make it a valid move (bandwagon.)
The "protection" of economic interests fuel and even are the underlying causes for a great many wars and covert acts all over the world (gaining a lock on mutually exclusive resources.)
Allowing nations to perceive it as a VALID means to their ends will allow them to continue excusing it and perpetuating such actions in the world. (Before you say "welcome to the real world," think about the same reasoning on a smaller local scale in a "civilized" community vs an "uncivilized" community.)
Iraq is about Oil Dollars and finally Americans are figuring that out (well, just the oil part.) Its a complete failure because we are not getting the oil and we are losing oil dollars. We are keeping the large war machine employed; however, its at the gamble of destroying the economy. Four large military bases in Iraq will probably not secure economic interests either (remember, the same people wrote the plan in the 90s-- the few experts I've met said they knew this underlying stuff was wrong decades ago. Wrong for long term empire and wrong ethically.)
Democracy Now! - uncensored, anti-establishment news
It benefits alot of folks. Defense contractors, the banking/investment industry, oil companies, independent civilian contractors (logistics, procurement, transportation, etc..)
Ita erat quando hic adveni.
I hope you aren't offended by my asking, but defend [civil rights] against whom? Unless you are old enough to have served in WW II, no one has bothered to attack the US in a serious way. And by serious, I mean take over our country by force. Terrorist attacks are not an attempt to take over our country by force.
If you really want to protect people's rights, perhaps you should have become a lawyer for the ACLU or the EFF.
I might be willing to fight to preserve american freedoms, but it is another thing entirely to die in Somalia in an attempt to distribute food aid or in Iraq for reasons that are not clear to me.
In my opinion, terrorism is not that big of a threat to the survival of our country. I think it is mostly a pain in the ass for the average person (i.e. TSA security) and a tragedy for those directly affected. I think that the folks who took down the fourth plane were heroes. But more importantly, they proved that such an attack was a one-shot deal. Terrorists might be able to crash an airplane or blow up an airplane, but no group of americans will ever let them fly the airplane again.
Terrorism may be done for a variety of reasons. Plain hatred. Revenge. To try to get attention for a cause. Sure, we need to fight terrorism, but we need to do it intelligently.
Some people say we are in Iraq to create democracy in the Islamic middle east. This is, in my opinion, about as futile as trying to teach a pig to sing.
Some people say we are there to get oil. Since oil production is actually down from where it was to begin with, I think that has not panned out. If we wanted more oil production in Iraq, that could have been achieved by simply lifting sanctions on the Iraqi regieme in exchange for a deal to send oil companies there to improve the infrastructure for oil production. Also, doing this would have helped the average Iraqi a lot more than invading iraq.
Some people think we are there because the regieme had weapons of mass destruction. The inspectors in Iraq were saying that was not the case well before the war started.
Some people think we are there because of a personal vendetta that Bush II had against Sadaam Hussein for trying to assasinate Bush I. This argument actually has some merit because Bush II cited it as a reason for the war. In my opinion, this is a very shabby reason to take a nation to war even if the assassination had succeeded.
Some people think we are there simply so that lucrative contracts can be given to cronies of the administration. While this argument may actually have some merit, it is not generally cited as a reason for the war by opponents to the war because people will think that anyone who says this is a "hater" and "conspiracy theorist". Note that name calling is not a serious refutation of an argument.
I'm totally willing to listen to other explanations.
Avoid Missing Ball for High Score
the reason they don't use it is because it can block the breathing passages, and thereby kill
so it's a great idea, and the technology exists, and has already been tested... except for that one catch
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
the president, let them down. He led them astray believing that they were protecting american by getting rid of "WMD's" when the real reason they were sent to Iraq is to secure US oil interests in the middle east.
Why do you have such a selective memory? Kerry, Clinton, Clinton, Schumer, Kennedy, Pelosi - all of 'em were quite happy to talk about Saddam's WMDs, and yet now you and they are pretending all that never happened. Here, read this on snopes: Words of Mass Destruction on Snopes
The snopes article shows cites for these quotes, and then goes on to expand them with the context of the comments. Short version, a bunch of Democrats agreed with Bush into 2003 at least, and now are pretending it was all his idea.
So, were they lying then when they said there were WMDs, or are they lying now when they say it was all Bush's idea, or both?
Ok, which one of you jokers modded the parent post as Informative!
For some reason, I just pictured a girl with gigantic tits jumping up and down on a trampoline followed immediately by Admiral Akbar yelling "it's a trap!"
I find your ideas intriguing and would like to subscribe to your newsletter.
... optical bomb triggers. If the silly string doesn't break the beam and detonate the bomb, the soldier walking into the "safe" room will.
Oh, and "itsatrap."
If they have a point of contact at an Eastern airlift base like McGuire or Dover, they could easily take the items to a terminal, have them inspected, and ship them to the theater.
Doing stuff like this is just a matter of asking the right people.
"This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
Flame throwers are legal weapons under the Geneva Conventions. Their only restriction is use against civilians and civilian objects.
Note to self: No more arguing with the faithful.
good on em! its the sole reason i dont join any military, because while balisitcs are cool, killing people isnt :/ so much pain, anguish, and suffering from it. I dont want to ever be put in a position where I would have to bring that upon someone.
You are a bigot.
Sorry, but if that isn't a racist comment, I don't know what is.
I'm not offended.
I joined in 1987, to fight the godless communists. Apparently, this event was enough to push them over the edge, resulting in the fall of their Evil Empire(tm 2006 microsoft).
I was injured during GW1, and got out about the same time it was mainly over. I still think GW1 was righteous, even if it was caused by Bush Sr. giving a wink and a nod to Iraq; that information didn't come out until after the shooting was over.
I don't think I would have participated in GW2; I never thought that Iraq had anything to do.... well, with anything. I would have been OK with going to Afghanistan, if for no other reason than that the Taliban were assholes and were destroying ancient works of art.
If GW2 is still ongoing when my son turns 18 in a couple of years, I'm probably going to look into moving the family to Canada.
Why, yes, I AM a Pagan Libertarian.
Um, no. There weren't.
A few desparate neocons have tried to make something out of hazardous trash left over from pre-1991 weapons programs.
We've already failed in Iraq. The question is whether or not we go on failing, magnifying our losses, or cut them short.
In the game of Go, there is a situation known as a "ladder", or "shi cho", where in trying to protect one stone, a player lays down stone after stone trying to outflank the opponent, only to lose them all when he runs out of room. A wise player knows to let the doomed stone go.
Great Britian beaten by it's little old colonies, and then again by the new United States. Rome beaten by a bunch of barbarians. U.S. beaten by little old Vietnam. U.S.S.R. beaten by little of Afghanistan. There's nothing unique in a world power being beaten by a "weaker" but more motivated force.
Empires fall. The sooner the American Empire falls, the sooner the U.S. can get back to being a great nation, rather than a lousy empire.
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
You cannot wash away blood with blood
You're a kneejerking fool who doesn't know what a racist comment is, but at least you're honest.
And how much of the U.S. electrical supply is generated by oil? Just about none.
Oil is vital to transportation, because we've made incredibly fscking stupid decisions about our transportation infrastructure, and some of us need it for heating (though here too biodiesel holds promise, and grants and tax credits for ground source heat pumps would take away most of that need). But oil has nothing to do with keeping the lights on.
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
You cannot wash away blood with blood
Sounds like a load of bullshit to me. Corporatism in America and abroad at its finest in my not-so-very-humble opinion.
If anyone seriously things that our soldiers are only there to benefit these "money making" persons and companies, they need to do a reality check and look at the whole picture.
Take a step back from it all and check out what we are REALLY doing in Iraq for a minute. But then, what the hell do I know... I'm on /.
"The reverse side also has a reverse side." - Japanese Proverb
Yes, they were pre-1991 stocks (that Saddam was not supposed to have after 1991) and they were weapons of mass destruction. The DoD quote from your thinkprogressive.org link says that these were "not the WMD's for which this country went to war." Notice how that implies that they were, yet, WMD's? Not the ones we were looking for, but WMD's none-the-less.
We haven't failed in Iraq. Our current offensive is failing but we have not yet failed. But the way things are going, with the majority of Americans complaining about the war instead of supporting it, we aren't far from failure.
There's nothing unique in a world power being beaten by a "weaker" but more motivated force.
We live in a different world than England did then. The capacity with which wars may be waged across continents and oceans adds the danger that enemies, keen on our apparent weakness, will be able to swiftly and effectively attack us. And we have an enemy that has no desire but to kill us all. Not to defend or to dominate, but destroy. They are encouraged and their ranks surge with every victory.
And calling the US has or is an empire is nonsense. But we could use to stop being the world's police.
You are a bigot.
Sorry, but if that isn't a racist comment, I don't know what is.
With regards to Islam, yes, I am a bigot. Proud to be one. However, you make one mistake. Islam isn't a race. So, it isn't a racist comment.Avoid Missing Ball for High Score
Avoid Missing Ball for High Score
You're right. According to the reasons that are immediately intuitively obvious to the average citizen, it makes no sense. However, according to the President's openly published plan for strategic defense, which is just a contemporary revision of the PNAC's (see below) manifesto, it's to take over the world.
Iraq is one of a series of strategically necessary American outposts in the imperialistic quest to turn the world into an American-controlled nanny state. That's just the officially stated position, and only the plan yet to date. The American government's increasingly imperialistic tendencies interpret the fall of competing superpowers as a power vacuum which needs to be immediately filled. In other words, they deny the need for there to be *no* superpowers and for the world to steadily continue to disarm and demilitarize, at least to a point. The military/industrial complex warned about by General Eisenhower absolutely must fill the only purpose it's designed to do. It no longer sees a clear and present enemy, so it must redefine the enemy as being the very unknown, it must redefine 'war' to be 'peace', it must redefine 'imperialism' as 'patriotism', and it must escalate militarization indefinitely at absolutely all costs.
When all you have is a hammer -- and the abject, narcissistic, paranoid, tautological corruption inherent in power -- then the whole world looks like a nail -- a very big and scary nail just waiting to stab you from the unknown, and must be struck before it strikes you.
Also see the Project for the New American Century (PNAC), the prevailing Republican think tank, for the contemporary origins of the American imperialistic mentality. PNAC's ideology has taken hold since at least 1992 and its chief demagogues now comprise virtually all positions of American power. They have no personal experience in war; they are merely in love with the *idea* of war as a means to all ends. They are tautology, personified -- they believe that what they do is right, and it's right because they do it. GWB is not in charge of all this; he's just the chief executive demagogue and possibly the fall guy. Why do they do all of this? Ultimately, it is because they can.
Many Americans voted for the PNAC explicitly in the voting booths to the point where the PNAC was handily able to coopt the rest of the election process, and almost all Americans vote implicitly for it every day with their insatiable consumption and disposal of natural resources. See the various articles in site in the above url for PNAC citations. They're not copmrised of conspiracy theories or anti-government propaganda -- their citations come from the organization's own publications, and from the nightly news.
Let's see how far the empire can be bankrolled and tolerated. Let's see how long the economy based squarely upon unlimited cheap oil and skyrocketing housing speculation will last. Let's see how many countries' resources amd strategic positions can be invaded and indefinitely occupied and how long the American public will tolerate being the next Rome. Let's see who can defend the public against the American government after its compulsory public education system, mass media propaganda, and devious credit industry have already euthenized, lobotomized, and indebted the public itself. Let's see how many citizens can be unconstitutionally detained for the crime of hypermilitarized, paranoid suspicion. All of these institutions are too corrupt to be patched, and must be overhauled by We, The People in a hopefully bloodless revolution -- the hopefully final chapter in the American Revolution, the revolution against domestic threat.
In my opinion, American patriots need to be either loaded for bear, or ready to expatriate. *Please* correct me if there is a *clear* and *present* alternative.
Although I admire the philanthropic efforts of this proud mother, it's a pretty futile effort. Currently the general lifespan of a particular device's techniques is about 2-6 months. About a year ago, the IEDs were remote detonated, so the Army/Air Force used radio scramblers to stop them. Then the enemy changed to where the device was tripped when a certain frequency was scrambled. Same goes with a lot of other techniques. By the time she collects enough and sends them, the majority of the trip-wire devices will probably be replaced. The enemy is great at adapting and keeping up with the detection tactics used by the coalition troops. The problem with keeping a good public image for the military is we have to let the public know about what we're doing, but it tends to hurt us on the front lines.
-Bob
Jammers and mine detonation tools as you describe are in use, but they don't do anything against command-detonated bombs that are controlled by wire, or against VBIEDs (car/truck bombs).
People make cheap detonators and are hard to jam if you don't see them first.
"This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
We were freed by the hessians? Or were they on a different team, I can't quite recall.
Please. Colonists were not professionals, they were angry people who had guns. Professional soldiers lined up to fight (like the Brits), which unfortunately for them did not prove advantageous.
And as long as we're talking... it would be "too" you're looking for, not "to."
Heil mein Fuehrer!
Relax I just want some peanuts.
Actually...we've beaten ourselves. We no longer seem to fight a war "all out". We get in there pretty quick..then, start slowing up and trying to win the minds and hearts shit.
The way you win a war...go full out, with overwhelming forces...blow everything to hell that moves, and when the people that are left waive the flag and completely surrender....then, you sign treaties...and in the case of the US in the past (think Japan), we rebuild them.
But, we didn't go into the Iraq thing full blast until it was over.
No...we don't fight a war like we used to...and we're losing because of that.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
A WMD must be, by defintion, capable of mass destruction. The chemical agents Iraq produced had a limited "shelf life" - about 5 years. Anything left over from before 1991 was past its sell-by date by 1996.
The Iraq Survey Group concluded: "While a small number of old, abandoned chemical munitions have been discovered, ISG judges that Iraq unilaterally destroyed its undeclared chemical weapons stockpile in 1991. There are no credible indications that Baghdad resumed production of chemical munitions thereafter, a policy ISG attributes to Baghdad's desire to see sanctions lifted, or rendered ineffectual, or its fear of force against it should WMD be discovered."
What Iraq had, had the same relation to WMD as the gooey melted mess in the back of my fridge has to a head of lettuce.
BS. The invasion is a failure. We have not achieved any of the (constantly changing) goals cited by the administration. We did not stop or harm Al Qaeda by invading Iraq, in fact we've helped them, giving them great recruiting motivation. We didn't eliminate a threat posed by Saddam Hussein to other nations, because there wasn't one.
As for the idea of creating a stable democracy in Iraq via an invasion, that was doomed from the start. Like trying to scuplt a bust of Pallas with machine-gun fire, it's simply the wrong technique for the job. And redoubling your efforts only makes more of a mess, and makes it unlikely that there's enough left to work with if you did stop and try to do it right.
That the majority of Americans are finally realizing that they've been had is not the reason these goals can't be achived; the reason that the majority of Americans are realizing that they've been had is because these goals can't be achived.
The only nations capable of waging effective war against the U.S. are the nuclear powers. (Neither Al Qaeda, not the insurgents in Iraq, are a "nation", and our conflict with them is not a "war", not a conflict between states or putative states.)
Terrorist groups can hurt us, sure, especially with the possibility of one of them getting a WMD, but no military victory is going to change the motivation of a terroist group.
In September of 2001, everyone knew that we had the world's most powerful military. It didn't help.
Their ranks surge with every innocent killed by Americans. Hell, their ranks surge with every insurgent killed by Americans, since in the eyes of many the insurgents are valiently and rightously defending their home against brutal invaders.
You can't put out a fire by pouring gasoline on it; and when gasoline fails as a fire extinguisher, it is not smart to say, "Oh, we obviously didn't use enough! Pour on more, that's sure to do the trick!"
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
You cannot wash away blood with blood
You guys know that most IED on the road are trigger by radio or cell signal. It might be useful in an indoor area, however most traps are trigger when the door is open or by remote control from a spotter outside the house.
The might story might give you a warm and fuzzy feeling but it is much more complicated then it sound. Realities is different from the movies.
How appropriate.
Sounds good at first, but you have to take a few things into consideration. One, Iraq is full of random trash everywhere. It's going to be difficult to detect bomb-detonating-copper/whatever in all that garbage. Two - electrical detonation is only one way of doing it - another way is a non-electric system like our military uses involving det cord or shock tube (which could be detectable too I suppose, but just pointing it out). Lastly, a lot of IEDs are so big you'd need to detect them from so far away it wouldn't be practical/possible.
Combat positions? You're joking, right? No - I'm not about to joke about the AF/Navy and combat, because there are a lot of guys in both who do some pretty crazy completely-combat-oriented jobs. However, the only way you're going to get in a combat-oriented job with the Navy and Air Force is if you sign up for it. They aren't going to take Joe who enlisted as an aircraft engine mechanic and send him with an Infantry unit into combat or something crazy like that. Do all of the services want more combat jobs filled up? Of course they do - they're generally the hardest to fill even in peace time. The thing is, the only way you're going to see real combat in the Navy or Air Force is if you sign up for their special forces type units (pararescue, combat controller, SEAL, etc). Show me some examples of people who signed up to be mechanics and whatnot getting sent to combat units.
It is no joke; here are some links; you have to read between the lines a little.s _2_5/ai_n16057511o n.asp
/ 20060922.aspx
http://www.af.mil/news/story.asp?id=123011448
http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0IBW/i
http://www.afa.org/magazine/July2005/0705expediti
and for Navy types:
http://www.strategypage.com/htmw/htmoral/articles
One of my best friends sons is Air Force, and is doing convoy escort, guarding prisoners, and he didn't volunteer for it; he is a Radar Technician.
The FACT is is that while the combat services are claiming that there is no shortage, it is a very far thing from the truth.
Why, yes, I AM a Pagan Libertarian.
Anonymous coward... how appropriate.
I never said I had a Purple Heart, Do I know you?
Why, yes, I AM a Pagan Libertarian.
You know, I'll concede to you the fact the military is screwed up. I signed up to be Infantry, and I've spent more time picking up leaves than training (however - I have done plenty of that too). The only thing these articles tell me is that you might have to fight back if attacked. Come on, isn't that common sense? The Air Force articles main emphasis is the Security Forces/Force Protection job anyway - one where you can expect to be guarding convoys and what-not. The Navy article doesn't specify what jobs the guys have. I think in the end it depends on what you call 'combat'. Granted, if you have to fight back in defense it is technically 'combat', but that's a far cry from the job combat arms jobs are doing. We need everyone, but seriously... When we're talking about combat, I thought you were talking about kicking in doors and doing raids and what-not. I have yet to talk to a radar technician who ever had to clear a room or take an active role in any sort of offensive operation. Is shooting back when someone tries to blow you up 'immoral'?