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Pakistan Used Google Earth For Military Targeting

NeoBeans writes "According to this article in the New York Times about the recent 'improvements' in military strikes by the Pakistani military it is revealed that they have dropped Google Earth as part of their target planning for a more precise technology. From the article, '... the air force has shifted from using Google Earth to more sophisticated images from spy planes and other surveillance aircraft, and has increased its use of laser-guided bombs. And no, you can't really find Osama Bin Laden using Google Maps either."

17 of 111 comments (clear)

  1. Google needs to improve their product by R4nm4-kun · · Score: 5, Funny

    I guess this is one unsatisfied customer.

    1. Re:Google needs to improve their product by recoiledsnake · · Score: 4, Funny

      They should've just tried to set the evil bit.

      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evil_bit

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  2. everyone's doing it. by gandhi_2 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    When I was in Ramadi (mid 05 to mid 06), all the local insurgent groups and out-of-town AQI used google earth for rocket and mortar attacks. Crazy, when "poor man's sat imagery" is almost as good as the rich man's. Luckily, GE images are often out of date....and insurgents fire rockets with an Insha'Allah kind-of mentality.

    1. Re:everyone's doing it. by mdm-adph · · Score: 5, Funny

      His nick is "Gandhi," not bloody "Rambo," you moron.

      --
      It is by my will alone my thoughts acquire motion; it is by the juice of the coffee bean that the thoughts acquire speed
    2. Re:everyone's doing it. by dkleinsc · · Score: 4, Funny

      Come on, man. Haven't you seen the Gandhi 2 trailer?

      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QfvLcozLwtE

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      I am officially gone from /. Long live http://www.soylentnews.com/
  3. What did they drop Google Earth for? by Monkeedude1212 · · Score: 5, Funny

    Microsoft Encarta Atlas 97?

    1. Re:What did they drop Google Earth for? by TheRaven64 · · Score: 4, Funny

      OpenStreetMap! Targeting information wants to be free!

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      I am TheRaven on Soylent News
  4. Its only a matter of time. by hombrejava · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Satellites are becoming smaller and cheaper because of advances in miniature high-performance computers, solar panels, batteries, and increased launch capabilities due to standardization. CubeSats are one example. People can put small, but high-resolution cameras into space, and if you can launch 100 pico-satellites with cameras then your going to get near real-time imagery of many places on the earth. Its only a matter of time until even the poorest third-world country gets its own fleet of spy satellites.

  5. Re:weapons of war is not consider evil? by Shatrat · · Score: 4, Insightful

    If I was to use an android phone to call you up and tell you not to be such a $%^&ing moron, would that be another example of google being evil?

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  6. Re:Pakistani citizen by recoiledsnake · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The problem is, unlike you lucky folks with you spy satellites, we have to rely on such open techs as Google Earth. If only you guys would share the info and the tech with us.

    Instead, your military insists it wants to hunt the terrorist itself in our territory, which seeing your track record, we simply cannot allow.

    And the terrorist roam free as a result, blowing bombs with impunity, at least once a week.

    Looks like a self made problem. The Pakistani military, intelligence and government sponsored terrorism and trained and armed them to create big trouble in Afghanistan and India. It succeeded. Now when the chickens come home to roost, you're blaming others. The US gives billions in military and other aid to Pakistan, every year anyway. Stop whining, the terrorist problem you're facing now(and you and your country no doubt cheered in glee when India or Kashmir was/is attacked by pakistani made terrorists) is entirely of your making. As you sow so shall you reap.

    signature: muslims!=terrorists

    That might be true, but there seems to be something about the culture which seems to raise terrorists very easily compared to other cultures. Is it because the culture prohibits all contact with members of other sex except in marriage, resulting in testosterone fueled violence or is it the strict adherence to some questionable material in the holy book? I don't know, but all I know is, the tendency and problem does exist and you can't brush it under the carpet with inane platitudes like the one in your sig.

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    This space for rent.
  7. In Another Five Years, If Google is Not Stopped... by RobotRunAmok · · Score: 4, Funny

    ...the headline is likely to read, "Google Uses Pakistan for Military Targeting."

  8. Re:Pakistani citizen by kalirion · · Score: 4, Informative

    The Pakistani military, intelligence and government sponsored terrorism and trained and armed them to create big trouble in Afghanistan and India. It succeeded. Now when the chickens come home to roost, you're blaming others.

    So what you're saying is that Pakistan is following our example?

  9. Re:Pakistani citizen by vertinox · · Score: 4, Informative

    That might be true, but there seems to be something about the culture which seems to raise terrorists very easily compared to other cultures. Is it because the culture prohibits all contact with members of other sex except in marriage, resulting in testosterone fueled violence or is it the strict adherence to some questionable material in the holy book? I don't know, but all I know is, the tendency and problem does exist and you can't brush it under the carpet with inane platitudes like the one in your sig.

    I thought it had something to do with extreme poverty, corrupt governments, and lack of education that created such a mindset.

    Yes, some of the 9/11 bombers were well to do and educated but their support base over all would be less inclined for such activities is they weren't rotting in hellholes.

    --
    "I am the king of the Romans, and am superior to rules of grammar!"
    -Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor (1368-1437)
  10. Re:Pakistani citizen by ryzvonusef · · Score: 5, Interesting

    1-Um, you are the ones who gave us the money to create the god-damned idiots in the first place, and they were created to bug the soviets as you well know, not the Afghanis and the Indians... and now when we are asking your help to get rid of them, you are ignoring us, come on, don't you want these guys gone or not? they attacked you because you stopped the gravy-train, and now they are attacking us because we did too.

    2-We do get get aid, but we don't get "billions". Trust me, the finance minister is crying our budget is shot because we didn't even get the last-dole out of the international aid or whatever.

    3-Also, its not the money problem only, we want the tech to find the the bad guys in the first place.The bottom line is, the bad guys are out there (literally in my case) and since you guys are so pressurizing us to get rid of them, then help us. The recent govt. seems to be genuinely interested in getting rid of the menace.

    4-No we don't cheer in glee, because we have more attacks then them. We get even more paranoid.

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  11. Re:Pakistani citizen by Scrameustache · · Score: 4, Insightful

    there seems to be something about the culture which seems to raise terrorists very easily compared to other cultures. Is it because the culture prohibits all contact with members of other sex except in marriage

    No, it's because that culture uses that tactic against your culture's use of massive armies with sophisticated, laser-guided, satellite-targeted weapons.
    If your culture was Sinhalese it would seem to you that there is something about the Tamils that makes them terrorists more than others.

    Now stop trying to make yourself feel better by calling The Other a bunch of sexist terrorists.

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    You can't take the sky from me...

  12. Re:Pakistani citizen by FailedTheTuringTest · · Score: 4, Insightful

    That might be true, but there seems to be something about the culture which seems to raise terrorists very easily compared to other cultures.

    Different times make different terrorists. Today, when you think "terrorist", you think "Muslim". But from the 1970s to the 1990s, "terrorist" meant the IRA, who were of course Catholic Christians. In the 1950s and 1960s, the main terrorist group in the USA was the Ku Klux Klan, or to a lesser degree in terms of body count the Black Panthers. In each case, I suspect people at the time said the same thing you wrote above: "there seems to be something about the culture which seems to raise terrorists very easily compared to other cultures."

  13. Re:In Another Five Years, If Google is Not Stopped by mpatmcg · · Score: 4, Funny

    ... or "Google Uses Pakistan Military for Google Maps Testing"

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    We will keep re-defining success until we are sucessful.