The Nice Guy At the World's Largest Weapons Expo

pigrabbitbear writes "It was the second day of the Special Operation Forces Exhibition in Amman, Jordan, and the temperature outside the convention center was around 80 degrees Fahrenheit, with a typical chance of rain of zero. Drones of various sizes hovered in the hot blue desert sky. Inside, Ed Atchley had set up a booth for his company, Aspen Water Inc., right next to a 30mm chain gun designed to sink things like helicopters and Somali pirate ships. Atchley had traveled from his headquarters in Richardson, Texas, to the largest weapons trade show in the world, mainly because he makes 'the army's smallest, lightest, least expensive, high output, reverse osmosis water purifier,' he says, and people in the Middle East – including soldiers – get very thirsty."

Comments

Re:Still a bad guy

[Concerned Onlooker]

Maybe he meant "senseless to a sensible person." Also, I think you meant rationalization, not rationale.

Re:Still a bad guy

[zill]

Definition of SENSELESS:
b : foolish, stupid: it was some senseless practical joke — A. Conan Doyle
c : meaningless: a senseless murder

He probably meant it as "meaningless" I'm guessing. As in, it's meaningless to resort to violence when it only makes the problem worst.

Re:Napoleon said it better:

[The Snowman]

Nothing, absolutely nothing, matters more at winning wars than logistics. The lethal fighting force is but the edge of a vast engineering and distribution network. Or, if it is not the edge of such a network, it is soon a defeated lethal fighting force.

I spent six years in the U.S. Air Force flying a desk. To this day people are shocked that the only time I flew on a plane was a civilian airliner, and I never saw combat.

When I was in, the USAF was around 300,000 Airmen. Around 10% was aircrew, which includes: pilots, navigators, crew chiefs, AWACS computer guys, etc. It took the rest of the USAF to handle the rest: feed the troops, get them to where they need to go, ensure their computers were working correctly, tracking millions of bullets, bombs and missiles, tending to medical needs, paychecks, etc.

Re:Still a bad guy

[MagusSlurpy]

Could, and does. FTFA:

Since those legal hurdles were resolved, Aspen Water has been growing, distributing fresh water systems to militaries around the world and in humanitarian crises.