Slashdot Mirror
Losing the War Data For Iraq and Afghanistan
cervesaebraciator writes with an excerpt from an analysis of a kind we're likely to see more of as ubiquitous sensors and cheap storage continue to proliferate: "'The Iraq and Afghanistan campaigns are unique in that they were the first wars to be documented electronically. The use of computers to track stabilization efforts produced enormous datasets in which important indicators were tracked, including daily electricity-production rates, georeferenced insurgent attacks, factory employment numbers, military spending on locally sourced goods and services and public opinion. [...] Army Secretary John McHugh recently admitted to members of Congress that thousands of records from the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts are missing. [...] The problem is that much of the existing data were collected in an ad hoc manner that reflects the lack of planning for stability operations following both invasions. While certain data types were methodically maintained, others were kept by single individuals in more arbitrary ways—in some cases, on a single computer's hard drive, in a personal computer or within an e-mail account. As flash drives are lost, computers reformatted, files erased, and human and magnetic memory degrades, various data types have been and will continue to be destroyed." With apologies to Santayana, those who do not backup data sets of the past are condemned to repeat them."
The problem is that much of the existing data were collected in an ad hoc manner that reflects the lack of planning for stability operations following both invasions.
With each generation the prior generation of technology often looks ad hoc or patched together. Given that these operations happened over a decade ago it's no surprise that the data was handled poorly by today's standards.
" The problem is that much of the existing data were collected in an ad hoc manner that reflects the lack of planning for stability operations following both invasions. " bureau-speech for "We didn't plan well enough, so no one can be blamed."
How much was lost, and how much purposely erased?
We can start another war and re-build the data set.
I hear those guys have a copy of everything.
Just build some foam LARP missiles and play it again, preferably in some remote desert.
Nae king! Nae laird! Nae yurrupiean pressedent! We willna be fooled again!
> cervesaebraciator writes
> cervesaebraciator
That is all.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
During WW2 the Germans did the same with their archives when the world started to understand what they were really up to.
What they want to keep secret must be very ugly.
It'll be cheaper to recreate the data than to recover it
I've had the displeasure to apply for Federal IT jobs. Their hiring system is so messed up, that anyone that makes it through is either a masochist or is a form filling savant. It's no wonder creative talented people stay away. Even if a creative type were to be hired, government "standards" would drive them insane.
If the government can't get good people, it's no wonder they can't handle all that data.
the lack of planning for stability operations following both invasions
you got that right
Did you check Snowden's laptop?
sudo make me a sandwich
The units brought their own network gear and staff, and it all departed at each RIP/TOA.
Much harder to track down and prosecute anyone there for much of anything, for reasons of justice, or to slake our emerging lust for kangaroo courts.
Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see things thou dost not.--King Lear
In wartime, militaries do some really nasty stuff. Ever since Vietnam, the US military has made it a policy to keep hidden from the public the facts about what they do, because they firmly believe that the US would have won the war had they not gotten into trouble with the US public for walking into villages and killing everybody.
And no, more modern wars have been no different in that regard: For example, the US has used drones to launch missiles at weddings and funerals in Afghanistan. There's the infamous "Collateral Murder" video which shows US soldiers gunning down unarmed civilians trying to rescue wounded unarmed civilians. The US has acknowledged torture (by the definitions the US used before they got caught doing it) of often innocent prisoners in Gitmo and Abu Ghraib. There have been some very suspicious "suicides" of prisoners of war.
I'm not saying war is never worth it, but you have to remember that in war all conventional morality is thrown out the window pretty quickly.
I am officially gone from
War is necessarily an imperfect business. I'd rather devote resources to the MIA soldiers from Vietnam and locating our lost submarines from WWII than worrying about what happened to documents about Iraq and Afghanistan. People have to come first. Leave no document behind ranks way below leaving no man behind.
In SOVIET RUSSIA... erm...NSA AMERICA, the Internet logs onto YOU!
Documents can do things such as verify toxic exposure to Afghan and Iraqi burn pits.
Their loss in past wars has caused vets many problems.For example, my friend worked VC-123Ks while TDY at Da Nang, but only has a single order amendment and no original order to verify boots-on-ground and exposure to Agent Orange.
The MIAs are dead (any VC in his right mind wouldn't bother saving useless prisoners) and the submarines are already war graves. The dead are dead, rituals over the dead are nice, but hundreds of thousands of LIVING veterans will be with us for nearly a century and perhaps longer.
"This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
we had a tradition where there would be a major accidental fire in a shop right on the verge of audit.
Loosing some data on a war campaign, eh? Right after Manning and Snowden scandals? Must be an unfortunate accident, I am sure.
I found this essay some time ago on a forum, it was interesting so I saved it. This is not my writing (I 'cleaned up' some f words) but somewhat related as it deals with computers and the military:
Weekly Rant
I Love Computers
This week I'm discussing the great efficiency attained with the use of computers in the military, since they've been in use. I for starters don't like computers (I do like this site so I can openly bitch to a relatively large audience and remain anonymous, since I'm still in. haha, f--- you SGMs). If I am correct, the armies of the world had pretty much functioned without the aid of computers since the dawn of man till about 20 years ago. Yes, to be a superior armed force you need the technological edge but do I really need a f------ computer to request ammo or to give a class on patrolling with power point presentation? I believe the divisions of our army still made it out to the range to shoot in the 70's and 80's with either handwritten or typed requests. Classes were instructed with a chalkboard, sandtable or in a walk through. Another observation, if computers make things so efficient why the f--- do we need ammo requests 6 months out? I've been in situations where we changed a little bit of the training schedule 2-3 months out from the training event and requested more or different types of ammo and was denied because it was too late. Too late? How f------- far back do these people want these damn request?...6 months...gee, that's the same amount of time, if not more, than back in the 70's and 80's. Or better yet the 'you have to go to the proper channels' f------ deal, where a memorandum or request has to go from one hand to the next going up the channels.
Only to find out it got lost by some pogue or sat too long on his desk. Then when you get wise to the puke and his oxygen thievin' ways, you skip him to go to the next level in hopes to get what you need done. Later you get a call from the NCOIC of the Bn S-3 . He says ' Sgt. why didn't you go through my shop for the range and ammo request.' In which, you bite your tongue and say 'Because your shop is overworked, I figured you can use an extra hand.' What you really want to say is:' Because your shop is full of sorry ass MF that would f--- up coordinating their own f------ sleep or a f----- pot of coffee.' But no you maintain composure and he says, 'Well, make sure you go through my shop and you say, 'Roger that Sgt'. Then you hang up and say' f--- you' and you go about doing it the same way; skipping as many pukes as it takes to make sure you buddies get what they need to conduct some good training.
Men, this was me as an ops Sgt in LRSD. There are other instances where my SFteam was told to use this new closed email system of requesting everything from equipment to G-2 to beans and bullets. This 'great new system' took 2 days to get running, then when we did start using it our request took forever to get filled. Why? Because the Bn pukes would let the requests sit in their email box because they were too busy stealing air. All of these shops were within walking distance!!! As opposed to the old way in which an LNO went and made a face to face with the pogue so at least there was some sort of accountability. God, computers are awesome in the army. And God forbid you f--- up the spacing in a memorandum, there are SGMs out there who have nothing better to do than check to make sure you typed that bitch right, because to them it is a direct reflection in their warped brainwashed mind of the type of warrior you are. But hey, what do I know I'm just a 'Joe'.
mfwright@batnet.com
I don't believe it's a problem.
Why do you want all that data? So we can fight the last battle better?
I know it seems 'obvious' that keeping all that data--and then analyzing it repeatedly--seems useful. But it probably isn't.
First off, it probably isn't 'data' so much as anecdote--a bunch of personal ideas from a limited perspective on what to do next. Do you really think there is 'data' on those click drives or is it more like ones and zeroes mostly attached to personal e-mails and off-color jokes?
That means you have to first sort the data, then correlate it to real events and real decisions. Mostly what you'll find is that people making decisions didn't have the 'information' they needed.
How that will be interpreted is to send more data up the chain and hope that somehow, somewhere, it gets transformed into useful information next time. Thus the end result of any study will be more data and less information. You don't have time to analyze it all.
We'd be better off, if we really want to spend the time and effort searching the 'data' to first outline ways to identify useless data from the field and ignore it. That cuts down on the rest of the processing but I don't think that _could_ happen given normal human incentives and the way orders are read and interpreted.
order: "Analyze the old data from the last war in order to use data more effectively."
Good idea, in theory.
I lost around a couple hundred bookmarks of more about the war , totally sick stuff about what happened on terrain and the assholes conspiring for it a decade or more before the fact, the bad botched execution and so on, and also some terrorists/resistance videos that are unavailable now (it was still the times when watching videos on the internet consisted in downloading .wmv files, which I somewhat miss. they did edit their video instead of throwing a high res shaky rush of people running around)
I thought I was going to go touring showing the stuff.
Geez, the Iraq occupation was horrible with e.g. incompetents schmuks manning checkpoints that gunned down far too many people and not much caring about running over people with their big toys. Or what about the botched building where piss rained down through the walls and floors. The US is even accused of carrying out ethnic cleansing - the massive population transfers in the capital where neighborhoods were redefined/created to segregate the population between shia/sunni/etc., at least the US was putting the concrete blast walls everywhere but dunno what you really have to do when the situation has collapsed since you got there.. Possibly there was a conspiration to break up the country in three states but dunno about that. Anyway that war was decided in the mid nineties or earlier by armchair generals and Kissinger wannabes.
Perhaps for a generous one-time donation WikiLeaks would be willing to restore the missing data sets ;).