Sun paid for Uniform Driver Interface drivers that SCO had developed. Since SCO and Sun both had System V Unix it would have been trivial for Sun to port them from Unixware to Solaris X86.
Sun badly needed this since they were trying to reinvigorate Solaris X86 after almost killing it. Their customers wanted Solaris X86.
Uniform Driver Interface support means that Sun can easily leverage drivers written for other operating systems. It helps them support more current hardware with much less effort. It makes Solaris X86 suck much less in terms of hardware support.
No conspiracy, just buying IP to cut development time and costs while making their product more competitive. Nothing more to see. Just move along.
Not everything is about trying to trip up Linux. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.
In terms of defense against other nations, the MAD doctrine seems to have been pretty effective and should continue to be as long as we have an imposing military.
MAD = Mutually Assured Destruction. You attack us, we attack you, we all die.
Let's not forget that the guys who got the whole terrorism scare started used nothing but plane tickets and box cutters.
That is an interesting juxtaposition. MAD has worked to date, so keep using it. We are fighting people who are willing to suicide in killing us. MAD fails against madmen. Depending upon the circumstances, Iran and North Korea could easily be situations in which MAD based deterrence fails. How many Americans would be an acceptable trade? North Korea is already starving its population to death is large numbers in pursuit of nuclear weapons.
As far as terrorism, missles just don't seem to be a vary likely attack methodology relative to other things, so it would make sense to spend most of this money on defenses that are likely to work against real imminant threats.
This clearly isn't intended to respond to terrorism. Threats from another state, yes, but not traditional terrorism.
Missile defenses are hard to throw together. If you haven't been working on it for some time you won't have it when you need it.
We may need this soon. North Korea is on the verge of having missiles capable of reaching the continental US now, and they are sharing technology with Iran. Do you really want to wait until they can hit us before we start?
as I mentioned before, that letter stated quite clearly that the West was being attacked in retaliation for the perceived assault on the Muslim world
You mean this section?
Palestine, which has sunk under military occupation for more than 80 years. The British handed over Palestine, with your help and your support, to the Jews, who have occupied it for more than 50 years; years overflowing with oppression, tyranny, crimes, killing, expulsion, destruction and devastation. The creation and continuation of Israel is one of the greatest crimes, and you are the leaders of its criminals. And of course there is no need to explain and prove the degree of American support for Israel.
The creation of Israel is a crime which must be erased. Each and every person whose hands have become polluted in the contribution towards this crime must pay its*price, and pay for it heavily.
You attacked us in Somalia; you supported the Russian atrocities against us in Chechnya, the Indian oppression against us in Kashmir, and the Jewish aggression against us in Lebanon.
(c) Under your supervision, consent and orders, the governments of our countries which act as your agents, attack us on a daily basis;
(i) These governments prevent our people from establishing the Islamic Shariah, using violence and lies to do so.
(ii) These governments give us a taste of humiliation, and places us in a large prison of fear and subdual.
That is a pretty borad net they cast: Chechnya, Kashmir, Lebanon. Support for the governments where thy live? Actions by the British alomst 100 years ago? "Erase" Israel?
But, hey, they do refer to us in the west as "Crusaders" then, don't they? Do you feel up to bearing the burder of 1,000 years of "guilt"?
You can dispute their true motives, but why should I take your word for what they believe over theirs?
You don't have to take my word for it. Read Bin Laden's letter to America. His demands start at Q2, about half way down. Read demands 1 and 2.
Demand 1 = Convert to Islam Demand 2 = Drop your Constitution, adopt Sharia, etc.
Bin Laden ends the demands with this statement:
If you fail to respond to all these conditions, then prepare for fight with the Islamic Nation. The Nation of Monotheism, that puts complete trust on Allah and fears none other than Him. The Nation which is addressed by its Quran with the words: "Do you fear them? Allah has more right that you should fear Him if you are believers. Fight against them so that Allah will punish them by your hands and disgrace them and give you victory over them and heal the breasts of believing people....
The US should have spent billions on spreading peace instead of war. Now with so much fresh blood on their hands it's going to be much harder.
That is a nice sentiment, but it is completely unrelated to the problem with Al Qaeda. The ultimate problem that they have with us is that we are not Muslims in an Islamic country under Sharia law. (Read Bin Laden's letter to America starting at Q2. Demand 1: Convert to Islam. Demand 2: (When fleshed out) Drop your Constitution, impose Islamic Sharia law, stop immoral acts, adultery, fornication, homosexuality, intoxicants, gambling's, and trading with interest under penalty of Islamic law (adultery: death, homosexuality:death, etc.)
Do you understand the implications of that? This isn't a case of: Sorry about blowing up your house, here is $20,000 and we call it even, or here is $50,000 for your village to get a new irrigation ditch. This is a case of us having to answer their demand of: Convert to Islam or die.
Do you honestly say that you don't see any significant difference between the North Koreans kidnapping civilians from Japan to be forced to teach their spies versus prisoners captured on the battlefield while under arms? You do realize that under the law of war, ordinary prisoners can be held until the end of hostilities?
And the nonsense about the Unicef report? You don't suppose that Saddams diversion of the Oil for Food money into billions of dollars in bribes and purchases of banned materials had anything to do with that, do you? And how many of Saddams palaces were built after 1991? The fact is that it was Saddam that is ultimately responsible for the harsh conditions the Iraqi people faced. When faced with the choice between buying food and medicine or missile parts, Saddam chose missile parts.
I find the moral authority that you attribute to the UN somewhat amusing, given the Libya is the chairman of the United Nations Human Rights Commission, and a the UN has some... strange priorities. The way it treats Israel, for example seems uterly pointless and grossly disproportionate.
The US is hardly trying to remake the world in its image.
Afghanistan hosted and protected the terrorists who attacked the United States in a act of war. The US and NATO allies when into Afghanistan to help them rebuild. The UN is aiding the political process with free and fair elections.
Iraq had 13 years to come clean, they refused, and continually evaded their responsibilities. The US went to the UN, got several resolutions passed, and had the support of 60 countries in the liberation of Iraq, more than 30 of which sent in troops of their own.
The US is the biggest threat to world peace? Hardly. Or if we are, it is only because we are one of the biggest and easiest targets.
Even if they do get this laser working the way it's supposed to, it will still be insanely expensive to have 747's aloft circling the "trouble areas" of the world 24/7.
The US used to keep significant numbers of B-52s aloft around the clock on deterence patrols. A 747 is probably cheaper to fly. Besides, keeping a 747 in the air when needed is cheaper than buying a new city.
It's true, the author does goes off about converting to Islam and how we're all moral degenerates and how eeeevil the Jews are, but I at least am of the opinion that we should deal with their legitimate complaints before we throw up our hands and say "I guess they just hate us for our freedoms! We'll have to kill them all."
There are a couple of problems with your line of reasoning.
First, in their minds, all of their complaints are legitimate. If we only address the ones we think are legitimate, they still won't be satisfied. And who is it we should be trying to satisfy? The governments? Specific religous factions? Bin Laden himself?
Take for example, US troops in Saudi Arabia. That was a major problem for Bin Laden. Unfortunately it was the Saudi government that invited in the US troops to help protect Saudi Arabia against Iraq adn the threat of invasion. So, who should we have tried to please, the Saudi government being threatened by invasion, or the religous fanatic multimillionaire gone terrorist? Do you see how quickly that escalates? And, exactly which factions do we have to please? Now, that particular controversy has gone away since the US has largely withdrawn from Saudi Arabia, but there are others like it.
The current problem that we have is with the Islamists, the Muslim extremists that want to reform the Islamic superstate that once ruled the Muslim world without separation of church and state in any sense. They want to spread Islam to rule the entire earth. Just pulling back before them gives them victory. Their problem with us is ultimately that we are not Muslims ruled under Sharia Islamic law as part of an Islamic superstate. I don't really see how you can compromise with that, or what "legitimate concerns" they have that you could deal with.
Even the points of his that you grant are dubious at best. For example, "you have used your force to destroy mankind more than any other nation in history". The US is not even close. Nazi Germany, the USSR, and the People's Republic of China far far excede the number of people that the US has killed by pretty much any measure I can think of. The world wide body count for Communism is in the 100 million range.
Many of his other points are also problematic, either on a factual basis, or when considered in terms of what he actually wants.
Nobody is suggesting killing all Muslims. None the less, the Islamist extremist terrorists have to be suppressed before it becomes a huge problem.
Interesting view. Unfortunately consequences are pretty steep. The US loses a couple of cities, they lose a country. South Korea is ruined, and Japan gets a coating of fallout.
Dictators often turn into gamblers. Saddam, for example, invaded Iran and fought an 8 year war to a stalemate. He then invaded Kuwait, captured it, and was eventually kicked out by a UN coalition.
If North Korea turns gambler, it could be enormous loss of life. It is also worth remembering, the loss of 1 building and 4 planes resulted in about $100 billion of damage to the US economy that we are only shaking off now. What kind of damage do you think a couple of nuked cities would do?
They hate us because we have been trying to control them and bombing them, and other fucked up shit for the better part of a century. It is really that simple........ Of course it is easier for people to unburdon themselves and just place the blame on bullshit like "they hate us for our freedom".
Apparently you've never read Bin Laden's letter to America. I suggest that you do. He states his demands that we must meet before he will stop trying to kill us pretty clearly starting at Q2. I'll give you the quick summary:
1. Become Muslim 2. Abolish the Constitution, separation of Church and State, and institute Sharia law. No more oppression, lies, immorality, adultry, debauchery, immoral acts of fornication, pornography, homosexuality, intoxicants (alcohol, drugs), gambling's, and trading with interest under pain of the appropriate punishment (adulty:death, homosexuality:death, etc.).
Now, I could go on, but just those two points should be enough to convince you that this war isn't going to end until we are Muslim, or they are captured, killed, or otherwise discouraged.
If we would have left the middle east alone and not tried to force them to recognize israel and wouldnt have supported israel then we wouldnt have been in this mess to begin with.
You seem to think that they have a problem with the recognition of Israel. That isn't so. Their problem is with its existence. Many Muslims and Arabs do not accept its existence. Killing all of the Jews to undo Israel isn't really an acceptable solution to make those Muslims and Arabs happy, is it? You are also mistaken if you believe that if the US wasn't involved in the area that there would be no conflict. Wahabism and extremism is spreading. It has a presence in America. It was only a question of time before we had to face the problem of Muslim extremists. It is better that we do it on our own terms to the greatest extent that we can.
Add to that the fact that we have supported dictators like the taliban and hussien and you can see why they have legit problems with us.
We've removed the Taliban and Saddam and are helping those countries more to democracy. The people who are most upset are the extremists that want to recreate the Muslim superstate combining church and state. They are the same bunch that demand of us: Islam or death!
Yes, it really is *THAT* simple. Leave them alone.
You're wrong. If you don't believe me, read Bin Laden's letter and consider the choice he offers you: Islam or death!
Why is it that we can't have mature discussion of military technology?
Because the need for military is a result of immaturity ?
In terms of Slashdot discussions, you might be on to something if you were to change that to:
"Because the need to bash the military is a result of immaturity?"
Funny, isn't it? With all of the interesting physics of lasers, the choice of laser type, the problems of maintaining beam focus, the problems of target detection and aiming, the computer guidance systems, the no doubt massive size of hte software code (Ada, or C?), the heat dissapation problems, what the discussions end up being is: You make everybody hate you cause you're bad! Nuh huh! Uh huh! Nuh huh! Why don't you spend the money on useful things like my pet project!! This is better! No, that is! Ooooh! Those people that believe that! Oooooh!
People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf. - George Orwell
It drives me up a wall that these guys were able to win an election in part because they were able to successfully misinform people.
I suspect that the only thing that makes the Kerry supporters look good is that the researchers are focusing on misperceptions that would be most likely held by Bush supporters. I don't think it would take much to reveal the Kerry voters to be similarly misinformed, and for practical purposes, the Bush voters to be much closer to the truth.
For example, ask the average Kerry supporter if Iraq supported international terrorism. I suspect that the answer is NO, since they have had drummed into them that there was no link between Iraq and Al Qaeda. The fact is that Iraq was a significant sponsor of international terrorism. Iraq paid for Palestinian suicide bombers. It offered refuge to a number of the most notorious terrorists of the 70s, 80s, and 90s. It offered refuge to Zarqawi (the guy giving us fits in Falluja). The Bush voter may be wrong in that Iraq didn't have close ties to Al Qaeda, but in the more general sense they are right since Iraq was a significant sponsor of international terrorism. The Kerry voter may be right in the narrow sense that there was no known close ties between Iraq and Al Qaeda, but in the more important general sense of supporting terrorism, they are wrong.
The same hold true for WMD. While the reports show that there was no actual manufacturing of WMDs going on, it is also clear that Saddam was nursing what was left of his programs, trying to retain expertise & equipment, and expand dual-use technologies. The was no doubt on the part of the Iraqis that Saddam wanted to restart his WMD programs as soon as he could shake off the sanctions. Iraq actually was building new missiles that were banned. In general, Saddam was not acting in good faith. And I think it is worth noting that there are a growing number of WMDs that have been recovered in Iraq since 2002, at least 30 or so that I know of. That is not a militarily significant number, and they are generally left-overs. However they are plenty good for use by terrorists. Now, the Bush voter might say Saddam had WMDs. In the narrowist possible sense, they are right. In the normal sense of looking for militarily significant stockpiles, they are wrong. In the more general sense, they are closer to the truth than the average Kerry voter. The average Kerry voter would say that Saddam didn't have them, and indeed never had them. The average Kerry voter would say this despite the fact that it is well established that Saddam manufactured enormous amounts of chemical weapons and used them against Iran and his own people. Iraq developed biological weapons, including anthrax bombs.
The same pattern holds in international relations. The average Bush voter would be literally wrong if they believe that the US invasion of Iraq had the support of the majority of the world. The average Kerry voter would be wrong if they really believe that it was literally a unilateral action. The US went to the UN repeatedly on the matter. There were something like 60 countries that aided the invasion in some way, and about 30 that sent in troops, no matter how small the number. 60 / 30 nations is only a fraction of the world. 60 / 30 is not unilateral.
Although the Bush and Kerry voters both tend to get some aspect of the questions wrong, the Bush voters are generally closer to a more useful general understanding of the problems than the Kerry voters.
There have been quite a few stories in the mainstream media in the last couple of years about how young adults are growing more conservative. That might be part of what is going on.
I've gotten the impression that there is lots of pascal development still going on in Easter Europe, including turbo. That seems to be something of a dying / lost art in the US. I wonder if there is a viable business in maintaining / updating pascal code.
It all depends on the calculations they make. They are already exporting missile technology for cash. They have threatened to do the same with nuclear technology, maybe even weapons. If they offered to sell one to Bin Laden, who already has permission to use a nuke against the US, the US would probably blockade the North. The North would considered that unacceptable, and could launch in invasion of the South. Now, its gets dicey. What if the North threatends to launch a nuke if the US intervenes and tries to reinforce the South? Of course we would have to intervene, and they would launch. Sure, we would launch some nukes, but it is still a hard problem. Japan and South Korean are subject to fallout. Conventional forces make for a big battle. North Korea has been tunneling and digging for 50 years. North Korean forces are in close proximity to the Southern forces, and occupy Seoul. The North would try to use the south as a giant hostage. No doubt they would lose in the end, but getting there would not be pretty. They might doubt the US has the will to win.
And then there are the Iranians. The North Koreans have been supplying them with missiles for years. A nation of martyrs?
The questions we really need to be asking are: Should we have gone into Iraq? Did we plan the occupation correctly? Did we make a mistake in disbanding the Iraqi military? Did we screw up by not securing caches and stockpiles of high explosives, RPGs, and portable SAMs? Does our government have a sufficient grasp of reality and the strengths and weaknesses of military and diplomatic approaches to put a stable government in place? Do our tactics, goals, and foreign policy make people less likely to take up arms against our soldiers, and civilians, or more likely?
I'll save you the suspense: Yes. No. No. Yes. Yes. Less likely, in the long run. Don't worry, Americans tend to be fast learners and we'll do Syria and Iran better if need be.
These are the major issues. None of these are technology issues. Unfortunately, Americans have a bad habit of thinking every problem is a technology problem, and furthermore that if technology hasn't solved it in the past, we just haven't used technology which is sophisticated and expensive enough.
Unfortunately we are stuck with the stories we get on Slashdot. This one was about lasers, er, make that fricken lasers. I suppose that some people think that it is sad to be stuck with so many technology stories here, especially when they aren't what's really important. Complain to the management if you think there are too few cat-fights over politics and Iraq.
One last thing: Keeping a missile from being launched isn't a technical problem, dealing with one in flight so it doesn't kill millions is. Both problems are worthy of solutions. The people who are more likely to keep a missile from being launched don't tend to hang out here. The people who might find a way to stop the missile do. Let's let the people who might find a way to stop the missile have their due. What do you think?
Just think what would happen if that $10 billion went towards a couple of public school systems.
Just think of what would happen to those $10 billion schools if the North Koreans detonated a single 500 kiloton nuclear warhead within 3 miles.
Their missiles almost the have the range to hit the continental US now, they claim to have nuclear weapons, and they regularly threaten to attack us. Group hugs and anti-bullying programs will be of no use. A functioning ABM system, on the other hand....
ICBMs can only be developed by countries with decent technological infrastructure, and they would never be used against us because we have the military power to destroy the government of any country that attacked us.
North Korea is on the verge of having missiles with enough range to hit the US now. The North Koreans regularly threaten to attack the US now. The North Koreans publicly state they have and are working on nuclear weapons. They also have the capability to employ chemical weapons. They have bought 12 former Soviet submarines and are rebuilding them. They are a threat.
The North Koreans are starving many of their people to death now in order divert resources to such military projects as building nukes, long range missiles, and other military technology. It is unlikely that the welfare of the general public will be a significant impediment to the leadership of North Korea.
..can it shoot down a suitcase? Because that's where the bombs are gonna be..
A suitcase dirty bomb isn't a huge threat.
A suitcase nuke is a significant threat. On the otherhand, they seem to require some fairly sophisticated nuclear engineering and experience. Only a few countries have made them. If one of those countries is handing them out to terrorists and one goes off in the US, it probably won't be the last nuke to pop.
The PATRIOT Act is likely to be far more useful in stopping a suitecase nuke than most technological widgets. But, if an Al Qaeda terrorist was stopped while carrying a suitecase nuke because of a PATRIOT Act wire tap, I suspect many Slashdotters would be conflicted.
All you need to do to defeat this is drop out shards of metal which show up as targets. If each missle turns into 10,000 potential targets the system will NEVER be able to cope.
Eventually that missile will have to leave the cloud of foil unless they drop it at every point to the target, which doesn't seem likely. And then... ZAP!
Besides, more sophisticated radar and signal processing will probably see past that.
We are technically at war with North Korea, and have been for 50 years now. The North Koreans are a major source of ballistic missile proliferation as they continue to develop and export a range of sophisticated missiles to nations such as Iran and Yemen. They have tested components for a missile capable of reaching the United States. They either have, or are close to having nuclear weapons. The North Koreas bought 12 decommissioned Soviet submarines and have used them to advance their technology and may deploy weapons on them.
North Korea regularly threatens to attack the United States.
To get a sense of the nature of the North Korean government you can just look at how they treat: orphans, the US deserver who just returned after 40 years, the Japanese they kidnapped to teach their spies, and last, but not least, the victims of their gulag.
The North Koreans could teach lessons to the Iraqi Information Minister. They deny having dug the tunnels into South Korea, some of which are big enough to drive vehicles. (A handy thing if you were of a mind to invade the South, no?) They no doubt also deny their regular attempts to infiltrate groups of agents into South Korea.
The North Korean Army had million soldiers in it in 1992. The North Koreans have been willing to starve the population, significant numbers to death, in order to sustain the army.
North Korea is a designated member of the "Axis of Evil."
They seem like a bunch you might want to protect yourself against.
If the DoD folks had any brains, they'd be doing their stuff over the public Internet, and challenging the world's hackers to crack their communications. And they'd publish their code. Then they'd know about problems before the insanity of battlefield conditions. But I wouldn't put a lot of money on them being that sensible.
Not going to happen. That would mean giving up the best security means out there: air gap - as in the two networks never overlap. The military will use every practical means to enhance their security. Silly hacker challenges won't be one of them.
You just use the courts to block recounts.... The media just ridicules the paranoid theories without ever bothering to investigate, and everyone is happy that The System Worked.
Not quite. There were numerous unofficial recounts after the election in 2000. Almost all of them reported that Bush really did win.
Slashdot Mirror
Sun paid 9.3 million for what?
Sun paid for Uniform Driver Interface drivers that SCO had developed. Since SCO and Sun both had System V Unix it would have been trivial for Sun to port them from Unixware to Solaris X86.
Sun badly needed this since they were trying to reinvigorate Solaris X86 after almost killing it. Their customers wanted Solaris X86.
Uniform Driver Interface support means that Sun can easily leverage drivers written for other operating systems. It helps them support more current hardware with much less effort. It makes Solaris X86 suck much less in terms of hardware support.
No conspiracy, just buying IP to cut development time and costs while making their product more competitive. Nothing more to see. Just move along.
Not everything is about trying to trip up Linux. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.
This is a horrible fallacy. . .just look at US foreign policy failures over the last 50 years to understand in depth why these are NOT words of wisdom.
Nixon goes to China (vs USSR)?
Iraq vs Iran?
It can be a fallacy. It can be true. If you engage on that basis, the lesson is be very careful.
This is also not often true... unless you define control as "determining how limited or non-functional something becomes".
Or how dead it can become.
Kidnapper can kill victim. Kidnapper controls victim, and ultimately in some measure the victim's family.
Terrorists can kill hostages. Terrorists control hostages. Terrorists try to extend control over hostages to influence or control over government.
Hacker can destroy computer (all vital information). Hacker controls computer, and possibly computer's owner in some measure.
It is far more common than you think.
Great for parties... wouldn't want to live there.
In terms of defense against other nations, the MAD doctrine seems to have been pretty effective and should continue to be as long as we have an imposing military.
MAD = Mutually Assured Destruction. You attack us, we attack you, we all die.
Let's not forget that the guys who got the whole terrorism scare started used nothing but plane tickets and box cutters.
That is an interesting juxtaposition. MAD has worked to date, so keep using it. We are fighting people who are willing to suicide in killing us. MAD fails against madmen. Depending upon the circumstances, Iran and North Korea could easily be situations in which MAD based deterrence fails. How many Americans would be an acceptable trade? North Korea is already starving its population to death is large numbers in pursuit of nuclear weapons.
As far as terrorism, missles just don't seem to be a vary likely attack methodology relative to other things, so it would make sense to spend most of this money on defenses that are likely to work against real imminant threats.
This clearly isn't intended to respond to terrorism. Threats from another state, yes, but not traditional terrorism.
Missile defenses are hard to throw together. If you haven't been working on it for some time you won't have it when you need it.
We may need this soon. North Korea is on the verge of having missiles capable of reaching the continental US now, and they are sharing technology with Iran. Do you really want to wait until they can hit us before we start?
You mean this section?
That is a pretty borad net they cast: Chechnya, Kashmir, Lebanon. Support for the governments where thy live? Actions by the British alomst 100 years ago? "Erase" Israel?
But, hey, they do refer to us in the west as "Crusaders" then, don't they? Do you feel up to bearing the burder of 1,000 years of "guilt"?
You can dispute their true motives, but why should I take your word for what they believe over theirs?
You don't have to take my word for it. Read Bin Laden's letter to America. His demands start at Q2, about half way down. Read demands 1 and 2.
Demand 1 = Convert to Islam
Demand 2 = Drop your Constitution, adopt Sharia, etc.
Bin Laden ends the demands with this statement:
The US should have spent billions on spreading peace instead of war. Now with so much fresh blood on their hands it's going to be much harder.
That is a nice sentiment, but it is completely unrelated to the problem with Al Qaeda. The ultimate problem that they have with us is that we are not Muslims in an Islamic country under Sharia law. (Read Bin Laden's letter to America starting at Q2. Demand 1: Convert to Islam. Demand 2: (When fleshed out) Drop your Constitution, impose Islamic Sharia law, stop immoral acts, adultery, fornication, homosexuality, intoxicants, gambling's, and trading with interest under penalty of Islamic law (adultery: death, homosexuality:death, etc.)
Do you understand the implications of that? This isn't a case of: Sorry about blowing up your house, here is $20,000 and we call it even, or here is $50,000 for your village to get a new irrigation ditch. This is a case of us having to answer their demand of: Convert to Islam or die.
Your comparisons don't survive close scrutiny.
Do you honestly say that you don't see any significant difference between the North Koreans kidnapping civilians from Japan to be forced to teach their spies versus prisoners captured on the battlefield while under arms? You do realize that under the law of war, ordinary prisoners can be held until the end of hostilities?
And the nonsense about the Unicef report? You don't suppose that Saddams diversion of the Oil for Food money into billions of dollars in bribes and purchases of banned materials had anything to do with that, do you? And how many of Saddams palaces were built after 1991? The fact is that it was Saddam that is ultimately responsible for the harsh conditions the Iraqi people faced. When faced with the choice between buying food and medicine or missile parts, Saddam chose missile parts.
I find the moral authority that you attribute to the UN somewhat amusing, given the Libya is the chairman of the United Nations Human Rights Commission, and a the UN has some... strange priorities. The way it treats Israel, for example seems uterly pointless and grossly disproportionate.
The US is hardly trying to remake the world in its image.
Afghanistan hosted and protected the terrorists who attacked the United States in a act of war. The US and NATO allies when into Afghanistan to help them rebuild. The UN is aiding the political process with free and fair elections.
Iraq had 13 years to come clean, they refused, and continually evaded their responsibilities. The US went to the UN, got several resolutions passed, and had the support of 60 countries in the liberation of Iraq, more than 30 of which sent in troops of their own.
The US is the biggest threat to world peace? Hardly. Or if we are, it is only because we are one of the biggest and easiest targets.
Even if they do get this laser working the way it's supposed to, it will still be insanely expensive to have 747's aloft circling the "trouble areas" of the world 24/7.
The US used to keep significant numbers of B-52s aloft around the clock on deterence patrols. A 747 is probably cheaper to fly. Besides, keeping a 747 in the air when needed is cheaper than buying a new city.
Interesting advice. Tell me, if somebody gets tired of using gnome, should they switch to Fortran?
It's true, the author does goes off about converting to Islam and how we're all moral degenerates and how eeeevil the Jews are, but I at least am of the opinion that we should deal with their legitimate complaints before we throw up our hands and say "I guess they just hate us for our freedoms! We'll have to kill them all."
There are a couple of problems with your line of reasoning.
First, in their minds, all of their complaints are legitimate. If we only address the ones we think are legitimate, they still won't be satisfied. And who is it we should be trying to satisfy? The governments? Specific religous factions? Bin Laden himself?
Take for example, US troops in Saudi Arabia. That was a major problem for Bin Laden. Unfortunately it was the Saudi government that invited in the US troops to help protect Saudi Arabia against Iraq adn the threat of invasion. So, who should we have tried to please, the Saudi government being threatened by invasion, or the religous fanatic multimillionaire gone terrorist? Do you see how quickly that escalates? And, exactly which factions do we have to please? Now, that particular controversy has gone away since the US has largely withdrawn from Saudi Arabia, but there are others like it.
The current problem that we have is with the Islamists, the Muslim extremists that want to reform the Islamic superstate that once ruled the Muslim world without separation of church and state in any sense. They want to spread Islam to rule the entire earth. Just pulling back before them gives them victory. Their problem with us is ultimately that we are not Muslims ruled under Sharia Islamic law as part of an Islamic superstate. I don't really see how you can compromise with that, or what "legitimate concerns" they have that you could deal with.
Even the points of his that you grant are dubious at best. For example, "you have used your force to destroy mankind more than any other nation in history". The US is not even close. Nazi Germany, the USSR, and the People's Republic of China far far excede the number of people that the US has killed by pretty much any measure I can think of. The world wide body count for Communism is in the 100 million range.
Many of his other points are also problematic, either on a factual basis, or when considered in terms of what he actually wants.
Nobody is suggesting killing all Muslims. None the less, the Islamist extremist terrorists have to be suppressed before it becomes a huge problem.
Interesting view. Unfortunately consequences are pretty steep. The US loses a couple of cities, they lose a country. South Korea is ruined, and Japan gets a coating of fallout.
Dictators often turn into gamblers. Saddam, for example, invaded Iran and fought an 8 year war to a stalemate. He then invaded Kuwait, captured it, and was eventually kicked out by a UN coalition.
If North Korea turns gambler, it could be enormous loss of life. It is also worth remembering, the loss of 1 building and 4 planes resulted in about $100 billion of damage to the US economy that we are only shaking off now. What kind of damage do you think a couple of nuked cities would do?
They hate us because we have been trying to control them and bombing them, and other fucked up shit for the better part of a century. It is really that simple. ....... Of course it is easier for people to unburdon themselves and just place the blame on bullshit like "they hate us for our freedom".
Apparently you've never read Bin Laden's letter to America. I suggest that you do. He states his demands that we must meet before he will stop trying to kill us pretty clearly starting at Q2. I'll give you the quick summary:
1. Become Muslim
2. Abolish the Constitution, separation of Church and State, and institute Sharia law. No more oppression, lies, immorality, adultry, debauchery, immoral acts of fornication, pornography, homosexuality, intoxicants (alcohol, drugs), gambling's, and trading with interest under pain of the appropriate punishment (adulty:death, homosexuality:death, etc.).
Now, I could go on, but just those two points should be enough to convince you that this war isn't going to end until we are Muslim, or they are captured, killed, or otherwise discouraged.
If we would have left the middle east alone and not tried to force them to recognize israel and wouldnt have supported israel then we wouldnt have been in this mess to begin with.
You seem to think that they have a problem with the recognition of Israel. That isn't so. Their problem is with its existence. Many Muslims and Arabs do not accept its existence. Killing all of the Jews to undo Israel isn't really an acceptable solution to make those Muslims and Arabs happy, is it? You are also mistaken if you believe that if the US wasn't involved in the area that there would be no conflict. Wahabism and extremism is spreading. It has a presence in America. It was only a question of time before we had to face the problem of Muslim extremists. It is better that we do it on our own terms to the greatest extent that we can.
Add to that the fact that we have supported dictators like the taliban and hussien and you can see why they have legit problems with us.
We've removed the Taliban and Saddam and are helping those countries more to democracy. The people who are most upset are the extremists that want to recreate the Muslim superstate combining church and state. They are the same bunch that demand of us: Islam or death!
Yes, it really is *THAT* simple. Leave them alone.
You're wrong. If you don't believe me, read Bin Laden's letter and consider the choice he offers you: Islam or death!
Because the need for military is a result of immaturity ?
In terms of Slashdot discussions, you might be on to something if you were to change that to:
"Because the need to bash the military is a result of immaturity?"
Funny, isn't it? With all of the interesting physics of lasers, the choice of laser type, the problems of maintaining beam focus, the problems of target detection and aiming, the computer guidance systems, the no doubt massive size of hte software code (Ada, or C?), the heat dissapation problems, what the discussions end up being is: You make everybody hate you cause you're bad! Nuh huh! Uh huh! Nuh huh! Why don't you spend the money on useful things like my pet project!! This is better! No, that is! Ooooh! Those people that believe that! Oooooh!
People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf. - George Orwell
It drives me up a wall that these guys were able to win an election in part because they were able to successfully misinform people.
I suspect that the only thing that makes the Kerry supporters look good is that the researchers are focusing on misperceptions that would be most likely held by Bush supporters. I don't think it would take much to reveal the Kerry voters to be similarly misinformed, and for practical purposes, the Bush voters to be much closer to the truth.
For example, ask the average Kerry supporter if Iraq supported international terrorism. I suspect that the answer is NO, since they have had drummed into them that there was no link between Iraq and Al Qaeda. The fact is that Iraq was a significant sponsor of international terrorism. Iraq paid for Palestinian suicide bombers. It offered refuge to a number of the most notorious terrorists of the 70s, 80s, and 90s. It offered refuge to Zarqawi (the guy giving us fits in Falluja). The Bush voter may be wrong in that Iraq didn't have close ties to Al Qaeda, but in the more general sense they are right since Iraq was a significant sponsor of international terrorism. The Kerry voter may be right in the narrow sense that there was no known close ties between Iraq and Al Qaeda, but in the more important general sense of supporting terrorism, they are wrong.
The same hold true for WMD. While the reports show that there was no actual manufacturing of WMDs going on, it is also clear that Saddam was nursing what was left of his programs, trying to retain expertise & equipment, and expand dual-use technologies. The was no doubt on the part of the Iraqis that Saddam wanted to restart his WMD programs as soon as he could shake off the sanctions. Iraq actually was building new missiles that were banned. In general, Saddam was not acting in good faith. And I think it is worth noting that there are a growing number of WMDs that have been recovered in Iraq since 2002, at least 30 or so that I know of. That is not a militarily significant number, and they are generally left-overs. However they are plenty good for use by terrorists. Now, the Bush voter might say Saddam had WMDs. In the narrowist possible sense, they are right. In the normal sense of looking for militarily significant stockpiles, they are wrong. In the more general sense, they are closer to the truth than the average Kerry voter. The average Kerry voter would say that Saddam didn't have them, and indeed never had them. The average Kerry voter would say this despite the fact that it is well established that Saddam manufactured enormous amounts of chemical weapons and used them against Iran and his own people. Iraq developed biological weapons, including anthrax bombs.
The same pattern holds in international relations. The average Bush voter would be literally wrong if they believe that the US invasion of Iraq had the support of the majority of the world. The average Kerry voter would be wrong if they really believe that it was literally a unilateral action. The US went to the UN repeatedly on the matter. There were something like 60 countries that aided the invasion in some way, and about 30 that sent in troops, no matter how small the number. 60 / 30 nations is only a fraction of the world. 60 / 30 is not unilateral.
Although the Bush and Kerry voters both tend to get some aspect of the questions wrong, the Bush voters are generally closer to a more useful general understanding of the problems than the Kerry voters.
There have been quite a few stories in the mainstream media in the last couple of years about how young adults are growing more conservative. That might be part of what is going on.
I've gotten the impression that there is lots of pascal development still going on in Easter Europe, including turbo. That seems to be something of a dying / lost art in the US. I wonder if there is a viable business in maintaining / updating pascal code.
I have converted the 747 into what I like to call a "Death Shark."
The Death Shark's crew is comprised of Military Opto-electronic Operations Noncomissioned officer Specialists.
They are divied into two parts: MOONS unit Alpha, and MOONS unit Zappa.
The laser has aperatures to fire at targets to the front, or the rear. We will now engage a target to the front.
( Turning toward the Forward Radiation Aperature - Alpha Unit.... placing pinky to mouth...)
FRAAU - Fire the "Laser"!
Well, that was just my imagination, but I'll bet the real crew procedures are a lot like that.
Scary, huh? Yah.
It all depends on the calculations they make. They are already exporting missile technology for cash. They have threatened to do the same with nuclear technology, maybe even weapons. If they offered to sell one to Bin Laden, who already has permission to use a nuke against the US, the US would probably blockade the North. The North would considered that unacceptable, and could launch in invasion of the South. Now, its gets dicey. What if the North threatends to launch a nuke if the US intervenes and tries to reinforce the South? Of course we would have to intervene, and they would launch. Sure, we would launch some nukes, but it is still a hard problem. Japan and South Korean are subject to fallout. Conventional forces make for a big battle. North Korea has been tunneling and digging for 50 years. North Korean forces are in close proximity to the Southern forces, and occupy Seoul. The North would try to use the south as a giant hostage. No doubt they would lose in the end, but getting there would not be pretty. They might doubt the US has the will to win.
And then there are the Iranians. The North Koreans have been supplying them with missiles for years. A nation of martyrs?
The questions we really need to be asking are: Should we have gone into Iraq? Did we plan the occupation correctly? Did we make a mistake in disbanding the Iraqi military? Did we screw up by not securing caches and stockpiles of high explosives, RPGs, and portable SAMs? Does our government have a sufficient grasp of reality and the strengths and weaknesses of military and diplomatic approaches to put a stable government in place? Do our tactics, goals, and foreign policy make people less likely to take up arms against our soldiers, and civilians, or more likely?
I'll save you the suspense: Yes. No. No. Yes. Yes. Less likely, in the long run. Don't worry, Americans tend to be fast learners and we'll do Syria and Iran better if need be.
These are the major issues. None of these are technology issues. Unfortunately, Americans have a bad habit of thinking every problem is a technology problem, and furthermore that if technology hasn't solved it in the past, we just haven't used technology which is sophisticated and expensive enough.
Unfortunately we are stuck with the stories we get on Slashdot. This one was about lasers, er, make that fricken lasers. I suppose that some people think that it is sad to be stuck with so many technology stories here, especially when they aren't what's really important. Complain to the management if you think there are too few cat-fights over politics and Iraq.
One last thing: Keeping a missile from being launched isn't a technical problem, dealing with one in flight so it doesn't kill millions is. Both problems are worthy of solutions. The people who are more likely to keep a missile from being launched don't tend to hang out here. The people who might find a way to stop the missile do. Let's let the people who might find a way to stop the missile have their due. What do you think?
Just think what would happen if that $10 billion went towards a couple of public school systems.
Just think of what would happen to those $10 billion schools if the North Koreans detonated a single 500 kiloton nuclear warhead within 3 miles.
Their missiles almost the have the range to hit the continental US now, they claim to have nuclear weapons, and they regularly threaten to attack us. Group hugs and anti-bullying programs will be of no use. A functioning ABM system, on the other hand....
ICBMs can only be developed by countries with decent technological infrastructure, and they would never be used against us because we have the military power to destroy the government of any country that attacked us.
North Korea is on the verge of having missiles with enough range to hit the US now. The North Koreans regularly threaten to attack the US now. The North Koreans publicly state they have and are working on nuclear weapons. They also have the capability to employ chemical weapons. They have bought 12 former Soviet submarines and are rebuilding them. They are a threat.
The North Koreans are starving many of their people to death now in order divert resources to such military projects as building nukes, long range missiles, and other military technology. It is unlikely that the welfare of the general public will be a significant impediment to the leadership of North Korea.
..can it shoot down a suitcase? Because that's where the bombs are gonna be..
A suitcase dirty bomb isn't a huge threat.
A suitcase nuke is a significant threat. On the otherhand, they seem to require some fairly sophisticated nuclear engineering and experience. Only a few countries have made them. If one of those countries is handing them out to terrorists and one goes off in the US, it probably won't be the last nuke to pop.
If anyone cares, Osama Bin Laden has sought and received religous approval to use nuclear weapons against the United States.
The PATRIOT Act is likely to be far more useful in stopping a suitecase nuke than most technological widgets. But, if an Al Qaeda terrorist was stopped while carrying a suitecase nuke because of a PATRIOT Act wire tap, I suspect many Slashdotters would be conflicted.
All you need to do to defeat this is drop out shards of metal which show up as targets. If each missle turns into 10,000 potential targets the system will NEVER be able to cope.
Eventually that missile will have to leave the cloud of foil unless they drop it at every point to the target, which doesn't seem likely. And then... ZAP!
Besides, more sophisticated radar and signal processing will probably see past that.
We are technically at war with North Korea, and have been for 50 years now. The North Koreans are a major source of ballistic missile proliferation as they continue to develop and export a range of sophisticated missiles to nations such as Iran and Yemen. They have tested components for a missile capable of reaching the United States. They either have, or are close to having nuclear weapons. The North Koreas bought 12 decommissioned Soviet submarines and have used them to advance their technology and may deploy weapons on them.
North Korea regularly threatens to attack the United States.
To get a sense of the nature of the North Korean government you can just look at how they treat: orphans, the US deserver who just returned after 40 years, the Japanese they kidnapped to teach their spies, and last, but not least, the victims of their gulag.
The North Koreans could teach lessons to the Iraqi Information Minister. They deny having dug the tunnels into South Korea, some of which are big enough to drive vehicles. (A handy thing if you were of a mind to invade the South, no?) They no doubt also deny their regular attempts to infiltrate groups of agents into South Korea.
The North Korean Army had million soldiers in it in 1992. The North Koreans have been willing to starve the population, significant numbers to death, in order to sustain the army.
North Korea is a designated member of the "Axis of Evil."
They seem like a bunch you might want to protect yourself against.
If the DoD folks had any brains, they'd be doing their stuff over the public Internet, and challenging the world's hackers to crack their communications. And they'd publish their code. Then they'd know about problems before the insanity of battlefield conditions. But I wouldn't put a lot of money on them being that sensible.
... The media just ridicules the paranoid theories without ever bothering to investigate, and everyone is happy that The System Worked.
Not going to happen. That would mean giving up the best security means out there: air gap - as in the two networks never overlap. The military will use every practical means to enhance their security. Silly hacker challenges won't be one of them.
You just use the courts to block recounts.
Not quite. There were numerous unofficial recounts after the election in 2000. Almost all of them reported that Bush really did win.