I am on the Kill List. This is what it feels like to be hunted by drones | Hacker News Reader

I am on the Kill List. This is what it feels like to be hunted by drones

independent.co.uk

140 pointswaffle_ss25 comments

Something not discussed often enough is the rank incompetence of, well, humans. People everywhere, at every level, are simply not very good at their jobs, including experienced "experts".

This is just one reason why it's insane to trust the government to carry out extrajudicial killings on people who, at the very least, pose no immediate threat. Both the selection of targets and the actual killing are prone to errors which have horrific consequences.

> This is just one reason why it's insane to trust the government to carry out extrajudicial killings on people who, at the very least, pose no immediate threat.

Pose no immediate threat to who? To the government doing the killing? True (but see Paris and Brussels for counterexamples).

Pose no immediate threat to humans? Absolutely they pose a threat.

For me it isn't a question as to whether or not this specific man poses a threat and is worthy of death, it is an issue of how he is being judged to be a threat, and judged worthy of death.

The drone powered war is a system in which an organization on the other end of a robot is acting as judge, jury, and executioner, with no way to appeal for recourse or even open a dialog, and this organization also has a history of extreme inaccuracy (which they try to hide under the guise of national security).

I see drone usage as just as reprehensible as the terrorism attacks carried out in Paris and Brussels, in that in both cases innocent civilians are dying and afraid of dying.

The drone program is turning into judge dread minus the megacities and motorcycles.

It's a bit of a strawman argument to bring in unrelated paris and brussels.

Appeal to emotion actually.

Yeah, see Paris and Brussels. It's exactly why the drone wars need to end. We don't need any more people that go nuts.

Other than that Belgium and France need to fix their shit and have less people falling for crazy extremists.

This isn't new. Paris and Belgium has a history of at least a century of terrorism.

With those bombs... look.. if that guy was a terrorists, how many more do you think it created? Dozens, maybe hundreds!

And that guy would still be an alive threat.

Imagine an ordinary American citizen, maybe not mentally stable (anymore), maybe living in poverty, seeing how Japan for example would have drones over the US, seemingly randomly killing friends and family. Imagine there was a group of people, calling themselves Patriotism for America. Also there have been wars ravaging the country, everything is ash and dust. There is more weapons than everything else. Imagine some people there had contacts and friends in Japan.

Guess what would happen.

Hint: There were way lesser reasons for many wars and acts of violence.

read this story and realize who the real terrorist is. Even if this man was a member of the taliban does that give anyone the right to make his children afraid to sleep in their bed at night?

this whole situation reminds me of the ending of I Am Legend where the protagonist realizes he has become the terror in the night that all children are afraid of. In an effort to combat terrorism the US has become the worlds largest and most aggressive terrorists. Committing more acts of violence against civilians in one week than all other terrorists in the past decade

Yea, it does. You go live under the threat of Taliban, Hamas, ISIS, etc.

Sorry but you keep ignoring the people who the Taliban threaten the most aren't just Americans.

Are you saying innocent children should pay for the transgressions of others?

Implicitly, that person is. But what that comment really says is, "if my government tells me they need my taxes so that we shall kill instead of being killed, that is a decision I am prepared to support."

Anyone who pays US taxes and doesn't do their utmost to stop these murders implicitly holds this belief, in my eyes.

Spoken like a true terrorist.

After reading The Drone Papers (fascinating reporting done by The Intercept) I can certainly believe all of this. I hope it's true and I hope this man can have his story told (and more importantly, believed) as far up as possible.

https://theintercept.com/drone-papers/

Killing civilians is war crime. Israel is hunted for 1/100th of this, even if they are doing everything to prevent hurting innocents, and terrorists are deliberately using civilian building to strike from.

This sounds pretty extreme. I would love to know both sides of this story. Without independent objective data I can't tell if this is a desperate plea for help from a lucky individual wrongfully sentenced to death without trial, surrounded by innocent victims also killed, or if this is anti-drone propaganda. But I would like to know.

It should be the standard that every controversial story comes with 2 sides of the coin plus the bonus 3rd side (coin lands standing). If the Internet thought me one thing it's to never judge based on a one sided story.

Even the fact how often he widnessed drone attacks is simply mind blowing. Poor guy :/

If he is advised of something then the UK government should start him and try him on a court of law. If found innocent then he should be freed. If guilty he just send his sentence.

Either way, the US needs to stop it's robotic war, which it quietly wages "on our behalf" but without our direct knowledge. They assume that out of sight is out of mind, but in reality, their actions breed hate and distrust of the US and it's allies. It is a hate that prolongs the "war against terror", lines the pockets of the military industrial complex and wastes tax payers money.

https://media.ccc.de/v/32c3-7443-the_price_of_dissent

Everyone should see this talk. Hatred tends to evolve into many types of nasty tactic; this isn't limited to drone strikes, and it isn't limited to Pakistan and Afghanistan.

"Muslims are the canaries in the mine."

Truth or not, it is either way a good propaganda.

Even if the drone attacks somehow only killed those fighting against Western interests they would still be evil. That's the reason that we didn't like the people with the Deathstar in that movie.

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