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Comment by adventured | Hacker News Reader

Because this makes it far easier to both get away with it, and not kill yourself in the process.

Today or in the near future, plant a bomb anywhere in public in a city and you're likely to end up on camera.

If a terrorist can accomplish the same outcome while not killing their self (suicide), they get to keep killing; it net lowers the cost of terrorism dramatically. The biggest cost in suicide bombings directed at the developed world, is getting the bomb carrying person into location (immigration, housing), feeding the person, and the time it takes to arrange it all. Drones mean you bring one person in, and they get to take action potentially numerous times.

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The 2004 Madrid bombing killed 191 people and wounded 1800 without requiring neither suicides nor drones. And I think the idea that you need to "bring a person in" is outdated; there are potential recruits in any country you might want to attack. The Tamerlan Tsarnaev is a good example.

> The 2004 Madrid bombing killed 191 people and wounded 1800 without requiring neither suicides nor drones

Shakers in the 18th century made some of (in my opinion) the most beautiful wooden furniture with simple hand tools. But each piece took ages to produce and finish.

Now we have power tools and inexpensive stains and finishing products that dry quickly. The output of a legion of Shaker craftsmen can be matched by a single moderately skilled woodworker today.

Similarly, the fact that attacks were successful without drones doesn't mean that cheap, commonly available drones can't make it easier to do lots of damage. Nobody says you need these items to make a successful attack, just that they have the potential to make a bad attack much worse. Not to consider this while implementing countermeasures is irresponsible at best.

I don't see how operating a drone to deploy bombs compared to simply dropping bags with a timer in a train and leaving a few stations earlier is in any way comparable to hand vs power tools.

Leaving the bags is arguably easier to do.

If I have 3 dozen bombdrones I get set them up automatically to take off at a certain time and proceed to their targets via GPS. I will have been seen absolutely nowhere near a bombing site, and could easily be out of the country before they even take off.

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