
US military to tech protestors: “We’re at war; pick a side” - Sequenza
https://diginomica.com/2018/12/05/us-military-to-tech-protestors-were-at-war-pick-a-side/
======
btilly
My answer to the military.

As soon as you stop spying on us, stop compromising corporate networks, and
stop lying to our government about doing these things, then we can discuss
whose side you are on. As long as you're still doing all that, you're not on
our side.

That also doesn't mean we're on your opponent's side either. This isn't a case
of the enemy of my enemy is my friend. Yes, the other guy is worse, but that
isn't an excuse for your undermining the values that are supposed to make this
country worth supporting.

Do you want to know how to change my mind? Here is how. Invite Snowden home.
Give him the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Discontinue all of the domestic
spying programs that he identified AND their successors. Do that, then we'll
talk.

------
marssaxman
Well, that's easy: I pick the side of "stop fighting stupid imperial wars
already". There is nothing which obligates "us" to be at war, to whatever
degree the United States represents any sort of a coherent "us" at this point.

~~~
xfitm3
Doesn’t military spending have a positive effects on the economy?

~~~
anonymous5133
If you are looking at pure economic activity then yes but all economic
activity must be viewed based on "quality" of said activity. Do we want people
spending time and resources building weapons of mass destruction or do we want
that economic activity going towards exploring outer space, developing new
technologies that benefit humanity positively and so on. Unfortunately, it is
mutually exclusive because Earth only has so much "potential" human ability so
we must determine where that human potential is being used.

~~~
Junk_Collector
It's hardly mutually exclusive. Many military problems are simply human
problems and because of their low tolerance for error, military systems are
often very good solutions that provide large non-military benefits.

The DoD needed a better way to navigate, so they invented GPS. They needed
more robust communications, so they funded the internet. They needed to
predict the weather to plan operations, so they funded weather radar and
satellites. Even the US interstate system was supported in large part because
the military wanted to have fast easy cross country logistics.

------
mjevans
Make "our" side worth fighting for/with again.

Liberty and Justice for all, in that order.

Freedom for everyone, and a war against the existence of repressive regimes
and states in all aspects.

(Liberty is a bit complicated, given harm to / from others and sorting that
out...)

~~~
anonymous5133
Yes but those reforms must come from within said country, not from an external
force forcing it upon the nation. When an external force acts upon another
country to "reform" it then often there are other agendas at play like power,
control of resources and so on.

~~~
mc32
I’d agree with this. Imagine if instead of a civil war France or Britain came
in and sorted things out for us.

Simetimes nations have to go through that crucible themselves and figure out
what works for them, provided they aren’t being belligerent against peaceful
neighbors.

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jacknews
"My take: The Big Tech employee resistance is driven in large part by people
who have come into adulthood after the opening of China in the 1970s and the
end of the Cold War and the fall of Berlin Wall in the early 1990s."

But before or during Saddam Husseins' supposed secret weapons of mass
destruction, Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo, "Extraordinary Rendtion" at "Black
Site"s, Snowden, etc, etc, etc.

"This is not about doing something that’s unethical, illegal or immoral. ...
We are the good guys."

While the CIA/military might be fighting _for_ the good guys (though what does
that even mean), I don't think they can claim to _be_ the good guys. And shame
on the leadership for turning the courage and sacrifice of individuals to such
methods.

~~~
devoply
You know who else calls themselves the good guys, the mafia.

~~~
cf725359u
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hn1VxaMEjRU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hn1VxaMEjRU)

The crucial point in time when you ask yourself if you might be a baddie.

------
nostrademons
It always strikes me as incongruous when the government or military says
"We're going to be the leaders in the Internet/AI/drones/cyberwarfare",
because these are all technologies that eliminate the raison d'etre for the
nation state as a social organizing principle.

Historically, the modern nation state arose during the 19th century from a
confluence of factors. Taking advantage of new industrial methods of
production required larger, more specialized workforces; this implied greater
population and larger political units. Longer supply chains also required
territorial integrity, so that the nation could ensure that its means of
production remained intact without physical attacks from foreign powers. These
bigger nations required more social control via propaganda and extensive legal
& security systems, but the emerging technologies of mass communications &
mass media enabled this. The armored war machines built by these industrial
supply chains dominated everything else on the battlefield, so non-
industrialized empires and kingdoms fell to industrialized nation-states.

Now supply chains are global and span trans-national boundaries; attempts to
enforce national boundaries on these destroy industrial capacity rather than
protect it. The Internet provides free information flow _across_ national
boundaries. Drones and robots give the military advantage back to small groups
of technologically advanced individuals. AI and huge personnel databases allow
you to instantly tell friend from foe regardless of geography, eliminating one
of the key advantages of territorial integrity (which would likely be
reestablished on a smaller scale afterwards). Cryptocurrencies undermine the
government's power to tax and track finances, with the latter ability granted
instead to anyone with a lot of computer power and knowledge.

Governments aren't sabre-rattling because we're on the verge of Cold War 2.0,
they're sabre-rattling because they're insecure. Not just _a_ government or
_the_ government - _all_ governments. The next war will likely look more like
Syria than the Cold War, with a confused jumble of non-national organizations
all jockeying for power, and the social organization that comes after that
will likely be a form of corporate feudalism a la _Snow Crash_. Google's on
its own side in that organizational structure, because all the existing sides
will be defunct.

~~~
devoply
Tell me when have governments have felt secure, go back to the J Edgar Hoover
era, or British Imperial era. Most governments are always on the brink of
multiple psychological disorders. There is no treatment for them. This is
business as usual... more power for them... that's what governments are good
for, accumulating as much power as they can and then trying to order the world
according to their interests.

And that's why these sorts of technologies are dangerous, they increase the
amount of power that governments can exercise by potentially multiples and
make them think that they can assert dominance everywhere which makes them
more cocky and more prone to war. And that's why workers refusing to further
this agenda are right and on the moral high ground.

------
davidwitt415
Counterpoint: The Pentagon is a massive fraud where over half of each tax
dollar is taken without accountability.

[https://www.thenation.com/article/pentagon-audit-budget-
frau...](https://www.thenation.com/article/pentagon-audit-budget-fraud/)
Exclusive: The Pentagon’s Massive Accounting Fraud Exposed: How US military
spending keeps rising even as the Pentagon flunks its audit

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billylindeman
Google seems like they're barreling towards the wrong side of history (e.g.
project dragonfly)

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code_beers
Tech protestors: “Wartime service is currently voluntary, get your own damn
engineers.”

------
jchw
What war are we (the U.S.) at? Would we consider it "war-time" or not right
now? (Not rhetorical; kind of curious. I realize we have ongoing conflicts,
but it seems like there are _always_ ongoing conflicts.)

~~~
AnimalMuppet
If you count cyber, we're currently at war with Russia and China, and maybe
North Korea. If you count operations aimed at our internal politics, we're
currently at war with Russia and Iran.

The way I see it, you'd better count cyber and political attacks.

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jrs95
If we're at war, then who are we at war with? Do they even pose a serious
threat to the U.S.? Or is this just really about money? Because it seems like
it's just about money. And in case you missed it, recent increases to the
defense budget were more than twice what it would cost to make college
education free and it had bipartisan support.

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jeffrallen
Pro-tip: Guys who find that they need to remind you "We are the good guys" are
typically not the good guys.

There are plenty of people whose personal ethics allow them to work on weapons
systems. To the rest of us, let's stick together and find other ways to
contribute to our societies.

~~~
mc32
As mature comics can attest to, it’s not as simple as black and white, but
there is lighter grey and darker gray. At the end of the day it’s better to
help thjngs become lighter gray.

------
fbomb
"Microsoft is going to provide the U.S. military with access to the best
technology – all the technology we create."

So which is it? The best technology or the technology Microsoft creates? You
can't have it both ways.

------
pohl
If we weren't perpetually in a state of war, that phrase would have more
gravity. Maybe we should figure out how to have a few years of peace time so
that people learn how to care again that we're at war.

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tyrust
Misleading title: the quote in the headline does not appear in the article.

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_robbywashere
> "At the center of Cold War 2.0 is advamced technology..."

Someone forgot to deploy their WEAPONS GRADE SPELL CHECKER

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sys_64738
The US military budget should be reduced by 50%. Even then we waste more than
most others spend.

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archagon
They're nervous. Good.

------
carapace
To me, it's a weird situation. I'm a left-leaning, peace-loving, pro-
capitalist, pro-military person, if you can credit that.

I sincerely hope that one day war will be a thing of the past. In the
meantime, I'm pretty comfortable with the _Pax Americana_.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pax_Americana](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pax_Americana)
I know we're not perfect, but I hope and believe we're better than the other
contenders for top dog, and that the world will slide into a golden age
without too much more violence and death. (Is that too much to ask?)

Within the milieu of sovereign nations with conflicting interests, it seems to
me to be borderline treasonous to e.g. work on Project Dragonfly but not JEDI
or Project Maven.

I believe that technology is forcing us to a post-historical milieu where
nations have given way to a global state powered by ubiquitous surveillance. I
don't know whether this will turn out to look like Star Trek or North Korea,
but I don't see how a technological society puts the genie back in the bottle.
(Wrote a blog post about it, wanna see it? Here it is:
[https://firequery.blogspot.com/2013/10/total-surveillance-
is...](https://firequery.blogspot.com/2013/10/total-surveillance-is-
perfection-of.html))

In this scenario, the state would have so many "soft" options to control
behaviour that outright killing people would be a manifestation of the
neuroses of the managers rather than a rational response. (Cf. CCP organ
harvesting Falun Gong, and putting Muslims in concentration camps. These are
NOT the decisions of _rational_ minds.) At that stage, war is obsolete. "The
people" literally can't rebel, and there are no outsiders, so any war that
occurs would be due to some psychological irruption or something, more akin to
a riot. (Unless we get some sort of staged war scenario.)

I'm saying that there will come a time in the future when sending robot bombs
to blow up the people who want to blow you up will be recognized as an
inferior strategy from the POV of operational goals. But we're not there yet.
In the meantime, yes, help the military of the value-system you think is
correct as much as you can, because the other bastard is still gunning for
you.

If you don't like war, work on technology that harmonizes value systems. This
is an interesting meta-logical problem that has lots of interesting solutions
(and people will even pay you well for it.)

