
The effort to make war less inhumane dates back centuries - danboarder
http://gizmodo.com/is-war-becoming-more-humane-1735636987
======
dang
Discussion here is getting derailed by the provocative title, so we've
replaced that with more neutral language from the article. If someone suggests
a better (more accurate and neutral) one, we can change it again.

Obviously there's no question of war being humane, but it isn't interesting to
just repeat the universal reflexive objection, which the article itself
includes: "The idea that we might be able to make war more humane at all seems
oxymoronic; war is, by definition, inhumane."

What we want is discussion that engages with the specific content of this
article, not generic dismissals. If it's wrong, great, but say how and where.
Long experience with HN has shown that generic dismissals lead to boilerplate
threads (edit: which usually then turn angry—perhaps because they're so
boring), but specific engagement gets interesting.

~~~
will_brown
I propose "Jus in Bello". There are 2 terms in the _Laws of War_ , one for the
laws that govern the legal right to engage in war/use of force itself ("Jus Ad
Bellum") and the laws that govern the conduct while engaged in war/use of
force ("Jus In Bello").

As an introduction to the subject of jus in bello this particular article is a
fire starter, for example, the thread would be much different if the article
introduced Jody Williams[1] being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for her work
in banning landmines. Wars will still be brutal and gory but it is also good
to know that 50 years after present wars are over kids won't be playing in a
field somewhere having their legs blown off by unexploded landmines; whereas,
10 years ago there were 15,000-20,000 deaths/year (mostly children) and in
2012 there were 3,000-4,000 (mostly children).

------
mtgx
The US gov (at least under the current president and under at least 90% of the
current candidates) does not care about non-lethal weapons. It prefers killing
them, even over blinding them instead (as the article says), or capturing them
[1].

As for automated killing robots, is anyone naive enough to think they will
wait until they can "perfectly identify an enemy combatant"?

First off, the definition of enemy combatant is _already_ waaay too vague, to
include just about any male in the Middle East.

Second, the gov is making _even now_ , in 2015, plenty of "mistakes" with
drone strikes (see the hospital strike, the killing of the mother of the guy
who they were supposed to kill, but had switched phones) - and they've been
using them for more than a decade.

After all of these facts, there's nothing that can convince me that the robots
will only kill the "right people" when they start launching them on the
battlefield.

[1] [https://theintercept.com/document/2015/10/14/small-
footprint...](https://theintercept.com/document/2015/10/14/small-footprint-
operations-5-13)

------
tzs
From Star Trek, season 1, episode 23, "A Taste of Armageddon":

ANAN: It's a vicious attack, extremely destructive. Fortunately, our defences
are firming, but our casualties are high. Very high.

KIRK: Sir, I have been in contact with my ship, which has had this entire
planet under surveillance. All during this so-called attack of yours, we have
been monitoring you. There's been no attack, no explosions, no radiations, no
disturbances whatsoever. If this is some sort of game you're playing...

ANAN: This is no game, Captain. Half a million people have just been killed.
Activate the attack units, Sar.

SAR: Yes, Councilman.

ANAN: Launch immediate counter attack.

SPOCK: Computers, Captain. They fight their war with computers. Totally.

ANAN: Yes, of course.

KIRK: Computer don't kill a half million people.

ANAN: Deaths have been registered. Of course they have twenty four hours to
report.

KIRK: To report?

ANAN: To our disintegration machines. You must understand, Captain, we have
been at war for five hundred years. Under ordinary conditions, no civilisation
could withstand that. But we have reached a solution.

SPOCK: Then the attack by Vendikar was theoretical.

ANAN: Oh, no, quite real. An attack is mathematically launched. I lost my wife
in the last attack. Our civilisation lives. The people die, but our culture
goes on.

KIRK: You mean to tell me your people just walk into a disintegration machine
when they're told to?

ANAN: We have a high consciousness of duty, Captain.

SPOCK: There is a certain scientific logic about it.

ANAN: I'm glad you approve.

SPOCK: I do not approve. I understand.

ANAN: Good. Then you will recall I warned you not to come here. You chose to
ignore my warning. I'm sorry, but it's happened.

KIRK: What has happened?

ANAN: Once your ship was in orbit about our planet, it became a legitimate
target. It has been classified destroyed by a tricobalt satellite explosion.
All persons aboard your ship have twenty four hours to report to our
disintegration machines. In order to ensure their co-operation, I have ordered
you, Captain, and your party held in custody until they surrender. If
possible, we shall spare your ship, Captain, but its passengers and crew are
already dead.

------
mzs
The blinding laser made an interesting point. My wife had surgery last year
where she told the surgeons to spare the use of her face rather than her
vision should they run into a situation requiring a choice. She also knew
going in that she would lose balance and hearing on one side. Different people
(and cultures) value different things. She would much rather be deaf and blind
than disfigured in any way. The point about potentially increasing casualties
though is valid.

Another point is regarding the targeting. When a missile strikes, assuming it
strikes the intended target and meets the objective, there tend to be other
losses as well. It's very disconcerting that it's people (even the objective)
doing day to day things during that time. What is worse is that US considers
16-49 year old males as enemy combatants in that case and does not report that
as civilian casualties. It's true it would be very hard and when it's at a
training camp or the like it's more likely, but it's not always the case.

Finally some of my family lived through WWII and some are still alive. The
stories they told before passing and those still here tell are chilling. War
is insane and inhumane. Unless you have this sort of account it's nearly
impossible to comprehend how callous and capricious the events can be. Take
the recent hospital strike. Of course the US military will do all they can to
fight hard in the rules of engagement. They will call in airstrikes when ever
they can and then you have civilian casualties. To war you have to live with
that.

------
patcon
I'll just drop this here:

The Strange Tale of the Norden Bombsight
[https://www.ted.com/talks/malcolm_gladwell](https://www.ted.com/talks/malcolm_gladwell)

~~~
Animats
For a sense of the problem, watch this Norden bombsight training film.[1] This
shows a training mission; the geometry of dropping a bomb with the sight is
covered in [2]. Three's lots of looking at crosshairs while making fine
adjustments to knobs. It's not enough to get the crosshairs on target;
approach and drift speeds have to be set so that the crosshairs stay on target
as the plane moves. This is a four-knob job; basically X, Y, dX, and dY. All
this has to be done in an airplane, often while people are shooting at you
from the ground or attacking the bomber with fighters. The aircraft had to be
flown straight and level for a minute or so approaching the target while the
bombardier adjusted all the knobs. That seldom happened in combat against any
defended target.

[1] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DlW-
JCqGkYo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DlW-JCqGkYo) [2]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eh3hknntD10](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eh3hknntD10)

~~~
mzs
Also Norden did not want to work with Sperry which had some better gyroscopes
and less production issues.

------
kaonashi
Curious how much of this is actually about making things 'humane' and how much
is for recruiting purposes.

If you're running a war against a worthy opponent, _everyone_ needs to get
behind it if you have a chance at succeeding.

It's also a pretty despicable thing to have to get behind, and not everyone is
going to want to on purely moral grounds.

If you can somehow soften the edges, at least in theory, you might be able to
convince otherwise inconvincible segments of your own society to at least
tacitly support the effort.

------
7952
Of course there is some twisted logic in actually killing people in war as it
removes the possibility of an enemy fighting again. If everyone just
surrenders at the first sign of a drone, or else is intent on suicide it just
becomes a form of policing rather than war.

------
mladenkovacevic
I wonder who commissioned this article.

------
danharaj
Really gizmodo? Your adherence to the Betteridge rule made me gag a little.
The question in the headline is abhorrent, even if the body of the article is
somewhat sensible.

It's honestly the worst line of investigation I could think of. Instead of
this question, I think the best premise is to ask how we got the point where
the image of constantly belligerent western militaries is distorted into a
picture of humanity and outright magnanimous consideration for human life?

~~~
the8472
> It's honestly the worst line of investigation I could think of.

Really? You don't think investigating whether technological progress has (or
hasn't) improved the damages caused by war is worthwhile?

The issue that we somehow can't manage to stop going to war is a distinct one.
Just because it would be preferable to not start wars in the first place
asking followup questions about the effectiveness of attempts to reduce
collateral damage and indiscriminate slaughter when we do seems reasonable to
me.

------
danboarder
According to Betteridge's law* a title in the form a question can be answered
with a "No".

That said, this article does explore developments in precision tech resulting
in "less killing" or "more targeted killing".

When will the global community work on growing past the age of war? Perhaps
toward an age of military competition without death.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge's_law_of_headlines](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge's_law_of_headlines)

------
KaiserPro
Sorry, but what world are you living in?

Yes, now that its not fashionable to report how many of the "enemy" are killed
or injured at the end of each day, it doesn't mean that they are not killed.

The sheer colossal waste of life for the last three big wars, is overwhelming.
In iraq we(the west) killed the best part of at least 100,000 people. Then
with the sheer ineptitude of occupation set the seeds for a bloody civil war
that is still raging (ISIS et al is just a direct consequence) claiming god
knows how many people through active fighting a week, and a magnitude more
because of the breakdown of the fabric of society.

Yes, we have precision bombs. Yes we have drones. but that just means that we,
the west don't directly get hurt. Not the "enemy", or the poor fuckers that
happen to be in the way.

Do you know why the current calibre for most nato guns is 5.56mm? yes partly
because its smaller, partly because there is less kick, but also because its
less lethal.

An injured enemy requires more resources to rescue, causes a distraction, and
mental anguish.

As described by many, more gifted people, war is hell.

And right now, futile.

~~~
67726e
> but also because its less lethal

Source? The reason I've always gotten is that it causes the bullet to
"tumble"[0] once it enters the body which causes even greater damage to the
body than simply passing through, which results in a greater lethality.

[0] - [http://www.futurefirepower.com/myths-about-the-
nato-556-cart...](http://www.futurefirepower.com/myths-about-the-
nato-556-cartridge)

~~~
hga
_All_ bullets will tumble when they change media like that, they do a 180 and
if in the body long enough will exit rearwards.

There's enough bullshit in the link you reference that it should be entirely
ignored, the twist rate pertains to getting the bullet to spin fast enough to
be stabilized in the air, it's not going to significantly affect the stability
once it changes media. It's been decreased, bullets are spun faster, because
we've adopted a heavier and disproportionately longer round (has a soft steel
penetrating capsule), and the particularly long tracer version requires a 1:7
twist rate.

Cavitation, which causes the effect called temporary stretch cavity, is if you
believe Dr. Martin Fackler, not a major wounding mechanism, most tissue will
snap back without major effects. Permanent crush cavity is what counts.

This is not the general understanding when the round was adopted, it's what
Facker found out after a lot of surgery in Vietnam lead to a career in wound
ballistics and shooting a lot of blocks of _calibrated_ gelatin etc. to figure
out what actually happens.

~~~
67726e
Source?

~~~
hga
In particular Fackler's works that are available on the net, but I'm under the
impression that's general knowledge, plus the basic physics.

Now that I think about it I'm not sure what the official story is with
expanding bullets, which are not under discussion here, but I can't see how
adding drag to the lighter end of the bullet will change this. And of course
it'll depend on profile, I'm talking about spitzer rifle bullets, a putative
fully jacketed wadcutter, a simple cylinder, wouldn't have any reason to swap
ends.

------
gitpusher
No. War is categorically inhumane. There are no gray areas.

You can add layers of abstraction on top of the violence – much like Tesla
owners are abstracted away from the pollution that powers their vehicles – but
at the end of the day, someone is on the receiving end of a weapon designed to
kill, and you can't sugar-coat that.

~~~
walshemj
As opposed to area bombing ww2 style - modern war takes far more care to avoid
collateral damage.

~~~
ihsw
You're kidding, right?

The operation in the Iraq War (2003) was a shit show -- we steamrolled Iraq's
entire public infrastructure, funneled untold millions/billions into Islamist
and Western militias, and killed/wounded tens of thousands of Americans,
Iraqis, or otherwise.

In Yemen and Afghanistan we send drones over with abandon, not taking care to
avoid civilians or that we're hitting the right target.

And after all that, hundreds of billions of dollars are thrown away. Not only
is collateral damage there but it's here too -- we are wasting money on
dubious programs that have no measurable indicator of success and no end in
sight.

War is every bit as ugly as it was a century ago.

~~~
walshemj
No I am not - you can't compare Iraq to fire bombing Dresden or Tokyo with a
single air raid killing 50k plus in a single night.

Let alone what happened on the ground in ww2 read Bevors Stalingrad or Berlin.

IRAQ was a CF but its relatively more humane than ww2

