Totally agree, not to mention the need for democracies to have all the best tools at their disposal to deter (and if necessary defeat) totalitarian nations. I think the war in Ukraine has shown us that the days of dictatorships and invasions are not yet over and that weaponry is still needed to defend democracy.
I don't think anyone is arguing that many nations, including democracies like the U.S., are infallible and haven't done awful things in the past (and probably are doing some awful things now and probably will in the future), but I can tell you that I would much rather live in a world where the U.S. and countries with similar democratic values and at least some measure of accountability have the tools needed to stand up to dictatorships and authoritarianism. We can see how bad those societies are not just for the people that live under them (ex. however flawed the American political system, I appreciate being able to have a real choice when I vote instead of a phony election), but for how they try to force their will on the rest of the world (Russia in Ukraine being the most obvious example). I hate that we need weapons and force to protect our values, I really do, but I just don't see any real alternative to being able and willing to fight when necessary.
Not every case will fit the parent’s criteria but it’s important to understand how the US’ realpolitik has affected the world. We (the US) are not always the white knight.
The U.S. makes mistakes in terms of doing the wrong thing. But because it’s a democracy, it is capable of recognizing those mistakes and attempting to make amends. For example the internment of people of Japanese descent during world war 2, it was terrible for the folks rounded up and put into camps. It took 40 years, but we acknowledged it was wrong.
“In 1988, Congress passed, and President Reagan signed, Public Law 100-383 – the Civil Liberties Act of 1988 – that acknowledged the injustice of "internment," apologized for it, and provided a $20,000 cash payment to each person who was incarcerated.”
If you are in a dictatorship, that acknowledgement of a past wrong is absolutely impossible. That’s why democracy is so important. George Takei makes this point much more eloquently that I ever could, and it’s why he believes so strongly in democracy.
Yes, that was the whole point, he explicitly went around apologizing for Stalin and a lot of the stuff he did.. Rehabilitation of Volga germans, freeing political prisoners, partial? abolition of prison labor, shaming/removing Stalin's lieutenants, etc.
>There was no apology for Holodomor
There wasn't any apology for that, not that I'm aware of.
I think they are commenting on atlassianshrugged's tacit assumption that american foreign policy and military power is always used in support of democracy against totalitarianism, with a sarcastic reference to a socialist democracy that the CIA helped overthrow and replace with a military Junta.
There is literally a U.S. law nicknamed the “Hague Invasion Act” that allows the president to authorize military action if an international body attempts to prosecute American citizens for war crimes.
> failure when criminals anywhere aren't head to account
Not just anywhere, but specifically here in America; but you wouldn't know from all the downvotes if folks are okay with holding American war criminals to account. The propaganda of "saving democracies" is too strong.
There is a fair amount of startup activity in defense around software/tooling. There isn't a ton in hardware for same reason you don't see as many consumer startups doing hardware, it's very expensive and risky business.
Like the Russians who are invading Ukraine? I mean yes, everyone is a citizen of somewhere, that's how we've structured global society but I'm not sure what your point is.
The insinuation here is that even the civilians are invaders? OP is talking about what's brushed aside as collateral damage, especially easily when things go south overseas.
OP said > The people we drop bombs on are citizens of somewhere too.
Nowhere in that sentence did I see an insinuation that we were talking about civilians (and I was specifically talking about Russian soldiers). But when we discuss collateral damage, yes that happens sometimes and its awful. However, take how much collateral damage Ukraine causes in Russia when fighting back and how much Russia causes in terms of civilian lives, infrastructure, etc. and it feels pretty clear to me that democratic nations are probably net better at minimizing collateral damage (and generally following international norms and treaties for human rights) than authoritarian regimes.
This statement is applicable to the US killing of Osama Bin Laden and is a perfect example of how beyond parody useless the UN is. Terrorists purposely use failed states and states which may have security apparatuses which are sympathetic to them (in the case of Pakistan and Osama) for safe harbor. They are legal combatants and should not be left to their own devices.
But listen, we have to defend democracy! (Despite being a federal republic.) We have to fund international interests! (Despite having various national problems.)
I strongly urge you to attend a history class, because only part of that is comparable to funding international wars for no gain or defensive reason. If the America of 1943 had the choice between its people or Ukraine, it would choose its people. Because that’s literally what we did while England and Poland was being bombed by the Nazis. It wasn’t until the Japanese made us get involved that we did anything. The closer example to now is indeed the cold war, but a lot of the “war on communism” was not only incredibly disruptive to smaller countries, and its efficacy over the long term was questionable, especially considering the USSR died out naturally.
It’s not nice or effective to imply I don’t know my history because I came to a conclusion you disagree with. For all you know I’m an absolute history nut.
It’s better to ask for my reasoning and explain your own opposing point of view.
You need new teachers then. The US was deeply involved long before Pearl Harbor, even if it didn’t have boots on the ground. The Soviets didn’t die out naturally, but due to the fierce competition with the US which they could not sustain that bankrupted them. North Korea never tried to compete in such a way which is why it continues to exist as a hermit Stalinist cult.
I work in the defense industry as an engineer, for one of the larger defense companies, a few thoughts on this:
- The defense industry is ripe for disruption, defense contractors are very top-heavy, siloed, and bureaucratic, and incredibly inefficient. However, there are structural issues to getting new companies started, and I don’t see anything in Ares that inspires confidence that they will succeed.
- Cash flow is a big problem for small government contractors. Although there are funding initiatives, such as SBIR, to encourage small entrepreneurship in government contracting, it’s generally difficult to transition out of that because the government can take an inordinate amount of time to provide the funds that they promise to a contractor. You can, of-course, get a loan from a third party to fill your funding gap, but that will eat into your profit margin. Size is a form of protection here because other contracts and programs can buffer against cash flow problems in one program.
- funding mechanisms, and laws surrounding them, the FAR in particular, incentivizes against non-traditional corporate organizing and being effective in execution. If you’ve made the transition to being a more established company, you’re getting bigger contracts, you will be following Earned Value (EV). This is required for contracts of a certain, agency defined, size. EV more-or-less requires you to follow waterfall development. It means you effectively cannot do agile development, although you can find examples of contractors using SAFe and other forms of Dark Agile, these are merely waterfall down poorly with extra steps. EV is a large bureaucratic undertaking, requiring certified earned value management systems and dedicated professionals, such as CAMs, planners, quality engineering, and contracts managers. This in service of being accountable, and making sure tax payer dollars are spent wisely, but it takes money to do this. You can’t capitalize on the benefits of being flexible and innovating with government funds because you need to report metrics as if you’ve laid out your entire plan at the start of the project.
- Defense startups effectively have one customer, the US Federal Government. Although it is true that foreign military sales (FMS) happen for a variety of defense articles, all of these sales need to be approved by the US State Department, meaning you are entirely dependent on the executive branch to give you business. How many investors would like to invest in a product that is limited by one party in determining how much you will grow?
None of these comments here are reassuring. As if people’s concerns about developing weapon technology are economic concerns lol.
- Partner countries like Israel (however you feel about that) will eventually use whatever we make. America will not be sole user.
- America’s police is not afraid to use technology on its own citizens. Obviously they don’t have access to missile defense, but there are plenty examples of them getting military hardware.
I am not actually 100% never-make-weapons, but I have strong doubts anyone profit-motivated is strongly thinking about the second order effects.
Hear your concerns but don't you have to look at what your enemy is doing and use that as the barometer for whether you're sufficiently innovative? Seeing Ukraine barely eke through shows we need low cost options
I don't know about you, but for me, "the enemy" describes the government of the country I live in, at least much and probably more so than anybody abroad.
> - Partner countries like Israel (however you feel about that) will eventually use whatever we make. America will not be sole user.
Regarding second-order effects, I take great comfort in that. Once upon a time people were able to discriminate between a country which uses violence to achieve goals (say kidnapping, murdering, and raping 1500 youth attending a concert) and national defense.
The US funded internet research and promoted its deregulation internally in belief that promotion of American values was something worthwhile. Post-Soviet era US tech was not conflicted in promoting a set of values in line with both its cultural and economic interests.
I see this as a small step in that direction, however tepid it may be.
There's also a second order effect to not having the most competent military. Would you rather the US military was less effective than it is today? Or only less effective than it might be?
The american tech industry in general and YC specifically used to be softly, subtly technofascist. The last 18 months it has been shifting more towards overtly so. This is another notch on that ratchet, rather than a totally new thing.
You don’t have to be a fascist to support the arms industry existing. Oddly enough, even some libertarians think that having a military is a good thing for governments to do.
Military strength is a Red Queen’s race; you need to run just to stand still.
Silicon valley’s foundation is building tools of war to defeat fascists. Today we face a new revisionist expansionist ethno state, and their tech companies are lock step with their government in matters of military and espionage. We can choose to either defend our democracy and the world’s most diverse nation or not.
> Silicon valley’s foundation is building tools of war to defeat fascists
Entirely by accident - the US wasn't fighting fascists for some ideals of democracy and freedom, or to liberate conquered peoples, or to save Jews being slaughtered; but because the fascists were invading and declaring war left and right, including against the US. Without Japan attacking, and Germany joining, the US would have probably sat the war out (of course still contributing a lot of armaments and loans to the UK, but that was probably as far as the public and Congress would have allowed things to go).
> the world’s most diverse nation
The US doesn't even make the top 50 other than in religion, which doesn't count IMO (because US subreligious groups are incredibly close to one another):
> Y Combinator backs its first defense startup, Ares Industries
That's not true - a quick search reveals a bunch of direct defense companies, like Apollo Shield, and a ton of companies building in the defense space:
I agree that production volume during high intensity wartime is important but most of the time isn't high intensity wartime.
The US is procuring a couple hundred cruise missiles per year right now, and unit cost isn't the reason they aren't buying more. If 100% of volume went to Ares (it won't) at 1/10th the cost, would that even be a sustainable business model? US manufacturing with US based input suppliers isn't cheap and neither are security cleared workforces.
At "10x smaller and 10x cheaper" I'm wondering if they are making traditional "cruise missiles" or something closer to what is being referred to as "fpv drones" in Ukraine...
They might be betting on a change in doctrine emphasizing this sort of platform, and/or the ability to sell directly to Ukraine (and to countries in similar conflicts going forwards), rather than looking at existing cruise missile contracts and trying to compete with those. Drones are one of the items I frequently see in the news as "Ukraine is purchasing these" instead of "these have been donated to Ukraine".
(This is pure speculation, everything I know about this company is from the article being discussed)
If there is anything unique about the military in the US, it's that the budget is extremely sticky and it only goes up. Its basically as "recession-proof" as it gets. Why wouldn't you fund a startup that targets:
1) A niche with a well defined TAM and stable growth prospects
2) No real recession prospects
3) Entrenched players that by all accounts are inefficient
4) An industry where its hard to imagine FTC really flexing its muscles to prevent anti-competitive mergers, in an era where FTC is trying to shut off the acquisition exit for startups.
It's also a part of a much bigger trend, Gov spending as a % of GDP is trending only one way over the last 70 years in the West(up) and so at a certain point why not explicitly start targeting the government as your end user?
Onebrief makes military planning software so it’s a matter of where people mentally draw the line. Ares is literally making weapons, so I could imagine that being the line for some people, though not for all surely.
We live in the most peaceful world ever, and within the last 30 years the US, which is where Ares and Y Combinator is located, has been the most belligerent state by a country mile.
Si vis pacem, par bellum does not really apply to the United States. The US is bellum paratum enough for war to be it's own election, and it has elected for war enough to know that making more weapons for the US won't being any peace.
I think there's a distinction between being involved in conflicts and being belligerent. Post fall of the Soviet Union the U.S. took on the role of world police, and that included getting involved in lots of conflicts that probably normally would have been fought by regional powers (ex. Desert Storm/Kuwait, Bosnia). The standout here of course is Iraq/Afghanistan, but in terms of globally belligerent behavior China seems to be the clear winner here, no (or maybe N. Korea but seems more regional)? Trying to redraw boundaries, creating artificial islands, aggressive maneuvers endangering Philippine and Japanese sailors, everything regarding Taiwan, aggressive trade tactics... the list goes on.
There's a neighborhood in my city where this family has taken on the role of community police. Strangely enough, most people outside that family believe they have taken on the role of the dominant criminal gang; I wonder why that is. When accused of violence, they mention the belligerence of some of their (real and imaginary) rivals.
This distinction is far too subjective and biased.
First of all, the vast majority of conflicts the US was involved in would not have been fought by regional powers, or not with that intensity, see Libya, various conflicts in South America, etc...
Second, when the US was in China's position, it did everything China does right now, with even more violence. The US annexed, failed to annex or dominate every one of it's neighbors until it relented. There has been no fundamental change in policy since then.
Yes, it's unlikely that a defence industry won't ever seem 'necessary'.
However, if we are going to take an ethical perspective, it seems like a particularly inopportune time to be joining the industry given that the intended customer (the US government) has refused to abide by its own laws with regard to selling weapons to regimes that fail to meet the necessary standards.
Women and children in Yeman would be an example of misuse of US weapons.
*War Atrocities in Yemen Linked to US Weapons
Columbia Law School researchers have unveiled a disturbing connection between American arms and civilian deaths.
a joint investigation by the Security Force Monitor [..] recently concluded that a “substantial portion” of airstrikes that have killed civilians in Yemen have been carried out by jets developed, sold, and maintained by US companies and flown by US-trained pilots.
We used to have a major, major war every generation.
Improved weaponry (and nukes) have been a huge force for peace since 1945. There have been only proxy wars since then and battle deaths per 100k people dropped off a cliff.
Silicon Valley was building chips and systems for the Department of Defense long before the internet and startups were a gleam in anyone's eye. The US is an oligarchy and the success permitted any business in the US is a function of its subservience and utility to the military industrial complex.
Look up the early history of Google and Facebook, you'll find tons of links to three letter agencies. Every FAANG (or whatever the acronym du jour is now) or equivalent startup is run by spooks and sociopaths with blood on their hands. That's just how America works.
> spooks and sociopaths with blood on their hands. That's just how America works.
Even in certain unnamed European countries, they proliferate more freely than you'd think, staying unnoticed as long as they’re deniably placating their wrongdoings within the civilian sector. Certain ones are known to become increasingly bold as they encroach on organized crime and PMC breeding grounds, both in close proximity, as of recently. It happens in seemingly ordinary situations, and you'd be surprised at how insidious certain individuals can become.
So we have nuclear weapons but we can't use them because then our enemies will use theirs and everyone loses.
But if cruise missiles (or drones, or anything else that put explosives on a target) become cheap enough to basically allow you to loiter thousands of weapons over any conflict area, overwhelm any defense, and annihilate all the enemy's material it becomes a similar game of mutual destruction.
An analogy could be a light dimmer switch compared to an on/off light switch (nuclear is on/off, while the dimmer can be strategically adjusted without complete mutual destruction)
In this world of super cheap standoff weapons, I don't think incrementalism makes sense. It may not even make sense today. In the first few days of conflict with China, we'll basically blow each other up and we'll be back to MAD. Even if we're slightly better and survive with a few ships, I don't think China will be like, "Oh - you used conventional weapons to annihilate our fleet - that's fair, we won't retaliate with nuclear."
Russian EW is so far ahead of the US that even Excalibur shells are useless. Most of the missiles the US provides Ukraine have had to be updated constantly. Not saying it doesn't have it's place but it will need to fly without GPS or have some serious anti EW capabilities. They should send it to Ukraine and see how it works out for them. That will be the acid test....
Russian EW is not even close to American. Excalibur just uses GPS, just about any EE here could come up with a jammer. Cruise missiles use terrain tracking in addition to other means so they can operate with in a contested environment.
'Defence Industry' (emphasis on defence) is a bit new-speak. It's hard to see a cruise missile as 'defensive' (yeah, I know the rationalisations that leads to offence being a kind of defence).
I appreciated one quote in particular from the recent Times profile of Alex Karp:
> Silicon Valley is telling the average American ‘I will not support your defense needs’ while selling products that are adversarial to America. That is a loser position.
I think that’s fair. And selling to the very deep-pocketed defense sector is obviously a winner position.
