Why Snipers Kill

An American sniper sits with a Ukrainian one to discuss ethics in targeting.

We conditioned ourselves that Talibs were targets and little else. Our time revolved around killing them as they killed us, and before they killed us more.

It would take years for me to realize how indoctrinated we all were. Raptor already understood — at least enough to articulate his findings to a stranger in a stairwell amid the thud of distant artillery strikes — that he was killing a human being, and trying to explain why.

“I don’t want to kill, but I have to — I’ve seen what they’ve done,”

Beneath the surface of the story is an American soldier warning about being trained to think not very deeply or independently about targets.

We found ourselves in the middle of some poorly thought-out counterinsurgency strategy, propping up a corrupt government that collapsed almost as soon as the United States left. We were protecting each other. That became a binding ideology, all the clarity we could summon in the puzzle our politicians in Washington handed us. We stumbled through exhausted, mouthing our lines, until our tours ended and we were discharged.

Protecting each other in a puzzle of politics is less dramatic than it sounds. Who goes inside the red circle depends on who gets defined as “each other”.

More to the point (of a spear) is the role of authorization in conflict. Is authority entirely controlled within a vacuum, as commonly found in dictatorship, or based on an inhereted set of laws and order (e.g. humanitarianism, war crimes)? And how easy is it for people to move between two opposed extremes where being on the wrong side means death?

American military orders have sometimes evolved far more on the side of “because I said so”, which lack very important “woke” (e.g. accountability) concepts that are essential to maintaining order beyond “each other”. Proper mindfulness, even liberalism if you will, is shunned and soldiers are left vulnerable to falling into line under bad authority.

The Vietnam War wasn’t enough of a lesson, obviously.

It reminds me of a Navy MARSOC who said he had a degree in sociology. “That must be useful in pulling the trigger” I said optimistically. “I call in what I see to get my orders, and I follow those orders” he replied with a curt and somewhat annoyed and condescending tone.

On the flip side a Navy SEAL related to me how he gave orders of full independent discretion to protect assets, yet one of his team immediately called in asking to verify authorization to kill a French soldier nearby making sloppy work that gave false appearances of being a threat instead of friendly.

It is no wonder the American soldier in this story is so surprised to hear Ukranian snipers carry into battle a more complete set of “woke” tools, better prepared for combat in heart and mind. Part of the problem for American military training is it doesn’t properly come to terms with its own past, such as creating the Taliban let alone being founded on principles of expanding slavery.

It’s not truly a hard problem to solve, fortunately. America needs more promotion of the learnings from Generals Grant and Sherman, more emphasis around soldiers John Brown and Silas Soule, with far less or even no more nonsense about the toxicity of Washington, Jackson, Polk and Wilson.

Related: America’s Most Evil War

And don’t even get me started on how the immoral and oppressive Washington and Lee were allowed to become the name of a learning center in America (e.g. imagine naming a college in Ukraine for Stalin and Putin).

Hamas Call Intercepted: Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza Bombed by Islamic Jihad

Even seasoned journalists have been commenting to me repeatedly that they need better source analysis and perspective in this new war to find truth. Hopefully this helps.

The Israeli government alleges it has a recording of Hamas itself identifying the Ahli Arab hospital bombers, as reported by The Guardian.

Israel’s foreign ministry has published what it claims is an intercepted call between two Hamas operatives where they discuss how the al-Ahli al-Arabi hospital has been struck by a failed rocket fired from within Gaza.

Reuters reported additional details provided by the Israeli Defense Forces.

…chief military spokesperson Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said an investigation had “confirmed that there was no IDF (Israel Defence Forces) fire from the land, sea or air that hit the hospital”. He said there was no structural damage to buildings around the Al-Ahli al-Arabi hospital and no craters consistent with an air strike. Asked to explain the size of the explosion at the site, Hagari said it was consistent with unspent rocket fuel catching fire. “Most of this damage would have been done due to the propellant, not just the warhead,” he said.

Israel has categorically denied targeting hospitals, however we know they also gave orders to evacuate by October 14 (four days ago) on the premise of reducing civilian casualties by moving them out of harms way.

Al Awda Hospital was struggling to evacuate dozens of patients and staff after the military contacted it and told it to do so by Friday night, said the aid group Doctors Without Borders, known as MSF, which supports the facility. The military extended the deadline to Saturday morning, it said.

As a historian, I am reminded of the Yalta Conference 4 February 1945 when Stalin opened the conversation with Churchill by asking “why haven’t you bombed Dresden?”

The issue for Stalin was this German city had become a weapons manufacturing and military command center. We also know very clearly today that it had become an essential hub of Nazi operations for brutally targeting and killing millions of civilians.

Ten days later, the Allied commanders unleashed nearly 800 Allied planes and upwards of 4,000 tons of explosives to destroy Nazi ability to orchestrate further attacks from Dresden.

Afterwards Churchill expressed disappointment with high civilian casualties, to which Air Chief Marshal Arthur “Bomber” Harris famously wrote to the Air Ministry in response:

Actually Dresden was a mass of munitions works, an intact government centre, and a key transportation point to the East. It is now none of these things.

The Axis also tried to propagandize the destruction of Dresden. Their military was known to regularly target civilians with strafing, indiscriminate bombing and even aiming at ambulances and hospitals. The Nazis thus tried to accuse an Allied “dicker Hund” over Dresden of using same inhumane tactics, yet ultimately none of such targeting accusations were found to be true. The opposite, undermining Nazi propaganda, Churchill was very clearly displeased with the air force adopting inhumane “area bombing” tactics and pressed for improved precision to avoid civilians. Inhumane, and also different from other inhumane acts.

Tragically 25,000 German civilians were killed by British use of widespread area bombing. The operation continues to be debated to this day for many reasons, yet the Nazi occupation of a city to perpetuate and orchestrate their massive Holocaust is front and center to any discussion about nineteen Dresden hospitals destroyed in 1945.

Based on reports so far there has been no evidence that Israel targeted or even accidentally hit the hospital with bombs.

I expect further investigation to continue and reports to evolve. One intercepted call isn’t alone enough to prove fault, which is why Israel also has been providing details that can easily be verified.

Update Oct 19:

The Guardian provides further analysis (OSINT) that the hospital was blown up by Islamic Jihad.

Justin Bronk, the senior research fellow for airpower and military technology at RUSI in London, said that while the results were not conclusive, no crater or obvious shrapnel pattern consistent with standard [Israeli] JDAM bombs was visible in images of the aftermath. “If this is the extent of the damage then I’d say an airstrike looks less likely than a rocket failure causing an explosion and fuel fire,” he added.

And again:

Marc Garlasco, a former Pentagon chief of high value targeting during the Iraq war in 2003, told the Guardian: “The number [of casualties] is astronomically high, an absolute high range of all time if true. “The crater is not consistent with an airstrike, it is more likely to be a weapon that failed and released its payload over a wide area. “The crater and surrounding damage is also not consistent with a JDAM aerial bomb. The hole on the ground occurred from kinetic energy.”

Thousands of people had moved into the large open courtyard of the hospital, instead of evacuating the city.

Just hours before the fateful bombing, the refugee children who sought safe shelter at Ahli Hospital gathered in the courtyard of Ahli Hospital together to sing for peace (“Salaam”), in a moving moment of solidarity and joy amidst the darkness. […] We do know that Director Suhaila Tarazi evacuated South before the attack, and is presumed safe.

Then, according to the intercepted Hamas call, a rocket was fired from the cemetery adjacent to the hospital that failed on launch and instead landed directly on the hospital.

Satellite view of the cemetery in Gaza adjacent to Ahli Arab hospital (H) that Hamas says was used by terrorists to launch missiles at civilians. Source: Google Maps

Notably, three days earlier the hospital also had been struck by rockets being fired nearby.

Rockets being fired nearby on October 14 struck the hospital upper floors, injuring four staff. Source: AFEDJ

The question I don’t see being asked, yet surely on the mind of reporters, is what kind of group would position rocket launches near one of the oldest and most famous hospitals in Gaza being used to shelter children?

Gaza terrorists launching large rockets so near to a hospital, immoral acts to intentionally use civilians as shields while also targeting civilians, increasingly are being proven to be the predictable and sole cause of the Ahli Arab tragedy.

Update Oct 23:

The NYT has apologized formally to its readers for bad reporting on this incident (parroting terrorist propaganda).

The early versions of the coverage—and the prominence it received in a headline, news alert and social media channels—relied too heavily on claims by Hamas, and did not make clear that those claims could not immediately be verified. […] The report left readers with an incorrect impression about what was known and how credible the account was. […] Times editors should have taken more care with the initial presentation.

“Taken more care” implies editors did more than nothing. It reads to me more like the NYT should have taken care.

Kudos to the Guardian for showing how to do a better job of it. Should be obvious to not parrot terrorist propaganda.

Mercedes Roasts Tesla in New Crash Test

There’s a lot to unpack from what Mercedes is saying about its new crash test, because of what isn’t being said.

I’ll do my best to translate the important points found in The Driven.

Euro NCAP requires a frontal impact test that uses a 1,400kg trolley travelling at 50km/h with an aluminium honeycomb barrier that replicates the front of another vehicle.

Too light and too slow for EV conditions, especially given the massively heavy Tesla tend to crash head on into other cars going more like 100km/h.

Mercedes-Benz, however, recently decided to go one further – conducting a crash test between two of its own electric vehicles – the EQA and EQS SUV.

Like Volvo, Mercedes is aiming for real world data to improve chances of survival. It’s not just a checkmark game for them. They put two of their vehicles head-on at 56km/h.

“As a result, the passenger safety cell of both electric models remained intact, and the doors could still be opened. In an emergency, this would make it possible for occupants to exit the vehicle on their own or for first responders and rescue personnel to reach them.”

Tesla are well known to trap occupants after a crash, doors inoperable especially from the inside. First responders also often fail to get Tesla doors open. Multiple lawsuits and complaints from the grieving families of Tesla victims are related to obviously defective door safety.

The high-voltage system in both the EQA and the EQS SUV also switched off automatically during the collision, ensuring the safety of the battery and all components with a voltage above 60 volts.

Tesla is known to burst into electric fires, filling the car with toxic smoke and burning occupants alive as they struggle to open a door.

A total of four adult crash test dummies were involved – three females and one male. Analysis of the up to 150 measuring points per dummy showed a low risk of serious to fatal injury during the crash.

Women have different physical attributes but rarely if ever are represented in safety tests. This results in women being nearly 75 percent more likely to be injured in frontal road collisions.

…all safety equipment, including airbags and belt tensioners with belt force limiters, worked as intended.

Tesla deaths lately have had an uptick of people thrown from the car. Should we add belt failure to the list of things the low quality brand has engineered incorrectly?

All very important results that show a car company thinking hard about real engineering and real values. It’s clearly roasting meaningless high “safety” scores; overly contrived tests have been gamed by immoral Tesla engineers in order to defraud and even kill their customers. Mercedes can’t say that out loud, however.

CA Tesla Kills Two in “Veered” Crash Into Tree

Condolences are pouring out in Fresno by a community that says it’s “shocked” to hear a Tesla suddenly “veered” into a tree and killed its passengers, like so many others.

Dr. Alfred Valles, 50, and Selina Valles, 46, were killed at 9:30 p.m. Friday when they were traveling north on Friant Road and crashed into a tree in the middle divider of Friant near Rice Road, north of Champlain Drive. Police confirmed Monday the vehicle involved was a Tesla…

Perhaps that tree saved lives by preventing another head-on collision.

Source: Google Maps

Related:

  • CA Tesla kills mother and child in “veered” crash into tree
  • CA Tesla kills nurse in “veered” crash into pole
  • Veered” crashes a known fatal defect ignored by Tesla since 2017