Drones UAV
MERRI OK, PROLLY NEGLECT, UKRAINE, IRAN WAR 3
ANDURIL PALMER LUCKEY 1780 CAPITAL TRUMP KIDS
SEE PRIVACY SURVEILLANCE
SEE autonomous weapons
ERIK PRINCE?
KOCH?
see blue bros
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Exposing the $1 Trillion Murderbot Grift
Premiered Aug 20, 2026
From Palmer Luckey to Google's Eric Schmidt, the Murderbot Revolution is already here. TAKE ACTION: https://safe.ai/
Exposing the $1 Trillion Murderbot Grift
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this video is so important. In 1942, the science fiction writer Isaac Azimov could already envision Terminator killer
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robots wiping out humanity. So, he proposed three common sense laws of robotics that would have to be the core
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principles in the development of AI if we as a human species ever wanted a chance to survive. And the rules, they
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were simple. One, a robot may not injure a human being or through inaction allow a human being to come to harm. Two, a
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robot must obey the orders given to it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the first law. And
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three, a robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the first or second law. They're pretty
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straightforward. And Azimov wanted this to be the base operating system of every robot, baked into the very core of all
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AI. Unfortunately, in the real world, ethics don't trump capitalism. Palmer Ly's company makes and sells weapons.
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And his first investor was none other than Peter Teal, whose company Palunteer does surveillance and analysis that often decides how those strikes are
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carried out. And since its founding, Andrew has raised at least $6.9 billion
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from investors. Of course, they are not the only billionaires profiting on drone delivered death machines.
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What's going to happen is that the autonomy aspects will make automatic killing machines in war much more likely.
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That's Eric Schmidt, the former CEO of Google, who instituted the company's motto, don't be evil, before eventually abandoning that ethos. and founding a
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drone warfare enterprise constructed like a Russian Matruska doll in a set of different shell companies. According to my research, its various names and
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corporate aliases include Swiftbeat and White Stor and Aurelian Industries and Maripos and Veoya Robotics, all meant to
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obscure a single kamicazi and interceptor drone operation that supplies the warfront in Ukraine.
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And I'm not talking about the robots that you see in movies. I'm talking about the equivalent of drones, whether they're sea drones or air drones, that
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are highly automated with highly automated kill chains.
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Some of those automated kill chains are already visible in Palestine.
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Your AI and your technology from Palunteer kills Palestinians, mostly terrorists. That's true.
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Regardless of your feelings about the war in Palestine, we need to all intrinsically understand that who qualifies as a terrorist and who doesn't
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depends on your perspective. I'm personally sanctioned by China as a radical separatist terrorist on account of arming Taiwan. And what really makes
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AI Overview
Anduril Industries, founded by Palmer Luckey, is a defense-tech company that secured a $20 billion enterprise contract with the U.S. Army to streamline drone and counter-drone capabilities. The startup builds autonomous weapons systems—such as drones and submarines—and has built the "Arsenal-1" factory in Ohio for mass production. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
Luckey broadly supports the Trump administration’s regulations on the defense industry, which include capping CEO salaries at $5 million and banning dividends. Backed by advisers like Elon Musk, who advocate opening Pentagon contracts to entrepreneurial tech companies, Anduril continues to scale up production to modernize the U.S. military. [1, 2, 3, 4]
For a closer look at Anduril's AI-driven weapons and manufacturing plans:
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AN 3 26
President Donald Trump reportedly spoke with Russia about whether they are helping Iran and told other officials that he holds them at their word that they aren't involved. Now, it turns out, there is evidence to the contrary.
Speaking to CNBC about the matter on Tuesday, Trump's special envoy, Steve Witkoff, claimed that Russia was being honest with the U.S.
"That's what they said. So, you know, we can take them at their word. But they did say that," Witkoff claimed. "Let’s hope they’re not sharing."
It prompted a question at the White House press briefing on Tuesday when one reporter asked, "The Kremlin put out a statement, a statement where Putin said, 'I would like to reaffirm our unwavering support for Tehran and our solidarity with Iranian friends.' How does the president think that Russia could be helpful if not helping Iran? And did the president push Putin on Russia sharing intelligence with Iran in this war?"
Press secretary Karoline Leavitt softened that emphatic claim by Trump and Witkoff, telling the press, "Both said that they've sent a message to Russia that if that was taking place, it's not something they would be happy with and they hope that it is not taking place."
CNN reported Wednesday morning that Russia has specifically been working with Iran on "advanced drone tactics," a problem that the Defense Department confessed was causing them headaches.
“There are not great defenses available to the U.S. military to defend against the Shahed,” a congressional official told The Atlantic last week after a Capitol Hill briefing with senior Trump administration members.
“So they have to use the defensives they have, which are costly,” the congressional official said. “We have known this for a long time. We don’t have, at scale, good defenses against drones.”
CNN confirmed that Russia is helping Iran with those drone tactics, after facing off against the assault themselves from Ukraine, Western intelligence said.
"Shahed drones, designed by Iran but mass-produced by Moscow for use in Ukraine, have been unexpectedly successful in penetrating the air defenses of Gulf nations," the report explained. "Russian intelligence sharing with Iran has until now been reported as general assistance with targeting, but specific tactical advice is a new level of support."
“What was more general support is now getting more concerning, including UAS [drone] targeting strategies that Russia employed in Ukraine,” the official told CNN.
The individual wouldn't provide specifics about the tactical help.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky wrote on X, “Russia has started supporting the Iranian regime with drones. It will definitely help with missiles, and it is also helping them with air defense."
He has his own drone interception experts and has agreed to send them to aid the U.S. They have a small, easily-produced $5,000 device that can stop the cheap Russian drones.
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an 6 25
"What could possibly go wrong?"
That's a questionNew York Times readers sarcastically asked on social media last Wednesday, after the newspaper reported that Erik Prince, founder of the notorious mercenary firm Blackwater and a key ally of U.S. President Donald Trump, is working with Haiti's interim government "to conduct lethal operations against gangs that are terrorizing the nation and threatening to take over its capital."
The newspaper noted that Prince declined to comment, and while Blackwater is now defunct, the former Navy SEAL "owns other private military entities." The reporting is based on unnamed American and Haitian officials and other security experts.
"Haiti's government has hired American contractors, including Mr. Prince, in recent months to work on a secret task force to deploy drones meant to kill gang members," who "have been killing civilians and seizing control of vast areas of territory" in the Caribbean country, the Times detailed.
"Mr. Prince's team has been operating the drones since March, but the authorities have yet to announce the death or capture of a single high-value target," according to the paper. Pierre Espérance, executive director of the National Human Rights Defense Network in Haiti, said the drone attacks have killed more than 200 people.
American journalist Michael Deibert said on social media, "If this story is accurate, on what authority does Haiti's unelected, temporary interim [government] invite foreign forces into the country and by what means—with whose money—do they intend to pay them for their work there?"
The U.S. State Department has poured millions into Haiti's National Police but told the Times it is not paying Prince.
Deibert said that "as someone who has reported on Haiti's armed groups for 25 years, it's hard to overstate how badly wrong bringing in foreign mercenaries, such as those allied with Erik Prince, will likely go given the current security, social, and political dynamics in the country."
Also weighing in on social media, Keanu Heydari, a history Ph.D. candidate at the University of Michigan, said: "A lot's going on here! A majority-Black nation, hollowed out by decades of foreign intervention, 'turning to' a white war profiteer to restore 'order.' That is not about logistics, this is about coloniality."
Heydari continued:
This isn't a story about drones and gangs. It's about how the world has made it structurally impossible for Haiti to govern itself—then offers mercenaries as a "solution." Haiti's sovereignty has been chipped away by debt, coups, U.N. missions, and now private warlords.Why does Erik Prince show up where Black and Brown countries are in crisis? Because the global market rewards violence disguised as security, especially when it's sold by Westerners to postcolonial states. It's racial capitalism in full view.}:
The NYT missed the story: This isn't a desperate government making tough choices. It's a story of empire outsourcing control, where mercenaries profit from the very chaos empire helped produce. Haiti deserves justice, not occupation by other means. DISASTER CAPL?
The Times article follows The Economist's reporting earlier this month that Haiti's interim government, the Transitional Presidential Council, "is so desperate that it is exploring deals with private military contractors. It has been talking to Osprey Global Solutions, a firm based in North Carolina. The founder of Blackwater, Erik Prince, visited Haiti in April to negotiate contracts to provide attack drones and training for an anti-gang task force. The council declined to comment."
In response to that paragraph in the May 7 article, Jake Johnston, director of international research at the Center for Economic and Policy Research and author of Aid State: Elite Panic, Disaster Capitalism, and the Battle to Control Haiti*, also asked, "What could possibly go wrong?"
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https://www.alternet.org/2020/08/when-robots-wage-our-wars-for-us/
When robots wage our wars for us
An MQ-9 Reaper, armed with GBU-12 Paveway II laser guided munitions and AGM-114 Hellfire missiles, piloted by Col. Lex Turner flies a combat mission over southern Afghanistan. (U.S. Air Force Photo / Lt. Col. Leslie Pratt)
Written by Michael T. Klare / TomDispatch August 25, 2020
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https://www.alternet.org/2020/03/as-coronavirus-pandemic-sweeps-the-globe-trump-authorizes-new-bombing-campaign-in-the-middle-east
no lnx
As coronavirus pandemic sweeps the globe, Trump authorizes new bombing campaign in the Middle East
Written by Jake Johnson / Common Dreams March 13, 2020
Authorized by President Donald Trump, U.S. forces late Thursday carried out a wave of airstrikes across Iraq purportedly targeting an Iran-linked militia that the Pentagon claims was behind a rocket attack that killed two American servicemembers earlier this week.
The airstrikes risk sparking yet another dangerous escalation of military tensions between the U.S. and Iran at a uniquely perilous moment: Both nations are struggling to contain and combat the novel coronavirus, with Iran hit particularly hard by the pandemic as it works to muster adequate medical resources while in the vice grip of Trump administration sanctions.
The Trump White House, meanwhile, is under fire for bungling its response the the outbreak and failing to devote sufficient government resources to fighting COVID-19, which has infected over 1,400 people in the United States—a number that experts say is likely to rise dramatically in the coming days as the disease spreads and the remarkably slow rate of testing picks up speed.
“This moment is the last three decades of U.S. foreign policy in miniature: spare nothing for war and military dominance and find little to spare for true threats like climate change and pandemic disease,” tweeted Stephen Wertheim, deputy director of research and policy at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), a 2020 Democratic presidential candidate, noted Thursday that “the annual Pentagon budget is $738,000,000,000.”
“The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is 1.5% the size,” Sanders tweeted. “If we can find money on bombs and missiles to kill people, we can damn well afford to protect everyone’s health and take care of each other.”
A senior Trump administration official told the Washington Post late Thursday that the president directed U.S. forces to bomb five Kataib Hezbollah weapons facilities with the stated goal of reducing the group’s “ability to carry out future attacks.”
Kataib Hezbollah is the same Iran-linked militia group that the Trump administration blamed—falsely, according to Iraqi officials—for a rocket attack last December that the White House used as a justification to assassinate Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani with a drone strike in Baghdad, a move that nearly sparked an all-out war.
It is not clear whether there were any casualties from the latest round of U.S. airstrikes in Iraq. Harakat al-Nujaba, a separate Iran-backed militia, “accused the United States of hitting militia and Iraqi army headquarters, as well as a civilian airport,” the Post reported.
“In the middle of a global pandemic—while people across the country quarantine in fear and struggle to pay their rent—Trump is bailing out fossil fuel corporations and bombing the Middle East,” tweeted Michael Galant, senior communications associate with advocacy group Win Without War. “It’s all laid bare. For everyone to see.”
Assal Rad
@AssalRad
Remember escalation w/#Iran is Trump’s manufactured crisis.
Stories from #Italy & Iran describe fight against #CODVID19 like war. All hands on deck needed. This is when we’re reminded of real crisis & global challenges. We need diplomacy & cooperation now more than ever.
?????? https://twitter.com/katekizer/status/1238130441359679492 …
Kate Kizer ??
@KateKizer
escalating into a direct conflict with Iran is the last thing the U.S., Iran, and the world needs right now. https://twitter.com/JackDetsch_ALM/status/1238128480581234691 …
Ryan Costello, policy director with the National Iranian American Council, said in a statement late Thursday that “without a radical change in U.S. policy, we risk repeating the escalatory cycle, threatening to plunge the region in yet another conflict and sucking the U.S. into another endless war.”
“Fortunately, Congress just sent a bipartisan resolution to the president’s desk clarifying that he does not have authority to start a war with Iran and urging him to withdraw troops in hostilities with Iran,” Costello said, referring to the War Powers Resolution passed by the House Wednesday. “Rather than ignore Congress and the American people’s wishes on war and peace, he should sign the resolution and urgently seek diplomacy to put the war threat on ice.”
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mosul; bagdadi
quite LOT of history isis, al-q; syrian civil war isis metasticize, gain ground, grabbed mechanized column rolled into ramadi
https://kpfa.org/episode/letters-and-politics-november-25-2019/
james verini sp they will have to die now
jonah to whale b/c would not go to ninevah; appeal orig not relig but political: promiosed order, malawi? gov't seen as pro shi/iran?
did not at 1st make men grow beards etc, but later clamped down eg on cigs; 1st cell phone war; app with map that showed progress realtime; off the shelf drones dripped grenades in turret on humvee before freq jam
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attacks on maduro and saudi oil (iran shot down one of our disputed airspace)
https://www.alternet.org/2019/09/this-not-the-price-of-oil-is-the-real-threat-to-prosperity/
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https://www.alternet.org/2019/08/campaign-demands-ban-on-killer-robots-and-calls-out-us-obstruction/
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Anwar al-Awlaki - Wikipedia
[
](https://duckduckgo.com/?q=drone%20al%2Dawlaki%20son+site:en.wikipedia.org&atb=v31-5__ "Search domain en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anwar_al-Awlaki")https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anwar_al-Awlaki
President Barack Obama ordered the strike. His son, Abdulrahman al-Awlaki (a 16-year-old U.S. citizen), was killed in a U.S. drone strike two weeks later. On January 29, 2017, al-Awlaki's 8-year-old daughter, Nawar Al-Awlaki, was killed in a U.S. commando attack in Yemen which was ordered by President Donald Trump.
Obama 'Surprised,' 'Upset' When Anwar Al-Awlaki's Teenage Son ...
[](https://duckduckgo.com/?q=drone%20al%2Dawlaki%20son+site:www.huffpost.com&atb=v31-5__ "Search domain www.huffpost.com/entry/obama-anwar-al-awlaki-son_n_3141688")https://www.huffpost.com/entry/obama-anwar-al-awlaki-son_n_3141688
The elder al-Awlaki was a U.S. born cleric who took a leadership role in al Qaeda's operations in the Arab Peninsula. Scahill writes that the CIA tried to pay Anwar al-Awlaki'syounger brother Ammar a sum of $5 million to turn in his brother.
Robert Gibbs Says Anwar al-Awlaki's Son, Killed By Drone ...
[](https://duckduckgo.com/?q=drone%20al%2Dawlaki%20son+site:www.huffpost.com&atb=v31-5__ "Search domain www.huffpost.com/entry/robert-gibbs-anwar-al-awlaki_n_2012438")https://www.huffpost.com/entry/robert-gibbs-anwar-al-awlaki_n_2012438
Abdulrahman al-Awlaki was the son of Anwar al-Awlaki, an al Qaeda propagandist killed by a U.S. drone a year ago. But the child was killed in a separate strike some two weeks after his father was killed.
Abdulrahman al-Awlaki - Wikipedia
[
](https://duckduckgo.com/?q=drone%20al%2Dawlaki%20son+site:en.wikipedia.org&atb=v31-5__ "Search domain en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abdulrahman_al-Awlaki")https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abdulrahman_al-Awlaki
Abdulrahman Anwar al-Awlaki was a 16-year-old American of Yemeni descent who was killed while eating dinner at an outdoor restaurant in Yemen by a drone airstrike ordered by U.S. President Barack Obama on 14 October 2011. Abdulrahman al-Awlaki's father, Anwar al-Awlaki, was alleged to be an operational leader of al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. Anwar was killed by a CIA drone strike also ordered by Obama two weeks prior to the killing of his son.
Anwar al-Awlaki's family speaks out against his, son's deaths ...
[
](https://duckduckgo.com/?q=drone%20al%2Dawlaki%20son+site:www.washingtonpost.com&atb=v31-5__ "Search domain www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/anwar-al-awlakis-family-speaks-out-against-his-sons-deaths/2011/10/17/gIQA8kFssL_story.html")https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/anwar-al-awlakis-family-speaks-out-against-his-sons-deaths/2011/10/17/gIQA8kFssL_story.html
In the days before a CIA drone strike killed al-Qaeda operative Anwar al-Awlaki last month, his 16-year-old son ran away from the family home in Yemen's capital of Sanaa to try to find him, relatives say. When he, too, was killed in a U.S. airstrike Friday, the Awlakifamily decided to speak out for the first time since the attacks.
Obama Killed a 16-Year-Old American in Yemen. Trump Just ...
[
](https://duckduckgo.com/?q=drone%20al%2Dawlaki%20son+site:theintercept.com&atb=v31-5__ "Search domain theintercept.com/2017/01/30/obama-killed-a-16-year-old-american-in-yemen-trump-just-killed-his-8-year-old-sister/")https://theintercept.com/2017/01/30/obama-killed-a-16-year-old-american-in-yemen-trump-just-killed-his-8-year-old-sister/
Two weeks after the killing of Awlaki, a separate CIA drone strike in Yemen killed his 16-year-old American-born son, Abdulrahman, along with the boy's 17-year-old cousin and several other innocent Yemenis.
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https://www.alternet.org/2019/07/as-charles-koch-cultivates-anti-war-image-koch-industries-profits-from-defense-contracts/
no lnx
As Charles Koch cultivates anti-war image, Koch industries profits from defense contracts
Written by Alex Kotch / The American Prospect July 26, 2019
Libertarian billionaire industrialist Charles Koch has gone to great lengths to paint himself as an anti-interventionist. He has funded foreign policy-focused think tanks and university centers such as the conflict-averse Center for the Study of Statesmanship at Catholic University and the Notre Dame International Security Center, which is directed by anti-NATO professor Michael Desch.
Most recently, he teamed up with an extremely unlikely ally, liberal billionaire philanthropist George Soros, to found the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft. The Charles Koch Foundation and Soros’ Open Society Foundations each contributed $500,000 to help found the Quincy Institute, which will open in September, along with $800,000 from other donors.
“Political leaders have increasingly deployed the military in a costly, counterproductive, and indiscriminate manner, normalizing war and treating armed dominance as an end in itself,” reads the institute’s website. “The Quincy Institute is an action-oriented think tank that will lay the foundation for a new foreign policy centered on diplomatic engagement and military restraint.”
But Koch Industries, the giant oil, chemical, paper, and electronics conglomerate owned and led by Koch, has been cashing in on Department of Defense contracts. Since 2016, two Koch Industries subsidiaries have gotten federal contracts worth a total of close to $2.3 million to provide the Navy with circuit boardsfor its ships, according to Sludge’s review of federal contract data from the Federal Procurement Data System.
A Navy spokesperson told Sludge that “circuit boards are used in a variety of ships, submarines and aircraft” but declined to provide additional details regarding the use of the Koch subsidiaries’ electronics.
The two most recent contracts, which total nearly $500,000, went to Camarillo, California-based Interconnect Systems, which Koch Industries subsidiary Molex acquired in 2016. Naval Surface Warfare Systems Crane, a Navy office with a mission “to provide acquisition engineering, in-service engineering and technical support for sensors, electronics, electronic warfare and special warfare weapons,” initiated a $247,350 contract with Interconnect Systems in March 2019 for “digital signal processing computer card[s].” The company had signed a similar contract in September 2018 with NSWS Crane for $243,950.
Interconnect Systems scored a $1 million contract for circuit cards in July 2018 from the Defense Logistics Agency’s (DLA) maritime facility in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania. DLA Land and Maritime “manages the supply chain for ground-based and maritime weapons systems repair parts, small arms parts, and fluid-handling systems.”
Nallatech, a subsidiary of Interconnect Systems, has gotten close to $247,000 worth of Navy contracts since 2016. The majority of that money came from NSWC Crane, but some came from the NAVSUP Weapons Support Systems agency, which supports naval weapons systems. NSWC Crane gave Nallatech its largest contract, for $147,000 worth of hybrid processors, in September 2017.
Since 2016, Interconnect Systems and its subsidiary, Nallatech, have gotten $2,260,000 worth of Defense contracts.
Nallatech, which last year integrated with Molex subsidiary BittWare, has received over $617,000 worth of Defense contracts since 2008, the year it was acquired by Interconnect Systems, according to usaspending.gov. The company advertises military and aerospace products such as radar systems for manned and unmanned vehicles that “provide unprecedented situational awareness and target coordination,” as well as a “ballistic digitizer.”
Molex, an Illinois-based manufacturer of electrical connectors, provides parts for a number of industries. In its defense section, the Molex website lists products for use in unmanned vehicles, missiles, and ground vehicles.
Koch Industries, the Quincy Institute, the Charles Koch Foundation, and Open Society Foundations did not respond to requests for comment.
More Navy Connections
A partially Koch-funded foreign policy center at a California state university is also involved with the Navy.
The University of California at San Diego’s Center for Peace and Security Studies got a $3.3 million multi-year grant from the Charles Koch Foundation in 2017, its second year of existence.
“We’re excited about U.C. San Diego and its scholars’ work to better understand emerging issues in security studies and their implications for U.S. foreign policy,” said Charles Koch Foundation Vice President for Research William Ruger in a university news story. Ruger, an Afghanistan war veteran, is in the Navy Reserve.
The Center for Peace and Security Studies also gets funding from the Office of Naval Research’s Minerva Research Initiative. Its current grant, covering 2014-19, is called “Deterrence with Proxies.”
The center’s website describes its work on military automation. “Technologies that supplant human labor in battle—such as UAVs (drones) and ground combat robots—lower military labor costs and limit political risks associated with friendly casualties. The tendency should thus be for military automation to increase the scope of threats or uses of force by the most advanced economies, geographically and in terms of the issues in dispute.”
UCSD has a long and lucrative relationship with the Navy; the Navy’s Naval Information Warfare Systems Command, which works with the defense industry to create new weapons systems, has been headquartered at the university since 1997. Since 1981, UCSD has raked in nearly $250 million from Navy contracts, according to data from the Federal Procurement Data Service.
Political science professor Erik Gartzke, a former Army and Navy officer who runs the Center for Peace and Security Studies, has written papers about “costless combat” drones.
Meanwhile, American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), the Koch-backed corporate bill mill, supported domestic drone use through its proposed Unmanned Aerial Vehicle program.
‘The Case for Private Defense’
“Charles Koch’s anti-interventionist posturing is more clearly understood through his decades-long support of anarcho-capitalist scholars who have developed and championed the call to privatize police and military defense,” said Ralph Wilson, co-founder of the Corporate Genome Project and former research director of activist group UnKoch My Campus.
Koch’s political views are shaped by the Austrian School of economics, which advocates unfettered free markets and small governments. One prominent right-wing think tank that has promoted these concepts is the Mises Institute,which was established in 1982 and is named after one of the 20th century’s leading Austrian economists, Ludwig von Mises.
The late Murray Rothbard, Mises’ close associate and vice president of academic affairs at the Mises Institute for 13 years, argued against the state entirely and advocated a privatized military and police force. Like Rothbard, Mises Institute senior fellow Hans-Hermann Hoppe supports fully privatized security. In a paper first published by the Mises Institute in 1998, Hoppe argues that “collective security is a myth that provides no justification for the modern state, [and] all security is and must be private.”
In a 2002 essay, republished by the Mises Institute in 2010, Mises Institute fellow Robert Murphy made the case for privatized defense. Since then, he has continued to speak on the issue; Murphy held a session called “The Market for Military Defense” at this month’s “Mises University,” an annual free-market-economics boot camp.
Murphy owes much of his career to the generosity of Koch; he’s a research assistant professor at Texas Tech’s Free Market Institute, which is heavily funded by the Charles Koch Foundation (but also, ironically, gets substantial funding from the state government); a senior economist at the Institute for Energy Research, which Koch helped found and which has received funding from the three Koch family nonprofits; and a research fellow at the Independent Institute, which has scored grants from two Koch foundations.
Rothbard and Koch co-founded the libertarian Cato Institute in 1977 but had a falling out in the early 1980s. Still, their spheres continue to intersect, as several other current Mises Institute associates teach in university programs also funded by the Charles Koch Foundation.
Just Another Rebrand?
The Koch family has struggled with image problems for some time. Koch, along with his younger brother, David, has helmed a libertarian-minded political operation for decades, which has helped propel conservative Republicans to state and national office, and helped to found the Tea Party. Koch Industries is one of the country’s biggest polluters and has had to pay over $800 million in fines for environmental, labor, workplace, and other violations.
Because of their poor reputations, Koch Industries and Koch’s political network have undergone a series of rebrands, including Koch’s newest incarnation as a philanthropist who works with both parties to reform the criminal justice system and restrain America’s forever wars. For several years now, Koch has compared himself and his network of wealthy conservative donors to civil rights heroes such as Frederick Douglass and Martin Luther King.
But critics say these recent initiatives are largely distractions from Koch’s core mission, which he has always followed: to cut taxes and slash regulations in order to maximize Koch Industries’ profits.
“Koch Industries has consistently chosen corporatism and profit over their own ‘principled’ libertarianism, whether contracting with the U.S. military or accepting over half a billion dollars in local, state, and federal subsidies,” Wilson told Sludge.
Koch will likely continue to fund think tanks focused on preventing wars, but his company’s simultaneous role in the military-industrial complex should not be overlooked.
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https://www.theverge.com/2019/7/18/18677437/darpa-squad-x-project-marines-drones-robots-ai-fog-of-war-caci-lockheed-martin-video-watch
Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), has been working on a project that partners dismounted soldiers with autonomous robots and drones called Squad X. It’s designed to provide soldiers in the field with more information about their surroundings.[NB lots of BS from tigerswan about situational awareness"]
Historically, one of the most persistent issues on the battlefield is something known as the “fog of war” — a catch-all phrase that describes the uncertainty of one’s surroundings. Technology has done wonders to help eliminate this: scouts on horseback, balloonists, airplanes, and satellites have been able to deliver more and more information to commanders, allowing them to respond to their enemies and surroundings more effectively. The introduction of drones, robots, and sensors onto the battlefield promise illuminate one’s surroundings further, which is where Squad X appears to come in.
DARPA first tested out the Squad X program last year in California with a week-long test, which had US Marines using drones and robots to coordinate their movements and to detect potential threats in the field. The project uses a variety of tools to gather and transmit information to Marines and soldiers: autonomous robots that can drive around their locations; aerial drones that can survey their immediate surroundings; and off-the-shelf Android tablets to take in all of that information and present it to soldiers on the ground. An artificial intelligence system processed the information from the sensors, and presented the relevant data to the participants.
:{:{:{}:
[Image: DARPA]}:}:
There are two systems at the heard of this project: one from CACIcalled BITS Electronic Attack Module (BEAM) Squad System (BSS), which allows personnel to “detect, locate, and attack specific threats in the radio frequency and cyber domains,” and Lockheed Martin’s Augmented Spectral Situational Awareness and Unaided Localization for Transformative Squads (ASSAULTS) system, which uses drones and robots to locate targets and engage them. DARPA says that the systems provide “small squads battalion-level insights and intelligence.”
Squad X program manager Lt. Col. Phil Root explained that the systems that they were testing don’t involve weapons. “The human is of course involved with any lethal action, but at this point, it’s about establishing superior situational awareness.” What the system is designed to do is to gather the relevant information, process it, and then allow soldiers and Marines to act on what they learn.
Lockheed Martin’s ASSAULTS system outfits Marines with vests rigged with sensors and accompanied by the drones and robots, who then moved through desert and simulated urban environments. DARPA notes that the robots are “always exploring and making the most of the current situation” to gather information and keep an eye on their surroundings. Another experiment included a “super node” an autonomous off-road Polaris loaded down with sensors.
Like other ongoing tests that the Army is conducting with:{autonomous armored vehicles, DARPA has noted that the tests aren’t just to figure out how to use the systems, but how the tactics that the soldiers use will change. Root said that there was a “steady evolution of tactics” that came with their robotic teammate. DARPA wasn’t just developing the tools for the soldiers, Root says, “but rather develop the hardware and the tactics that allow this to operate seamlessly within the close-combat ground environment.”}:
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North Dakota Army National Guard has deployed two surface-to-air missile-launchers near a critical work site for the controversial Dakota Access Pipeline, or DAPL.
Protestors spotted one of the Avenger missile systems on Jan. 16 and posted photos and videos on Facebook. “Anti-drone missile system confirmed on top of a hill guarding the DAPL drill pad,” Jon Ziegler, a self-described “citizen journalist,” wrote on Facebook.
North Dakota Guard spokesman William Prokopyk told The Daily Beast that the Avenger’s missile tubes aren’t loaded. “These systems have observation capabilities and are used strictly in the observation role to protect private property and public safety,” Prokopyk said.
“There’s no authority to arm them,” he stressed, adding that the two Avengers have been in Morton County—site of the drill pad—for more than a month without incident.
The drill pad the Avenger is “protecting” belongs to Dakota Access, LLC, the company building the nearly 1,200-mile-long pipeline meant to transport oil from North Dakota’s Bakken oil field to a storage facility in Illinois.
Dakota Access had hoped to extend the pipe underneath Lake Oahe, which lies on federal land in southern North Dakota. A protest movement originating with the Standing Rock Indian Reservation, which lies on Oahe’s western shore, successfully pressured the Obama administration to deny Dakota Access the easement it needed to drill underneath the lake.
But Dakota Access has vowed to complete the $4-billion pipeline, apparently via an alternate route. Work continues on private land. And it’s on this land that the Guard has stationed its missile launcher.
The Morton County Sheriff’s Department commented on the Avenger deployment on Facebook shortly after The Daily Beast began making inquiries. “MYTH: Law enforcement has [an] anti-drone missile system on the top of a hill to guard the DAPL drill pad and shoot down drones,” the department wrote.
“FACT: The N.D. National Guard does have an Avenger system employed in support of the Dakota Access Pipeline Protest,” the department continued. “These systems are used strictly for observation of ungoverned encampments to help protect private property and maintain public safety.”
Still, the presence of a missile launcher—even an unloaded one—will likely increase tensions between the Standing Rock protestors and authorities. Police in North Dakota have come under scrutiny for using violent, military-style tactics against peaceful, unarmed protestors.
The Avenger is foremost a weapon of war. It combines a Humvee truck chassis with a rotating turret that can be armed with eight Stinger missiles and a .50-caliber machine gun. The North Dakota Army National Guard’s 1st battalion, 188th Air Defense Regiment—which has companies in Bismark, Fargo and Grand Forks—operates Avengers.
When fully armed, the Avenger can engage airplanes, helicopters—and, yes, drones. On Oct. 23, 2016, the Morton County Sheriff’s Department announced it had shot down a protestor’s drone after it had approached a police helicopter “in a threatening manner.”
The drone’s operator denied endangering any aircraft. Nevertheless, the FAA subsequently established a no-fly-zone over the pipeline work site.
Prokopyk said the Guard sent the Avenger because it possesses night-vision equipment that many North Dakota Guard units lack, and because the Avenger has an enclosed, heated crew compartment. “With wind chill here, it’s been negative 45 degrees,” Prokopyk said. “I’m not kidding.”
Prokopyk declined to say whether the Avenger crew at the drill pad is using the vehicle’s night-vision equipment specifically to detect activists’ drones.
Around 200 “water-protectors” from the main Standing Rock protest camp reportedly cut through a fence and attempted to reach the drill pad on Jan. 16. Police and National Guardsmen stopped the protesters from reaching the pad. But the activists got close enough to spot an Avenger.
“Many water protectors made it further around the bend to the east closer to the drill site and were met with police and reports of mace used,” Ziegler wrote on Facebook. “We climbed up the hill on the west side right up next to the launcher.”
The Morton County Sheriff’s Office said three people were arrested during the Jan. 16 protest.
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omfg
STAND DOWN
National Guard Pulls Missile Launchers Away From Standing Rock Protesters
A day after The Daily Beast reported heavy-duty weapons were brought to the Dakota Access Pipeline sight, they’ve been removed—for now.
David Axe
01.18.176:05 PM ET
https://www.thedailybeast.com/national-guard-pulls-missile-launchers-away-from-standing-rock-protesters
North Dakota National Guard is withdrawing the two unloaded missile launchers it had stationed near the Dakota Access Pipeline construction site in order to “observe” peaceful protestors, which The Daily Beast first reported on Tuesday.
“Its removal demonstrates our commitment to deescalating any tensions its presence may have caused,” Guard spokesman William Prokopyk said in a statement.
Two Avengers launchers, Humvee trucks with rotating turrets that can be armed with guns and eight Stinger surface-to-air missiles, were deployed a day after protestors from the nearby Standing Rock Indian Reservation had spotted one of them deployed on private landoverlooking a pipeline work site.
Several of the protestors were arrested for trespassing.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers denied Dakota Access, LLC an easement to extend its pipeline under Lake Oahe, which lies on federal land and borders Standing Rock. Dakota Access has vowed to continue building the 1,200-mile oil pipeline, most likely on private land in Morton County.
Jon Ziegler, a self-described “citizen journalist” covering the Standing Rock movement, described the Avenger as an “anti-drone missile system.”
On Oct. 23, 2016, the Morton County Sheriff’s Department announced it had shot down an activist’s drone after it had approached a police helicopter “in a threatening manner” —an accusation the drone’s operator denied.
But Prokopyk said Army Guardsmen—who have deployed alongside local police to guard the pipeline—were using the unloaded Avengers strictly as observation platforms. The Avengers boast sophisticated night-vision equipment that many other Guard vehicles lack.
“It was employed for over a month in a passive role to observe areas within Morton County where numerous incidences of criminal trespass and mischief have occurred,” Prokopyk said of the pair of Avengers.
“In the same vein as when we used unarmed Blackhawk helicopters to put out a fire near the protest camp in October of 2016, the unarmed Avenger was used in an observation only role to support public safety in southern Morton County.”
Not only were the Avengers not armed while stationed near the work site—there aren’t even any missiles for the vehicles anywhere in North Dakota, Prokopyk explained. “All munitions are strictly controlled by the United States Army.”
Prokopyk denied that authorities sent in the Avengers in order to intimidate anti-pipeline activists.
“If they were placed to intimidate anyone, it wouldn’t have taken a month for someone to notice them.”
The North Dakota Guard selected the Avengers for the “observation” mission not only because of the launchers’ night-vision equipment, but also owing to their enclosed, heated cabins, Prokopyk said. Taking into account wind chill, winter temperatures in North Dakota can dip below negative 40 degrees.
Having withdrawn the Avengers, Guardsmen will continue monitoring protestors using handheld night-vision equipment, Prokopyk said.
“Good thing we’re in a heat wave,” he added. “It’s almost 30 degrees!”
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https://www.alternet.org/2019/04/pioneer-in-field-warns-dangers-posed-by-artificial-intelligence-are-very-real/
A pioneer in the field of artificial intelligence warned that “dangers of abuse” of AI “are very real.”
The warning from Canadian computer science professor and leading AI researcher Yoshua Bengio came in a Q&A with the journal *Nature* published Thursday.
The interview was conducted back in January, before Bengio was named along with two others the latest recipients of the Turing Award, a prize dubbed the “Nobel Prize of Computing.”
Bengio told Nature that “we have to raise flags before bad things happen” in terms of irresponsible use of AI.
Unfortunately, “what is most concerning is not happening in broad daylight” but “in military labs, in security organizations, in private companies providing services to governments or the police,” he said.
In particular, Bengio said, he is concerned with so-called killer drones—lethal autonomous weapons—and surveillance, which can be abused by authoritarian governments.
AI “can be used by those in power to keep that power, and to increase it,” said Bengio, and be used “to worsen gender or racial discrimination.”
Some sort of government or international regulatory framework needs to be in place to put a check on AI, added Bengio: “Self-regulation is not going to work.”
It’s not the first time Bengio expressed concerns about possible abuse of AI. This week he joined over two dozen other AI researchers in calling on Amazon to stop selling its facial-recognition software Rekognition to police departments.
The group of “concerned researchers” wrote in a post on Medium that “legislation and safeguards to prevent misuse are not in place.”
Bengio also served on the steering committee for the recently-unveiled Montréal Declaration for Responsible Development of Artificial Intelligence. Among the declaration’s 10 principles are that the “development and use of [artificial intelligence systems] AIS must contribute to the creation of a just and equitable society.”
“Generally speaking,” he wrote at The Conversation highlighting the need for the declaration, “scientists tend to avoid getting too involved in politics. But when there are issues that concern them and that will have a major impact on society, they must assume their responsibility and become part of the debate.”
“And in this debate, I have come to realize that society has given me a voice—that governments and the media were interested in what I had to say on these topics because of my role as a pioneer in the scientific development of AI.”
“So, for me, it is now more than a responsibility,” he said. “It is my duty. I have no choice".
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https://www.ecowatch.com/robot-bees-walmart-patent-2548372230.html
Walmart Files Patent for Robot Bees
With the mass die-off of bees spelling trouble for agriculture, the world's largest retailer has filed patents for the use of "unmanned vehicles," or drones, to aid with pollination and crop production.
In U.S. Patent Office documents made public last week, Walmart has applied for six patents on drones designed to identify pest damage, spray pesticides and pollinate plants.
Reuters noted, "Walmart may see drone technology as one way to get food from farms to store shelves faster and more cheaply to compete with Amazon.com Inc, following its purchase of Whole Foods Market last yearand the expansion of discount chains like Aldi and Lidl."
Here's what's in the filings, according to CB Insights:
To track pests, Walmart describes using machine vision to monitor damage to crops as well as spot and identify the pests themselves. To prevent damage, the drones could shoot targeted sprays of pesticide or simply fly by to shoo off birds, acting as a next-generation of "scarecrows or shiny devices," the patent notes.
Drones could spray pesticides across a more targeted set of crops, rather than the blanket approach used today. The patent notes that "chemical spraying of crops is expensive and may not be looked upon favorably by some consumers."
Pollination drones, on the other hand, could help offset the loss of bee populations over the past few years. Walmart's "applicators" would carry pollen from one plant to another, and use sensors to verify the transfer was successful.
Some have compared Walmart's filing for drone pollinators to a horrifying Black Mirror episode on robot bees, but this technology isn't completely unheard of.
[vid]
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https://boingboing.net/2017/05/27/provocateurs-and-drones.html
Tigerswan, a secretive private mercenary company, was hired by Energy Transfer Partners to run campaigns against Dakota Access Pipeline protesters in five states, including states in which they were not licensed to operate -- the measures they deployed were developed as counterterrorism tactics, including
Tigerswan prepared reports that called the indigenous-led protests "an ideologically driven insurgency with a strong religious component" and compared them to jihadi fighters. The reports were leaked by a Tigerswan contractor to The Intercept, who supplemented the with thousands of pages of documents secured through public records requests.
Tigerswan appears to have also run an online disinformation campaign, "creating and distributing content critical of the protests on social media."
Tigerswan conducted substantial infiltration and provocateur operations against the water protectors. These infiltrators engaged in "exploitation of ongoing native versus non-native rifts, and tribal rifts between peaceful and violent elements."
Perhaps one of the most striking revelations of the documents is the level of hostility displayed by TigerSwan toward the water protectors. TigerSwan consistently describes the peaceful demonstrators using military and tactical language more appropriate for counterterrorism operations in an armed conflict zone. At times, the military language verges on parody, as when agents write of protesters “stockpiling signs” or when they discuss the “caliber” of paintball pellets. More often, however, the way TigerSwan discusses protesters as “terrorists,” their direct actions as “attacks,” and the camps as a “battlefield,” reveals how the protesters’ dissent was not only criminalized but treated as a national security threat. A March 1 report states that protesters’ “operational weakness allows TS elements to further develop and dictate the battlespace.”
In one internal report dated May 4, a TigerSwan operative describes an effort to amass digital and ground intelligence that would allow the company to “find, fix, and eliminate” threats to the pipeline — an eerie echo of “find, fix, finish,” a military term used by special forces in the U.S. government’s assassination campaign against terrorist targets.
TigerSwan pays particular attention to protesters of Middle Eastern descent. A September 22 situation report argues that “the presence of additional Palestinians in the camp, and the movement’s involvement with Islamic individuals is a dynamic that requires further examination.” The report acknowledges that “currently there is no information to suggest terrorist type tactics or operations,” but nonetheless warns that “with the current limitation on information flow out of the camp, it cannot be ruled out.”
LEAKED DOCUMENTS REVEAL COUNTERTERRORISM TACTICS USED AT STANDING ROCK TO “DEFEAT PIPELINE INSURGENCIES” [Alleen Brown, Will Parrish and Alice Speri/The Intercept]
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http://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/what-war-are-we-buying-another-58-billion-military
trump drone 4x, yemen starve, cluster?
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https://thinkprogress.org/drones-law-enforcements-secret-eye-in-the-sky-9eda68fb8bc#.b9fz10xqp
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https://theintercept.com/drone-papers/the-assassination-complex/
...Intercept has obtained a cache of secret slides that provides a window into the inner workings of the U.S. military’s kill/capture operations at a key time in the evolution of the drone wars — between 2011 and 2013. The documents, which also outline the internal views of special operations forces on the shortcomings and flaws of the drone program, were provided by a source within the intelligence community who worked on the types of operations and programs described in the slides. The Intercept granted the source’s request for anonymity because the materials are classified and because the U.S. government has engaged in aggressive prosecution of whistleblowers. The stories in this series will refer to the source as “the source.”
The source said he decided to provide these documents to The Interceptbecause he believes the public has a right to understand the process by which people are placed on kill lists and ultimately assassinated on orders from the highest echelons of the U.S. government. “This outrageous explosion of watchlisting — of monitoring people and racking and stacking them on lists, assigning them numbers, assigning them ‘baseball cards,’ assigning them death sentences without notice, on a worldwide battlefield — it was, from the very first instance, wrong,” the source said.
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Since 2013, State Department whistleblower Peter Van Buren has been covering our new world of constricting freedoms in what he’s termed “Post-Constitutional America” for TomDispatch. With this look at the government’s newfound “right” to kill an American citizen without due process, he completes a three-part series on the shredding of the Bill of Rights, the previous two parts having focused on the First Amendmentand the Fourth Amendment. Tom
Dead Is Dead
Drone-Killing the Fifth Amendment
You can't get more serious about protecting the people from their government than the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution, specifically in its most critical clause: "No person shall be... deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law." In 2011, the White House ordered the drone-killing of American citizen Anwar al-Awlaki without trial. It claimed this was a legal act it is prepared to repeat as necessary. Given the Fifth Amendment, how exactly was this justified? Thanks to a much contested, recently released but significantly redacted -- about one-third of the text is missing -- Justice Department white paper providing the basis for that extrajudicial killing, we finally know: the president in Post-Constitutional America is now officially judge, jury, and executioner.
Due Process in Constitutional America
Looking back on the violations of justice that characterized British rule in pre-Constitutional America, it is easy to see the Founders' intent in creating the Fifth Amendment. A government's ability to inflict harm on its people, whether by taking their lives, imprisoning them, or confiscating their property, was to be checked by due process.
Due process is the only requirement of government that is statedtwice in the Constitution, signaling its importance. The Fifth Amendment imposed the due process requirement on the federal government, while the Fourteenth Amendment did the same for the states. Both offer a crucial promise to the people that fair procedures will remain available to challenge government actions. The broader concept of due process goes all the way back to the thirteenth-century Magna Carta.
Due process, as refined over the years by the Supreme Court, came to take two forms in Constitutional America. The first wasprocedural due process: people threatened by government actions that might potentially take away life, liberty, or possessions would have the right to defend themselves from a power that sought, whether for good reasons or bad, to deprive them of something important. American citizens were guaranteed their proverbial “day in court.”
The second type, substantive due process, was codified in 1938 to protect those rights so fundamental that they are implicit in liberty itself, even when not spelled out explicitly in the Constitution. Had the concept been in place at the time, a ready example would have been slavery. Though not specifically prohibited by the Constitution, it was on its face an affront to democracy. No court process could possibly have made slavery fair. The same held, for instance, for the “right” to an education, to have children, and so forth. Substantive due process is often invoked by supporters of same-sex unions, who assert that there is a fundamental right to marry. The meaning is crystal clear: there is an inherent, moral sense of “due process” applicable to government actions against any citizen and it cannot be done away with legally. Any law that attempts to interfere with such rights is inherently unconstitutional.
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