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Submitted via IRC for Runaway1956
Once a hallmark of state-on-state conflict, simply finding oneself inside of an American kill box in today's counterterrorism wars is enough to be retroactively defined as guilty.
In laymen’s terms, “kill boxes” sound like torture devices. In military jargon, they are almost incomprehensible; as defined in the Department of Defense Dictionary, they are “a three-dimensional area reference that enables timely, effective coordination and control and facilitates rapid attacks.” But despite their ominous name and complicated technical definition, kill boxes are actually relatively simple in concept: They are three-dimensional cubes of space on a battlefield in which members and allies of the United States military are completely free to open fire.
According to the DoD, “there is no formal kill-box doctrine or tactics, techniques or procedures.” They require a sophisticated web of logistical, bureaucratic, and technological expertise to implement. Like most military tactics, kill boxes aren’t new—they’ve been around for nearly 30 years now. But they are constantly being reinvented for new conflicts. In recent years, kill-box strategy has shifted: They are now used in conflicts that are not between two states, but rather within states against terrorists and fighters who aren’t members of any particular country’s military. With this change, two things have started happening. First, kill boxes have materialized in places the local population might not expect. And second, kill boxes have been used in conjunction with disposition matrices, or “kill lists.” The DoD uses these to target people whose “pattern of life” fit the parameters of an algorithm, rather than specific individuals. For example: Say someone who owns a cellphone has been calling numbers that trigger a response from a computer at the Pentagon. Analysts will triangulate the cellphone’s whereabouts, and military leaders might initiate a “kill box” at that location, authorizing soldiers to kill everyone within the “box.” Mission accomplished.
Source: Defense One
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 22 2017, @10:50PM
APFN? What a bunch of loonies! Well, at least we have found one place for a "kill box". Actually, weren't they called "free fire zones" in Vietnam? Or "Indian Country" before that? Really, just a sign of a military that is too lazy or to incompetent to do proper identification and targeting. So much easier, a la the Albigensian Crusade, to "kill them all and let God sort them out." Oh, yes, that was the policy of the Bomber Mafia under both the RUKAF and Curtis LeMay. Gen. Sheridan started the policy, by exterminating American Bison.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Monday January 23 2017, @01:20AM
" Actually, weren't they called "free fire zones""
Before Vietnam, they were called "killing fields". The concept is as old as firearms, at least, and probably as old as bows and arrows. The commander told his troops, "When the flag goes up, you kill everything." Or, "I'll throw my hat, and nothing leaves that field alive."
The concept of a killing field is ancient. The box is hust a variant on an old idea.
The real story is, that innocents are routinely included in the box, and that is considered "acceptable".
The attitude seems to be, "Oh well - they're just brown people, right?"
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 23 2017, @01:24AM
" Actually, weren't they called
Says the Navy vet, the one with early onset.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday January 23 2017, @01:39AM
And, where did you think the title for the movie came from?
Don't refute what I say, just attack me personally, why don't you? Do you need another salt suppository for that butt hurt?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZsncbgMK4zM [youtube.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 23 2017, @04:00AM
And, where did you think the title for the movie came from?
Cambodia? The Khymer Rouge? Don't know much about history, do we?
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday January 23 2017, @05:27AM
So, the US army apparently created the term just for the Khmer Rouge? Is that what you are proposing? History began in the 1980's, and this term had never been used before that time?
Add this one to your lexicon - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kill_zone [wikipedia.org]
People have been describing scorched earth policies and practices in various ways since time immemorial. Do I need to look up the terms that the mongols used, when they destroyed Khwarezmia? The mongols destroyed entire cities, and built pyramids of the heads they chopped off in those cities. Kill zone, killing field, dead zone - who knows what terms the mongols used. If you speak Mongolian, maybe you can help us out with that one. The Khmer Rouge weren't especially original, and the term "killing fields" didn't originate with them.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 23 2017, @07:12AM
Sun-zi said, "死地則戰", but he was referring to your own troops. When it came to the enemy, he said always give them a way out. Truly you are a alternative scholar of history and military tactics!
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday January 23 2017, @07:44AM
Ho-hum. Sun Tzu wan't Mongolian, or Russian, or Turkish, or Persian, or Greek, or Roman, or American - need I go on? Sun Tzu was most certainly a master at his craft, which was not precisely the art of war. Sun Tzu was what most military men aspire to, but most military men are incapable of even understanding what Sun Tzu was the master of. We have some examples of military men who came closer than most. Between them, Grant and Sherman grasped a great deal of Sun Tzu's teachings. Erwin Rommel was nearly the equal of Grant and Sherman. Other clowns, such as Custer, weren't fit to shine Sun Tzu's boots, but they are still held up as heroes because they spilled a lot of blood. We've certainly not seen a Sun Tzu candidate in any of the mideastern wars waged in recent decades.
The fact that I understand what a killing field is, how it works, and how to make it work, has little to do with my understanding of history, or of Sun Tzu.
Why don't you try to choose one subject, and stay on that subject. I believe that you started out disputing that "kill boxes" existed before the modern age of computers, radar, infrared, passive and active sensors, etc. I repeat - "kill box" is just another iteration of an old idea. You prepare the field ahead of time, then at a given signal, all of your firepower is focused on that field. You kill, kill, kill, and continue to kill, to ensure that no living thing comes back out of that field.
Do you wish to return to the argument over semantics, or do you wish to discuss Sun Tzu? If you choose the latter, we could be here for the rest of our lives. The former is so much simpler a concept.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 23 2017, @08:21AM
Ho-hum. Sun Tzu wan't Mongolian, or Russian, or Turkish, or Persian, or Greek, or Roman, or American - need I go on?
Yes, you do! So what was he? I bet he was an anchor baby! Maybe was an illegal immigrant from the Northern tribes! And, nearly aborted before he even got a chance to live by something called "Planned Parenthood, Time Travel Division". Please go on, Runaway!
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday January 23 2017, @08:50AM
You go ahead and have your little rant. Spew your hatred of me. If/when you care to attempt to make sense, get back to me. Geeez, I wonder who hates me so much? Might it be a Greek pedarast?
(Score: 1) by butthurt on Monday January 23 2017, @03:10AM
Those weren't Runaway1956's words; that was a quote from the post he was responding to. The quotation marks ought to have been enough to indicate that.
(Score: 3, Informative) by VLM on Monday January 23 2017, @03:05PM
Before Vietnam, they were called "killing fields".
See also, "No Fly Zone" which sounds like an innocent can of raid or a clean restaurant kitchen, but what they really mean is they kill anyone trying to pilot an aircraft.