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from the what-could-possibly-go-wrong? dept.
Turkey aims to produce unmanned tanks: Erdoğan
Turkey is targeting the production of unmanned tanks for its armed forces, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has stated. "We will carry it a step further [after domestically produced unmanned aerial vehicles] ... We should reach the ability to produce unmanned tanks as well. We will do it," Erdoğan said at a meeting held at the presidential complex in Ankara on Feb. 21.
Five Turkish soldiers were recently killed in a tank near the Sheikh Haruz area of Syria's Afrin district, where Turkey has been carrying on a military operation against the People's Protection Units (YPG) since Jan. 20.
[...] The Turkish president has repeatedly criticized certain foreign countries for allegedly being reluctant to sell unmanned aerial vehicles, armed or unarmed, stressing that unmanned systems could decrease casualties.
Also at ABC.
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(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 22 2018, @03:41PM (2 children)
> how do you know which side won?
Score like battlebots? This is really getting silly (if you stand back and look at all the money spent for destruction).
More to the point, Why can't we all just get along? New Tedx talk on this topic, brings together several themes I've seen here on SN: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndCzlfs3gqs [youtube.com]
Disclaimer, I knew the speaker as an undergrad, our last contact was nearly 10 years ago.
(Score: 5, Informative) by tangomargarine on Thursday February 22 2018, @04:59PM
This is a pretty good question about the Middle East in general, somewhat moreso about Turkey in particular. I suppose it's easier to get along with your neighbors when you've genocided all the ones who don't like you into nonexistence.
The borders of modern Turkey are a result of the breakup of the Ottoman Empire, the rump government signed a treaty at the end of WWI, and the general in charge of their armed forces basically said, "That's nice and all but we're not going to abide by that. Come on boys, let's grab as much territory as we can and sign a new treaty instead!" Then the areas they annexed had a bunch of people they didn't like in them so that whole thing that they strenuously emphasize wasn't genocide happened.
Fast-forward to present and can't say what Erdogan's getting up to is terribly surprising. The military's role in Turkish politics was to keep the President et al. in line, so the first time they stand up to him violating his presidential rules it's obviously time to gut the military leadership. So if you don't trust the military, the next step is to make the military irrelevant by making things unmanned. And the second benefit is that the population can't complain about their soldiers getting killed in action.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 3, Interesting) by LVDOVICVS on Thursday February 22 2018, @07:29PM
It was interesting to hear this expounded in a bigger vision than I ever had. I've told people for years that we should run at least the House of Representatives like jury duty. People can get picked for two years once in a lifetime, given a place to live and three squares a day in D.C. with travel vouchers to regularly get back and forth from home. With the result being that our country would get a lot more interested in providing a proper educational system if any Jo(e/sephine) Blow could be selected for Congressional duty.
Like all my ideas, nobody cares. [sad trombone]