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U.S. drone strike kills 30 pine nut farm workers in Afghanistan

(www.reuters.com)
350 points tepidandroid | 1 comments | 19 Sep 19 16:51 UTC | HN request time: 0.208s | source
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whiddershins ◴[20 Sep 19 12:15 UTC] No.21025779[source]▶
I wonder why, even though we generally try to be skeptical of the news, I’m not seeing many comments here that question whether what this article is saying is even accurate.

How exactly does the reporter know which people are IS fighters? Is there some notion that militants don’t ever also farm?

Also in these comments there seems to be a huge double standard. The idea the United States might accidentally kill some civilians is somehow morally outrageous, but the regular and deliberate targeting of civilians by the Taliban and the IS as they attempt to completely destabilize the Afghan government is taken as somehow normal?

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1. gldalmaso ◴[20 Sep 19 12:41 UTC] No.21026019[source]▶
Can we really call it an accident when strikes are made at weddings, funerals, farms, vans, and even double striking to kill first responders based on a phone chip signal that might have, at some point in time, been used by rebels?

In fact it really doesn't matter how we see it, but how they see it.

Every strike has a chance of producing more rebels than they kill and I have a hard time thinking the arms industry doesn't also believe that.