The Ministry of Defence of Ukraine outlines what a kill chain is and how AI helps make enemy target engagement even more effective.

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[–] [S] 13 points 3 days ago* (20 children)

Ukraine is using them to kill invaders which is 100% morally legitimate. The Russians are free to go home, and then there will be no more attacks. Problem is when global powers begin to use them offensively against innocent countries and civilians to gain power.

HUGE difference.

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  • [–] -1 points 2 days ago (19 children)

    Indiscriminate killing is a war crime, invaders or not. Indeed, it means there’s no way to know if its going to kill invaders, defenders or civilians.

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  • [–] [S] 2 points 2 days ago (17 children)

    Sorry, but what point describes indescriminate killing?
    They are on the contrary describing a very rigid procedure to determine the correct target, and then hitting the correct target.
    The exact opposite of what you claim.

    find – identifying an enemy object using intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) capabilities;
    fix – determining the object’s precise coordinates and confirming its status;
    track – continuously monitoring the target’s movement in real time;
    target – selecting the most appropriate kinetic or non-kinetic means of engagement to accomplish the mission;
    engage – employing a weapon against the target at the designated coordinates;
    assess – analyzing the effects of the strike to determine whether re-engagement is necessary.

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  • [–] 0 points 2 days ago* (16 children)

    This was not the procedure for their experimental attack, where they identified an area in which Russians had been seen, and geofenced that on the drones which were then instructed to kill all humans in that area before returning to their unit. This skips the “fix” element, and does not discriminate between enemy soldier, friendly soldier or civilian. This is contrary to the Geneva statutes.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 days ago (6 children)

    isn't that what bombing does? It blows up an area and does not care whats in it?

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  • [–] 1 point 2 days ago* (5 children)

    A bomb is supposed to be targeted with a human making the final decision, and it affects a far smaller area, and represents one violent event (cluster munitions being illegal). It also cannot hunt people and follow them around corners.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 days ago (4 children)

    yeah the human makes the decision of the geofenced area the bomb will effect and then it kills everything in it. how is this different.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 days ago* (3 children)

    Because it is not a single-shot attack. There are hundreds of bullets. There is no accountability, with the drone cutting off all communication with the operator. Whereas modern bombing is usually monitored for efficacy, this is not possible in the autonomous attack. The operator doesn’t actually know who or how many were killed. Nor can they select targets or ceasefire. This counts as indiscriminate killing, which is a war crime.

    Different weaponry has different laws. As it stands, autonomous drone attacks are illegal under the Geneva Convention. I’m not sure that should change.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 days ago (1 child)

    Anti-personnel land mines are not a war crime despite doing exactly the same thing: Killing indiscriminately in a selected region. They're even worse than autonomous drone attacks in that they will continue to kill for decades to come.

    The only thing banning them was a convention Russia never signed, forcing Ukraine to withdraw as well.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

    Anti-personnel land mines are illegal under international law as per the Ottowa Treaty 1997, to which Ukraine is signatory.

    Russia is one of the non-signatories, and during the war Ukraine has decided to deploy land mines, but as a signatory this is illegal under international law. Ukraine has not yet withdrawn from the treaty so is eventually liable to prosecution for war crimes on this count as well. This would barr them from entry into the EU, for example.

    International law is not a matter of what is convenient at the time. It is a commitment. This war is rapidly exploring new frontiers of killing, and it is absolutely essential that those actions are held to account for future posterity. Otherwise there is no such thing as a war crime, and it just comes down to who is willing to debase themself to the greatest extreme.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 days ago

    I don't see the difference you do. Especially the monitoring is not possible with an autonomous attack. Again the bomb and missile are autonomous once fired. Same thing about the operator not know who or how many were killed. Heck there are whole sections of war stories with bombers not knowing who they killed. You certainly can't stop a bomb or ceasefire it once dropped but it can be explodes early as can missiles as can drones.

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  • [–] [S] 1 point 2 days ago (8 children)

    If there are only enemy soldiers in that area it does, and you have presented no evidence any of these drones ever attacked civilians.
    You are seemingly making shit up to make Ukraine look bad.
    On the other hand we know for a fact that Russia is attacking civilians in Kherson every day. Hunting them with drones controlled by Russian soldiers.
    So please put a damper on your false accusations against Ukraine, when we know for a fact that Ukraine is up against an invader that does every war crime to terrorize the civilian population in Ukraine.

    Ukraine is merely defending themselves, try to get that into your head.

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  • [–] 0 points 2 days ago (7 children)

    War crimes are crimes whether the committer is defending or not. If we decide it matters who the perpetrators are, then war crimes simply don’t matter. Ukraine must defend itself, but it must do so within international law. What comes next may be irreversible.

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  • [–] [S] 1 point 2 days ago (6 children)

    But you haven't shown any actual war crime, so it's all hypothetical. Your claim was that Ukraine were attacking indiscriminately, while I showed the process that clearly they don't.
    At this point you are merely wasting time IMO.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 days ago (5 children)
  • [–] [S] 1 point 2 days ago* (4 children)

    on the front line of the Ukraine war.

    Killing soldiers on the front lines is not killing indiscriminately.

    However, we do not use fully autonomous drone systems that independently select and engage targets without any operator involvement,” says Polozhukhno.

    So your accusation is completely invalid!

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  • [–] 1 point 2 days ago (3 children)

    The article details an event in which that did in fact happen.

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  • [–] [S] 0 points 2 days ago (2 children)

    Does it? I don't see it, and I don't see why I should read an entire article to prove your point.
    You are extremely low effort not quoting from the part you are referring to.

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  • [–] 0 points 2 days ago* (1 child)

    Low effort is not bothering to read the 4th and 5th paragraph:

    The test took place two years ago and involved quadcopter drones that were programmed to fly towards the front line, cover between 3 and 5 kilometres over around 10 minutes and then engage “Terminator mode”, in which an AI model searches for and intercepts targets.

    “We just launch it and we know everything will be dead – everything that will be found there in this particular area will be dead,” says Kokhanovskyy. “There is no connection to the drone at all, you cannot see the video, nothing… Everything it sees will be killed.”

    No-one gets a free pass on war crimes. It is not inconsistent to support Ukraine but also to expect that when Ukraine commits war crimes those responsible are held accountable.

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  • [–] [S] 1 point 2 days ago*

    Of course I read that, and you are reading it wrong, because it is later clarified very clearly:

    However, we do not use fully autonomous drone systems that independently select and engage targets without any operator involvement,” says Polozhukhno.

    WE DO NOT ENGAGE TARGETS ... WITHOUT OPERATOR INVOLVEMENT!!

    What they can do with AI however, is to have one operator control multiple drones.

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