I wonder how they didn’t hear the drone hovering over their heads. My drone would have sounded like a swarm of angry bees. Or have they worked out how to muffle the rotors, do you think?
Apparently some US military vehicles (including at least one Abrams tank!) have met similar fates from drone-based attacks in recent conflicts, so it’s becoming a recurring theme for asymmetrical warfare.
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So now everyone is going to need fighter drones to attack, and fly escort for, bomber drones. Things could get wild.
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I thought so, too but it turns out there are two different videos in the link - one that detonates behind the truck, and one that goes into the open sunroof.
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It is gruesome and fascinating at the same time.
Also am I a bad person for feeling no sympathy at all for those Russian soldiers killed?
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a molly w/o the toffee
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If the Russian soldiers were a professional army made up of volunteers vs a conscript army I’d have less sympathy.
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They may well have heard the drone, and were in the process of moving the vehicle away when they were bombed. Note that compared to most anything else in war a drone is pretty quiet, so it could get fairly close before being audible (particularly in an active warzone).
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IIRC the Ukrainian forces are also using drones for artillery strike siting. So no more playing telephone between soldiers on the ground versus the gun crew miles away. They just see it in real time when they miss then adjust their aim. It’s kind of scary to be honest.
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They start getting hard to hear once they’re a few hundred feet up, especially if there’s any background noise… if they were trying to be sneaky it would have approached from over a thousand feet up, and would have been very hard to hear until the last minute. Really scary form of modern warfare, especially considering how cheap it is, anyone with ~$2,000 can rig something like this up.
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A bayonet is a weapon with a worker on each end.
I don’t feel much sympathy either, I have to confess. But I do feel sadness.
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Yeah, it’s a deadly serious situation, and I would have preferred if the video didn’t include the silly music that seemed to detract from the gravity of what we were watching, but I haven’t been in a war and probably have to cut the Ukrainian soldiers some slack if they feel the need to de-stress with some gallows humor.
Certainly no need for any outside observers to trivialize what’s going on though, so I appreciate your restraint and choice not to post that meme.
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Huh - let me try again…
ETA - ah, scrolled down and found it. Bullseye!
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Well, I find it difficult to see why you wouldn’t to be honest,
Like the people who illegally invaded Iraq and murdered uncounted Iraqis? I can feel sympathy for them too, particularly when they were facing visceral terrifying situations and horrible death. Existing in a narrative that is completely misleading can lead to outcomes like that conscription.
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I do sympathize with the Russian soldiers. I’d sympathize less if they were all volunteers.
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Saves on artillery observers, those are always considered a tad expendable.
Lloyd Alexander had a quote like this in one of the Westmark books. “Half of a soldier’s job is killing, the other half is being killed.” Or pretty close to that
Like the US army then? I don’t get that. They still exist in the same relentlessly propagandised, serve your country, ecosystem where it is unthinkable that your country isn’t the one in the right. Even if you are an imperialist invading a smaller country.
Which is actually the norm for wars involving powerful nations.
Now if they were flat out mercenary scum like Blackwater or Wagner fascists I’d move the needle a bit.
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I’m clearly not coming across well here I think.
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Sorry. I’ve got into trouble in lots of contexts for sympathising with soldiers even while hating what they do. It’s rare that they aren’t also victims.
Violence: to be avoided if possible.
