Slashdot Log In
Taliban Demands Downtime on Afghanistan Cellphone Networks
Posted by
samzenpus
on Tue Feb 26, 2008 11:05 AM
from the since-you-asked-nicely dept.
from the since-you-asked-nicely dept.
faster_manic writes "The Taliban has demanded that cellphone network providers in Afghanistan cease service between the hours of 5pm and 7am each night of the week, as they believe American troops are able to track down Taliban members using their cellphones."
Related Stories
This discussion has been archived.
No new comments can be posted.
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
Full
Abbreviated
Hidden
Loading... please wait.
Isn't it as easy as (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Isn't it as easy as (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:Isn't it as easy as (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:Isn't it as easy as (Score:5, Informative)
Also, apart from the baths and showers with which the camps shall be furnished prisoners of war shall be provided with sufficient water and soap for their personal toilet and for washing their personal laundry; the necessary installations, facilities and time shall be granted them for that purpose.
ref: http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/lawofwar/geneva03.htm#art29 [yale.edu]
Parent
Re:upon the cessation of hostilities? (Score:5, Insightful)
I hope you're being sarcastic.
You can measure how free and fair a society is by examining the way it treats it prisoners.
I mean it must be safe and reassuring in a society that condones biological warfare. You never have to treat the enemy the same way they treat you, you always have the choice to be better and in the long run the most ruthless don't always win (American revolution, Napoleonic wars, WWII FFS).
I really hope you're being sarcastic.
Your idea of victory is to become your enemy?
Convert to westernism or die from a horrible communicable disease.
I'm sorry but you earn a big EPIC FAIL here. If we followed this strategy we'd all earn a big EPIC FAIL. I mean here's a fantastic idea, lets give people who hate us and already are willing to die an incurable, slow acting fatal disease. By George that's fantastic thinking make a fanatical people more desperate, that'll show em, they'll never retaliate.
Radical Islam is not the enemy, thinking like this is the enemy, thinking you own the world is the enemy. Radical Islam can only be defeated by discrediting their leaders, a video of Bin Laden having a glass of wine would be more effective than all the bombs dropped in the last 6 years. If left alone, Radical clerics will lose support, Radicals need an enemy otherwise the indoctrinated have time to think. Radical Islam will never force western nations to convert and the chance of western society being destroyed by external influence is so astronomically low that it is not worth mentioning so to succeed against radical Islam, we don't have to win, we just have to survive. I would rather see my free and fair state destroyed than see it succumb to ignorant and extremist thinking from inside. If I can go about my daily business then that is a victory.
I'm sorry but your logic of war fails when you don't understand your enemy or the logic of war to begin with. The logic behind releasing non-uniformed combatants is to create a bridge to peace, holding them only continues the to fuel a cycle of hate. The true objective of war is not the elimination of the enemy but the elimination of their reason to fight you. If you continue to hold there citizens they will continue to have a valid reason to attack you, an enemy without a valid reason for a war will not be able to garner much support (Sun Tzu covered this 2000 years ago) which is why the IRA haven't been in the news lately, they don't have much of a reason left to attack anyone.
Parent
Re:Isn't it as easy as (Score:5, Insightful)
That's unlikely since in a guerilla war like this they could go on for a long time. They come from the largest ethnic group, the Pashtuns (42% of the population). The United Islamic Front for the Salvation of Afghanistan (or the Northern Alliance as the media prefers) is mostly made up of Tajiks (27% of the Population), Hazara and Uzbeks.
This whole thing is broken down on ethnic grounds and NATO have chosen to back one ethnic group over the others. The United Islamic Front (UIF) are really no better than the Taliban if you look at the human rights reports.
The UN recently reported that NATO and US forces had killed more civilians than the Taliban, mostly in air-strikes. There is a policy of sacrificing civilians in order to keep military casualties down. It's safer to bomb something than to send troops in. 10 dead Afghan civilians is more politically acceptable than 10 dead US soldiers. In the unlikely even of the media kicking up a real fuss about the civilian deaths, you can always just dredge up the tired old excuse that it's the enemy's fault for "hiding among the civilians".
Parent
In fact, we all did it. (Score:5, Insightful)
Max Hastings, the military historian, has written in his remarkably fair and balanced book Armageddon about the British policy of carpet bombing civilians, and how it probably lengthened the war (because it diverted resources from protecting shipping in the Atlantic, and because strategic attacks on oil plants could have caused the German army to come to a stop much sooner. He describes revenge attacks by many Allied groups. Apart from Bomber Harris, the Allied commanders were in general much more careful than the Russians, and this reduced casualties in the West. In the east, knowing what the Russians would do, the Germans fought with more desperation.
Hastings points out, very fairly, that Japan suffered far less than Germany because the result of the A-bomb attacks was surrender without invasion. Therefore, paradoxically, the A-Bomb may well have reduced the death rate in the Far East very considerably.
This shows how ethically difficult the whole thing is in the context of all out war.
It is also very difficult nowadays to define who is a civilian. Is a worker in an oil production plant a civilian when a tanker driver is a soldier? They are part of the supply chain, and the oil plant could well be a legitimate military target. In a country where the majority of men carry guns, how do you tell a civilian from a soldier?
I am not in favor of indiscriminate war, believe me. Thanks to my father and my uncle and their friends, my only experience of the military has been as an R&D engineer. But I do think we often expect the military to solve ethical problems that philosophers give up on, and that when it comes to people who want to run a country so they can torture and abuse women versus people who, basically, don't, I think we need to be very careful before sounding off.
Parent
Re:Isn't it as easy as (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't see how this would be useful at any reasonable distance. You'd have to flood the area with enough RF to fry small animals. And it definitely wouldn't be useful for identifying individual phones (unless you have a REALLY good database of imperfections in their antennas, and how many keys each Talibanister carries in his pocket).
Furthermore, the Taliban have requested to have the towers turned off, not to have the batteries removed from each phone by some form of remote magic. So evidently they're already comfortable with remaining trackable, they just don't want to be annoyed by stupid ringtones after dark.
If the phone company towers were turned off and I were the CIA, then promptly at 5:01pm each evening I'd turn on my own promiscuous CIA towers, and all phones in the country would cheerfully tell me where they are.
Basically, it appears the Taliban's grasp of telecommunications is about on par with their grasp of Islam.
Parent
Re:Isn't it as easy as (Score:5, Insightful)
The mentality I speak of is "The entire world around me should be adjusted to fit my way of thinking or doing things."
If you happen to live in an area where "blue laws" exist, you'll know what I'm talking about. In my area, you cannot buy beer on Sunday before 12:00 noon, so if you forgot to buy beer before the game starts the previous day, you're SOL thanks to these religiously sponsored legislative actions. Such laws do not serve the community -- they serve to create a society that better aligns itself with religious interests.
In this case, it would make more sense that Taliban people should have to turn their phones off to avoid being tracked... but it's too inconvenient for them to change the way they do things. So instead, they want to make things inconvenient for EVERYONE to better suit their individual needs.
This just goes to show what is truly broken about their minds. They are far too self-interested to really be concerned about anything resembling "greater good." And I'll say it once again -- this is not the exclusive territory of muslim extremists. It's not even the exclusive territory of religious extremists though it does seem to be something of a hallmark of them. It's a problem of the self-interested mind.
So every time you see someone trying to get new law written to protect their children when they should be doing it themselves, this is a sign that they have the same mental weakness that requires the rest of the world compensate for their stupidity.
Parent
Re:Isn't it as easy as (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:Isn't it as easy as (Score:5, Interesting)
What was always interesting was how often the bootleggers sided with the preachers to keep the county dry, every time they held a vote.
Parent
Re:Isn't it as easy as (Score:5, Informative)
I spent a few weeks in WI this summer, and was completely blown away by their state fair. Every food booth there sold beer along with food. (I imagine it had something to do with WI being the brewery state!). In Oregon, you have to have a fenced off area, with guards manning the entrance, ID'ing everyone that wants to walk in. My cousin couldn't enter the beer garden, because her 1 year old son was with her in a stroller, and they wouldn't let her in, she might give alcohol to a minor! Nice to know that Oregon is there to Protect you from yourself!
Parent
Re:Isn't it as easy as (Score:5, Insightful)
They will lose. Let me save them the trouble:
The transportation or importation into any State, Territory, or possession of the United States for delivery or use there in of intoxicating liquors, in violation of the laws thereof, is hereby prohibited
In broad terms the 21st Amendment allows the states to do whatever the hell they want with liquor sales. That was the price of repealing prohibition -- the states gained full control to do virtually whatever they want within their own borders. There's nothing preventing a state from adopting statewide prohibition tomorrow if it desired to do so -- well, nothing except the voting public :)
Parent
Re:Isn't it as easy as (Score:5, Funny)
-nB
Parent
I think you misoverestimate them (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:Isn't it as easy as (Score:5, Interesting)
"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.".
It's probably not politically correct to point out that in this case, "progress" would mean "towards a Taliban-controlled state which is about half a millennium behind the rest of the world".
Parent
Re:Isn't it as easy as (Score:5, Insightful)
That's something I can't understand, except that people are too lazy to read their own bibles and fall prey to the wolves in sheep's clothing.
There is nothing whatever in the Christian Bible that says drinking is a sin. Ok there is a passage in the old testament that says kings shouldn't drink, and one in the new testament that says we should soberly wait for the second coming - but it also says "give strong drink to the dying and wine to those with the blues." It also chronicles the fact that on Jesus' last night on earth, all the apostles were shitfaced drunk.
These peole aren't reading Christ's bible, they're reading Pat Robertson's bible. Jesus had quite a few things to say about people like Robertson and his four thousand dollar suits...
-mcgrew
Parent
Re:Isn't it as easy as (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:Isn't it as easy as (Score:5, Funny)
Mohamed dials 1-(800) us-army on his cell phone,
Mohamed: hey Army Joe, that scumbag taliban Achmed and his guys that keep stealing my chickens "for the cause" is coming through the village
US Army Joe: Sure no problem Mohamed, we'll light'em up out on the trail.
Mohamed: Thanks Joe, have a good one.
Parent
No, its not easy, they have a legit complaint ... (Score:5, Insightful)
No, it is not that easy, they have a "legitimate" complaint from their perspective. The "problem" is *not* their people and their cell phones. The "problem" is that ordinary citizen are reporting suspicious nighttime activities. Their are essentially trying to turn off the tips hotline.
Parent
Re:Isn't it as easy as (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:Isn't it as easy as (Score:5, Funny)
Don't antropomorphise
Parent
Re:Isn't it as easy as (Score:5, Insightful)
Now the US will drive in a moble cellphone tower. All the phones will connect to it because it is the only available tower in range. Now the US can easily fallow the signal or use more moble towers to pin point an exact location and just bomb it.
And because the towers are off, the people that would have turned the phone off dont.
This is the stupidest mistake they could make.
on the other hand, if the cellphone makes that tone indicating that it is roaming late at night something is up.
Parent
Re:Isn't it as easy as (Score:5, Insightful)
The interesting thing here is that we are seeing two things that we haven't really saw before. One and probably the most significant, is that taliban tactics are being traded and treated like open information like the US government's terrorist spy program. This tells me that people aren't as afraid of the taliban as they used to be. The other is that we are hitting them so hard that they are scrambling for a way to mitigate it. If it was something they weren't worried about, they would simply say leave them off. But for some reason, they are desperate enough to ask for help in turning the towers off because they think it is how we are finding them.
Either way, I like it.
Parent
Re:Isn't it as easy as (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:Isn't it as easy as (Score:5, Insightful)
It tells me quite the opposite. It tells me that the Taliban is back to being powerful enough to make demands of companies and think it has a chance of being listened to. Over 6 years after they were almost bombed out of existence they are now almost back to running some things.
Parent
agreed (Score:5, Informative)
The best quote from her was along the lines of 'They have paved the roads in Kanahar, which is great, but if you drive on them you'll be shaken down by the government in the day and the taliban at night.' She said that before the taliban fell that she could drive into Kandahar (when the roads were dirt), but wouldn't dream of doing it now (she was making a point, not saying that they should come back).
She is on the ground there living as a citizen and doesn't think that the taliban is going anywhere anytime soon. Her opinion of the government is that we have replaced the taliban with criminals.
Parent
Re:Isn't it as easy as (Score:5, Interesting)
The problem the Taliban have isn't that their own cellphones are emitting at night. I'm damn sure they're careful with cellphone use.
The problem is when NATO electronically sees a whole village *leave* their village at 2am.
Hmmm, I wonder what town the Taliban just rolled into?
Parent
Informants! (Score:5, Interesting)
Taliban is not supported by majority, or even a sizable minority in Afghanistan. People are tired of war. Hell, 25+ years of it in one way or another.
Furthermore, do you think the women like Taliban? Even if only 1 in 100 women is brave enough to report Taliban movements, that's 1 in 200 people. And I would guess that most med do not want their women bound to their houses either (hey, men don't like the extra work
Kabul is now thriving compared to when Taliban were in power. Kandahar is even much better off now. People see the change. There are more informants every day. And cellphones are what is enabling them to provide the military/police with intelligence they would never be able to gather alone.
Parent
Note the word "essential" in Ben's quote (Score:5, Insightful)
They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety. --Benjamin Franklin
I love Ben's wisdom, but this quote is being so overused and so often poorly used that it is being diminished. Please note the word "essential", Ben put that word in there for a reason. His words were carefully crafted and extraneous words were not left in. In short, non-essential liberties are excluded by the quote and anonymity while driving is a non-essential liberty, actually a non-existent liberty. We have no right to drive on public roads, it is a privilege. We knowingly enter into a contract in order to exercise that privilege. Our cars must be registered and display a unique identifier, the license plate. We are required to be licensed and must present that license upon request. Furthermore, OnStar is voluntary and has positive benefits, any good contract should, such as notifying rescue personnel of an accident's location. Ben's quote is quite inappropriate here.
Parent
Re:Note the word "essential" in Ben's quote (Score:5, Interesting)
The original quote from 1755 is:
"Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
He was actually talking about a collection of people who were living on the frontier, and my comment is a gross simplification... it was apparently well-received because he used it many times throughout the pre-revolutionary and revolutionary periods, in many different contexts.
Parent
obvious answer (Score:4, Insightful)
it's much easier to make a personal change than to have a whole infrastructure shut down.
Re:obvious answer (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re:obvious answer (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re:obvious answer (Score:5, Insightful)
US: Give us bin Laden.
Taliban: We don't have him.
US: Bullshit. Give us bin Laden.
Taliban: OK, we have him, but we'll try him in our own special way.
US: Bullshit. Give us bin Laden.
Taliban: Come and get him. But remember the USSR.
US: [invades]
Parent
Try Reading The Article (Score:5, Interesting)
Parent
DIAL MYCROFTXXX... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:DIAL MYCROFTXXX... (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
and also that (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
This made me laugh! (Score:5, Funny)
Don't get me wrong, the news story is quite legit, it just sounds like the kids playing cowboys and indians in the playground.
This is a good first step. (Score:5, Funny)
Good Luck (Score:5, Funny)
Cheap ass U.S. government (Score:5, Funny)
Disrupting Communications (Score:5, Insightful)
too bad it'll make them more easily tracked (Score:5, Informative)
they believe American troops are able to track down Taliban members using their cellphones.
Too bad it'll make all their cell phones transmit MORE, looking for said shut down towers- when a cell can't reach a tower, not only does it try to reconnect more often, but it also bumps up the transmit power.
That makes the cell phone a whole lot easier to find...and kills everyone's batteries...
5:00pm to 7:00am (Score:5, Funny)
"Tomorrow at 8:00pm, you will drive an explosives laden truck into the American barracks."
"Hold on, Muhammed. My position as a level 1 suicide bomber clearly states that this is a non-exempt position, and my scheduled hours are from 8:00am to 5:00pm complete with two fifteen minute breaks and a 30 minute lunch. I can't be forced to work any overtime. Look, we can take this all the way to Vicki in HR, but I'd really rather not.
Re:Huh? (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:Stupid (Score:5, Informative)
Wrong. They can track it even when it's off. They can even use it as an eavesdropping device, when it's off. Google "roving bug"...
Take out the battery.
Parent
the muslim world (Score:5, Insightful)
the usa gets plenty of criticism for its actions in the world. much of it deserved. do you think the usa deserves no criticism? of course you don't
so, in the spirit of an open mind, you accept that the muslim world deserves criticism as well
there are some xenophobic bigots who are doing the criticism of the muslim world, yes. there are also some mindless bigots criticizing the usa
the point is, the existence of these bigots does not mean that all criticism of the muslim world, or criticism of the usa, is simple bigotry or without merit
so if you dismiss all criticism of the muslim world out of hand, simply because you think it is all bigotry, it is you, as well as the bigots, with a closed, simple partisan kneejerk mind
Parent
Re:the muslim world (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem is that you lead off with a pre-emptory attack on anyone that might consider Islamic culture conducive to the breeding of these crazies, and you don't - in your own words - personally condemn them. That's exactly the problem, here. You attack - as your opening sentiment - everyone else, and not a peep out of you, in the same breath, about how little you think of the people who are trying so hard to defame the wider Muslim culture through their actual, murderous actions. This is exactly what I encounter in almost every conversation I have with Muslims. A completely defensive posture about the whole thing - so defensive, in fact, that they sweep defense of retrograde mysoginst killers like the Taliban right up into their piety and wounded feelings. In essence, people who think and act like the Taliban are busy making the world a more miserable place for Muslims, and Muslims are so busy saying how offended they are when lumped together with the Taliban that they forget to bother to proactively differentiate themselves from those clowns. If a culture of untold millions of people is unable to regularly figure out that they're not helping themselves by aggessively shouting down and personally doing everything they can to extinguish movements like the Taliban, then I have a hard time feeling sorry for them when they're perceived as being part of the problem.
The people in quesition kill women for teaching their daughters to read. They stone women to death for having been raped. And what do I hear from somewhat more modern Muslims? Not, "These people have to be stopped, especially since they want to run the entire middle east that way (and London, and Canada) - how can I help?" but rather, "Oh, we're not all like that, and you're a bigot for even wondering if Islam itself, by its nature, seems to be built around these notions." Passively allowing violent medieval theocracies to try, again, to take root and spread is only scarecly worse than actively pushing for it. Making the people who honestly express disgust at that entire world view sound like the villains is your primary mistake, and if anyone should be insulted it's them, not you.
Parent