War crimes are bad, but using ATP land mines is not a war crime by itself.
For example ATP land mines with reliable self-destruction used properly are OK (yes, some failure rate will exist - in case of war you rarely have 100% sunshine and rainbows solutions).
While dropping randomly land mines over city to target civilians is bad, evil, war crime and terrorism.
Yes, in case of war it is very likely that murdering soldiers of other side will become necessary. It does not make executing PoW acceptable, but guns/mines etc will be used.
One core principle behind determining whether the use of a weapon is a war crime is seeing if it can be used discriminately, i.e., if it can be targeted. So for example, the use of guns (though awful) is not a war crime, because using it requires you to point it at something and pull the trigger. You are in control of whether you shoot an enemy who is actively engaging, an enemy who is retreating, a field medic, a journalist reporting on the scene, a civilian who was not able to flee the area. With for example mustard gas, you cannot make this choice, and that's one of the two major reasons why the use of mustard gas is a war crime.
Even if you build in a self destruction mechanism to landmines(1), this indiscriminate nature remains.
On top of that, you mention something about peppering cities with land mines not being ok (and it wouldn't be), but I'm not convinced that anyone's doing that. And still civilians make up 90% of the victims.
Of course, there's another thing playing into that 90% figure, which is that, by and large, mines are not very effective against military tartgets because they have ample means to dispose of them. Given the fact that our target here is Russia, and not some poorly funded guerilla outfit, I think this should be taken into consideration.
Pairing their war crimey nature and their low efficacy (2), I personally cannot get behind withdrawing from the Ottawa treaty.
There is much more to say about this, and much more has been said about this. I would recommend giving
a skim. They give alternative, more effective, less inhumane, solutions to the problems that mines try (and largely fail) to solve.
(1) Which is ultimately a bit of a hypothetical exercise, because the nations that left the treaty, well, left the treaty. They didn't propose an amendment allowing for temporary mines, they left the treaty. And on top of that the failure rate for such smart mines is like 20%. You get 1/5th of a war crime I guess.
(2) Earlier I said something to the effect of "I'm sure they're effective". At the time I hadn't read up on the actual effectiveness of mines, because to me, the effectiveness of a method plays no role in whether it should be allowed in combat. I've since read up on that part too, and I'm reasonably convinced they're not very effective in our current context.
Modern mines have programmable target discriminators that use multiple sensor modalities in addition to a programmable self-destruct. A cow or a goat herder usually won't set these off.
Many types of sophisticated mines cannot be trivially cleared with line charges or engineering vehicles. Soviet style mines can be cleared this way but aren't the only kind that exist.
This tech isn't sophisticated but it costs money and requires maintenance. Many militaries don't use them because they want weapons that can sit in a warehouse for 50 years with zero maintenance.
The military purpose of mines is not to kill anyone. It is to deny use of space in order to shape the battlefield and trap the adversary in areas where they are exposed to other weapons. Mines are highly effective at this purpose and will be for the foreseeable future against almost all adversaries. This is not controversial.
The "expert" in the linked article has no background in mine warfare, only EOD. This became obvious when I was reading the article because it presented an unexpectedly naive understanding of mine warfare. That perspective might make sense if your only experience is clearing old Soviet mines and IEDs but it doesn't generalize.
I wonder how those sensors detect a retreating enemy. And again, a failure rate between 6% and 20% is not acceptable. A bit of mustard gas is still mustard gas. And the baltics left the "all mines" treaty, not the "smart mines" treaty.
You are underestimating what kind of evil things people had done and will do. This was in fact done.
> Even if you build in a self destruction mechanism to landmines(1), this indiscriminate nature remains.
Would you claim that dropping bombs from planes is also war crime? Because if mines are placed in exclusion zones or deployed directly in front on enemy charge then mines can be as discriminate as alternatives.
> Of course, there's another thing playing into that 90% figure, which is that, by and large, mines are not very effective against military tartgets because they have ample means to dispose of them. Given the fact that our target here is Russia, and not some poorly funded guerilla outfit, I think this should be taken into consideration.
In Ukraine mines were in fact effective, both against Russia and Ukraine.
> because they have ample means to dispose of them
Main benefit of using mines is slowing down enemy and forcing them to deploy means to dispose them
It drastically lowers speed of advance, even if mines harm noone in the end.
> And on top of that the failure rate for such smart mines is like 20%.
I heard about much better failure rates. Do you have a reliable source for that 20%? I would be happy to educate myself (and maybe change my opinion)
I did, and their claim of "Minefields can now be breached in minutes, using armoured engineering vehicles and explosive line charges." is highly misleading.
For example Russia lost piles of tanks and other combat vehicles around Vuhledar, large part of them to remotely deployed mines.
For other side, Ukrainian summer offensive failed in large part due to massive mine fields (there were also other factors like insufficient supply of armoured engineering vehicles and explosive line charges and Russian helicopters sniping ones that were trying to breach minefields).
If you restrict claim to ATP mines - they are still useful and they are nightmare to advancing military. Yes, after war they will be also horrible for civilians if not cleaned up.
Manipulation/mistake in quoted source is that any military thing can now be breached in minutes or faster, at least in some cases with proper tools deployed in proper position. The trick is that it is not reliable, you may lack this tools, you may miss window for deploying them, they may be opposed or stopped.
Yes, sometimes mines can be defeated quickly, mines are not win button, mines will not solve all problems. It does not change that mines are extremely useful and side not using them (or giving up ATP mines) is at huge handicap.
> I'm reasonably convinced they're not very effective in our current context.
I am not, at all, and as far as I know this is widely shared opinion among people who are actual experts in military matters. (I am not one)
> Yes. But the what's the point of a convention about weapons that you only observe during peacetime and abandon as soon as war is at your gates?
You should ask people who supported or invented this convention. I never supported it and would support exit from it also before 2014 or 2022.
More cynical answer is that in time of peace refusing to sign up gives you bad PR so you sign up and in case of war you exit it (Finland, Poland, Baltics just did it) or ignore altogether (as Ukraine did). But it just weakens commitment to other conventions and PR hit would not be so bad, so I consider it as a mistake.
but signing up to it while Russia has not even pretended to do so was absurd.
> The Baltics withdrawing from the Ottawa treaty was an absolute disgrace. Indefensible.
It is entirely defensible on account of wanting to reduce risk of being invaded by Russia.
PS: Poland also exited the treaty. I entirely support use of mines on territory of mu country for purposes such as reducing risk of Russian invading Poland again. Though deployment should not be premature.
But I hope that production and stockpiling of enough mines is ongoing.
If you think that is indefensible - are you aware of how WW II went for Baltics, Poland, Belarus? In Poland about 16% of population was murdered, in Belarus about 20% of population was murdered. And Poland and Baltics got decades of occupation on top of that. Belarus still has not managed to get from Russia's boot as of 2026.
And I have no problem with position "war crimes are not OK".
War crimes are bad, but using ATP land mines is not a war crime by itself.
For example ATP land mines with reliable self-destruction used properly are OK (yes, some failure rate will exist - in case of war you rarely have 100% sunshine and rainbows solutions).
While dropping randomly land mines over city to target civilians is bad, evil, war crime and terrorism.
Can you at least stop lying to yourself? Given what they did with Anthropic for not supporting domestic mass surveillance and autonomous weapons...
> My understanding is that the OpenAI deal disallows domestic mass surveillance and autonomous weapons
Your understanding is entirely wrong. At least stop lying to yourself and admit that you are entirely fine with working on evil things if you are paid enough.
I never in my life were mocking and making fun out of other people for trusting me, or equivalent.
I also never run company that knowingly ruined multitude of lives and social interactions in general.
> snarky
Snark is not a problem that people have with Mr. Zuckerberg.
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