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‘The frontline is like Terminator’: fighting robots give Ukraine hope in war with Russia
(www.theguardian.com)
this post was submitted on 04 Apr 2026
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Anyone cheering this on is a bad person btw.
edit: 7 years ago it was uncontroversial to say robots should not be used to kill people. We are in the dumbest timeline. I actually do hope this spreads so the people downvoting my point understand how bad of an idea this is when their kids are determined to be valid combatants by automated weapon systems and are obliterated in order to win a war no one but the robots are still fighting.
It is a bad idea, but Pandora's box cannot be closed. We must remember that developments within technological warfare has been the reason colonization and imperialism spread.
I hate the "good guy with a gun" position, but in regards to invading forces, it's best to be prepared for what may come. Sun Tzu said "he who wants peace must prepare for war".
What we're seeing in the theater of war in Ukraine right now is how warfare will be waged currently as well as in the future and as such we want rather to lose robots than trained personnel, or even civilians.
The new war of attrition will be one of chips and metal. There's nothing we can do about that really, except build defense systems, drones and robots made to counter or even cancel out invading drones and robots.
But make no mistake: Pandora's box cannot be closed again. All the evils have been released - and you can't shove them back in the box.
We're not losing robots though. that's the thing. This isn't drone on drone warfare. This is drone on civilian and soldier warfare.
And that's the exclusive future for this technology.
That's what we decided was better than simply stopping all wars by enabling nuclear proliferation.
That's also why Ukraine got invaded and why Cuba got sanctioned to death - because they gave up their nuclear armament. That's why they call it a nuclear deterrent.
What you're suggesting is that Ukrainians should stop developing these drones and robots so that Russia can get ahead of them, which will lead to even more civilians dying - because Russia sends drones to destroy apartment complexes, hospitals, schools, and civilian infrastructure all the time - because Russia is a terrorist state. Heck, Russia kills their own soldiers on the battlefield once said soldiers are deemed expendable - all for their glorious emperor Putin.
Your type of thinking is inherently defeatist and would bring about the fall of Ukraine. You're not against war. You're for successful invasion and takeover of entire nation States. You're in effect an enabler. You're against people, cultures and countries protecting themselves from invaders, fascists and imperialists. You live in a fantasy world predicated upon your feelings.
Either that, or you're a Russian sympathizer and collaborator. I'd rather give you the benefit of the doubt and call you ignorant and blind to the realities of the world.
Again: imperialism isn't dead and one wonders if it ever will be. In any case, the promise of modernity must be kept - of no more shifting borders - be it through treaties or a defense industrial complex.
And also, the US is nuts. They'd gladly let Russia take Lithuania, Poland and Finland. Europe sees this and we're not here to be a footnote in the history book of whatever conqueror gets to rewrite it.
Everything in this paragraph also applies to Ukraine. Stop pretending their war crimes don't exist, and if you believe they don't, expand your media consumption so you actually see truthful reporting.
The rest of your fearmongering brainwashed nonsense shows you have no objective media consumption. You are fully subject to whatever your corporate owners want you to believe, and you happily believe it.
Here's a hint: EVIL DOES NOT EXIST, AND PEOPLE DO NOT DO THINGS JUST TO BE EVIL.
Why is Russia invading Ukraine?
Why does the entirety of the corporate world back Ukraine?
Why is the fact Ukraine has been sending children to die in the front lines against their and their parent's will just not come up in these discussions?
Why do none of you people question anything your governments tell you?
I get it, you've been brainwashed for decades that Russia is magically Nazi Germany (despite their government and economy just being the United States') and that they want to exterminate all [[insert whoever is getting a new starbucks here]]. And they're bad, but they're no worse than the US. They're no worse than Hungary. They're no worse than Turkey. They're no worse than Ukraine or Israel.
They're all the same flavor of fascist. This is just fascist infighting to see which fascist gets monetary control of land. Not people, the people don't enter into the equation. Ukraine doesn't have a people anymore, an entire generation exterminated because death was better than paying taxes to Putin.
Good and evil are indeed social constructs, but stupid isn't.
I pay deep attention to the war in Ukraine, their actions in Russia and vice versa. What you are posing is a false equivalency. Ukraine may target petroleum infrastructure, but does not target hospitals, schools or indeed apartment complexes - whereas Russia does it all the time to break the Ukrainian spirit. This is all open source intelligence and has been verified conclusively all across the world. There's no such thing as a private war in 2026.
The motives are clear. Ukraine is fighting for it's right to exist, for it's people not to be genocided by Russians, for it's language and culture to be preserved from an opposing fascist imperialist power. Russia wants to take over, to subjugate and control the entirety of Ukraine, all at once - or bits and pieces, and they'll use all the automated weaponry they can gather to do so.
Therefore what you want is for Ukraine to be trodden down to meet with your ideological fancies - in effect enabling and even justifying said fascist imperialist power - by telling Ukraine and even Europe to lay down it's arms, throw our hands up and give in to to a fascist dictatorship that would have you and your ideals sent to the gulag.
It's quite possible that you're just another Russia bot, like the various parties and shills across Europe who "just want peace", when what they really want is to cut off all support from Ukraine so that Russia can steamroll them - so they have earned the salary given to them by the Kremlin.
But let's say you're just anti war to the core, against any and all military power. Why don't you go to Putin and Russia first? Why not go to the Iranians, the Chinese or even the Americans with your demands? Do you think they'll just cancel all development, all production and manufacturing, that all engines will cease?
Nuts! You're an ostrich, sir. You care not for the safety, security and freedom of Europeans. You'd have Russia go into Poland, Lithuania and Finland to lay claim to these countries, to destroy their way of life, to subjugate them via russifiafication, that their history, language and culture be expunged to be yet another "republic", yet another colony and vassal state to a fascist empire.
That will be the success they need to go even further. They even want to march through Berlin, as they said at the beginning of the war. You cannot reason with fascists or imperialists. At a point there's nothing doing but to raise arms and fight for your freedoms - because if they take over, just look at what they're doing to Russians currently. It'll be a thousand times worse the further away it is optically from the Kremlin.
You're not fighting fascism. You're an enabler, a facilitator, a supporter of fascism. Either this kind of technology is widespread, standardized and decentralized, or one party holds all the cards - which will lead to more imperialism and fascism, more death, more genocide.
PANDORAS BOX CANNOT BE CLOSED.
3 day old account spreading Russian propaganda, how original
That's the brainwashing I'm talking about. Nothing I've said is propaganda, and nothing I've stated is being stated by Russia.
You people are as bad as zionists, anything that even suggests your holy land might not be heaven incarnate and your brain shuts down.
These "robots" are actually ground drones, and the term "robot" is being widely misused.
They can't identify the allegiance of a soldier. The operator will see, consider and then shoot. It's better than going out there and getting shot at.
If you don't know the state of the art, it's easy to think they are robots, but they have the same autonomy level as an FPV drone. They are automated to the degree that you can tell them "drive 50 clicks north-east and stop".
Really advanced versions will have a local algorithm to track and shoot an aerial target, once the operator decides that it's a target. Because in air defense, latency means losing.
However, swarming weapons are a cause for concern in near future, because in those cases, one soldier may end up controlling 100+ weapons and likely won't have a good overview of the situation.
If you can't understand that its because of the context, and that your brief initial comment is ignorant/simple, then it is probably not worth trying to persuade you towards any nuance involved here. Furthermore, no where is it mentioned that these weapons are autonomous; just robots/drones, giving a country under invasion a much needed advantage. Some of your comments seem to indicate a support of Russia, so again, likely spurious effort here.
There is no context that makes these weapons okay, and I have never supported Russia.
I get that reading is hard for liberals, which is why liberals exist in the first place, but do try a bit harder.
The big brained response is disappointing yet not surprising. No one said they're ok, just that you made erroneous claims and are over simple. Ironic comment about dur reading is hard. Very low effort and trite.
"giving a country under invasion a much needed advantage"
So advantage is not ok? It's not a positive thing? It's not normalization of one of hte most environmentally and socially destructive technologies?
What is the alternative that you are ok with?
Diplomacy and asymmetric warfare. If you are actually being invaded and your response is to destroy your own environment while implementing weapons that indiscriminately kill, you don't care about the people you're protecting and you have no concern of the world after the war.
they don't kill indiscriminately, just the enemy. what are you on about. and the environment angle really? next you will tell me russia is using only eco friendly bombs and drones. to be able to think about the world after the war you must have the world after the war. if you lose the war someone else will think about your world and i bet anything that they won't be thinking about your precious environment. grow up
Except when they do. Both Ukraine and Russia have posted HD drone video showing internationally recognized war crimes targeting civilians and unarmed surrendered soldiers, as well as medical transports and civilian infrastructure and buildings.
The Guided Weapon fallacy is well documented at this point, drones are an extension of this, the drones mentioned in the article which have even fewer safeguards and fewer human steps make this much worse.
To the rest of your nonsense, no. This isn't a life or death war. The Ukrainian people that were created 30 years ago will not disappear if they lose. Hell Russia doesn't even want Ukraine according to Ukraine or Russian negotiations.
This is literally a local territory dispute that has cost more lives than could be saved if Ukraine or Russia won today.
We have a good 100 years left on this planet, at most, before climate change forces around 80% of us to die. Why waste this destroying what little land might be livable during that time... over 3 territories that don't objectively matter to Ukraine?
Ok now your angle is clear!
And that is?
Fuck you, Russian fascist. That is all.
Not Russian, The opposite of fascist hence why I'm against Ukraine and Russia.
But nice try liberal. Maybe the fediverse isn't right for you, since you align with u/spez 100% and should be on reddit.
Guys chill im an antinazi it means want disabled people to gas the Germans.
I don't think they're smart enough to parse that, you really have to break down anything that isn't what their owners' told them.
Oh my god man, it's you. You're the antinazi for brainlessly parroting every Russian pro-war talking point while claiming to be anti war. Yes the fastest way to end a fight is to kill him.
You know what they call a serial killer that kills serial killers?
The particular conflict in Ukraine is between two capitalist nations. It's a conflict between fascists & liberals to decide which tricolor is cooler. Call them both fascist if you want because it changes nothing. Every day they fight and die, the elites become 1% more fascist, and the people 1% more miserable.
And if Russia wins, the Ukranian people get to be exploited by maximally fascist ghouls, while being made even more miserable, that's all. Why the hell would you support that.
...Russia is not wanting to and has never stated and the claim from ukraine has never been the take over of Ukraine.
Where you got this idea is beyond me, since no news coverage has ever suggested as much.
This particular conflict is between Ukraine, Luhansk, Donetsk, and Russia. The stated war goals of Russia, from the start, was to secure Luhansk and Donetsk during their fight for independence.
The Ukrainian point of view is that Russia somehow infiltrated both regions, faked a 90+% vote for independence in those regions, and invaded when Ukraine denied their independence.
Same thing with Crimea so many years earlier.
As far as 'Russian pro-war talking points' THERE ARE TWO SIDES TO THIS CONFLICT AND NEITHER SIDE IS MORE RIGHT THAN THE OTHER.
Russia is not 'the bad guys.'
Ukraine is not 'the good guys.'
Ukraine is lead by a genocidal dictatorship hell bent on creating a new Israel in the corpse of the Ukrainian territory.
Russia is lead by a genocidal dictatorship hell bent on recreating a capitalist propaganda version of the soviet union.
If Russia wins two new countries get made and fall to the Russian block of allied countries.
If Ukraine wins, at this point, they will spend the next 50 years receiving international aid to the tune of trillions per year to try to recreate what they had before the war. While still dealing with a non-zero amount of their population who DO NOT WANT UKRAINIAN LEADERSHIP ANYWHERE NEAR THEM, after kidnapping kids off the street to fight an unpopular war.
There is no winner in this war, there is no side to root for, both are fully fascist dictatorships with no sense of democracy, but refusing to understand the underlying motivations of either side hurts analysis of other conflicts.
Like the Iran war isn't over oil, or religion, or even the oppression of the Iranian people.
It is so Israel doesn't have any threats in the region during their imperialist expansion. If you treated the Iranian war like you people treat the Ukrainian war, you'd assume Israel is the good guys and the victims
which is how Israel has gotten away with genocide for 80 years.
Also, the Luhansk and Donetsk PRs no longer exist as political entities. They were unilaterally annexed several years ago, because, y'know, the aim was never to help them achieve self-determination, but to expand Russia's borders. This is the exact same thing they plan to do to the rest of Ukraine. Again, extremely obvious.
Israel is a bizarre comparison. I support Iran's right to exist, and the connection is that both of them are vile offensive wars aimed at killing people or removing their right to self-determination.
Neither Russia nor Israel is going to outright state their maximalist territorial aims, because it would unite their enemies and some people are hopeful or stupid enough to take them in good faith. However, both are ultranationalist organisations, and their ideal world is one where every other ethnicity is eradicated or subsumed by their own. While that's not realistically possible, they'll try to achieve the closest thing that is.
If you genuinely believe either of them you're just gullible, I don't know how else to say it.
In regards to Donetsk etc, I see no evidence that there's legit internal support for separatism, and on that basis they're not legit. If the Russian govt believed that it existed they'd surely would have pushed for a robust and independent plebecite to provide legitimacy to their buffer states. That they tried to stuff the ballots, shows that it's a crock of shit.
Nice try fascist. No true leftist would side with the oligarch tyrants in Moscow. Go back to /pol.
Again liberal, I haven't once done so. I know reading is hard, otherwise you'd be a communist, but do try to read things instead of instinctively shut your brain down every time someone questions your chosen propaganda.
Just because someone doesn't think the guy that took military control of his country, killed elections, had dozens of parliamentary members arrested, and has been kidnapping young men off the streets to fight in one of the least popular wars in that country's history is a good guy fighting a good fight doesn't mean they think the equally as fascist Putin is a good guy.
The world isn't black and white, no matter how much you liberals would love that to be true.
All Fascism is bad. Not just the ones your state told you to hate.
You're fun, but please learn another term or three for "liberals" so that you can mix it up with different insults for each response.
You should read more! It improves your vocabulary, as of now it seems like you've only read some flyers you found in the bathroom at a bus station. Kinda lazy
In my memory, which to be honest is quite limited, it was uncontroversial to say thay autonomous robots should not be used to kill people. Non-autonomous robots, such as Ukraine seems to be using, are essentially nothing more than an extension of modern arms, but one where the person 'wielding' the weapon is in a relatively safe place.
So you don't remember the massive drone strike controversies or why the majority of the Iraqi and Afghanistan population will never, at any point in their lives, for the next several generations, be able to go outside without PTSD induced fear?
Or why drone operators commit suicide at significantly higher rates than other military vets?
It is the man not the machine. Humans design the robots. If the robots kill indiscriminately, that's the fault of the designer. The article said that some of the robots do tasks besides killing such as clearing mines and bringing up supplies.