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A comment on Drug Traffickers Are Spoofing Border Drones.

Re:Drug Traffickers Are Spoofing Border Drones by roymurdock on Tuesday December 22, 2015 @11:17AM (#10778526)
> UAVs helped in just 2 percent of apprehensions on the southwest border. The audit came out just as DHS was asking Congress to give it $443 million for another 14 Reapers, also called Predator Bs, which the agency received.

So we spent $360m (at least, probably more due to creative accounting cited in article) on spoofable, hackable, drones since 2005. Then, instead of waiting for an audit, Congress greenlights another $443 to purchase 14 more of the same 2% value added drones which were designed to carry out strike missions in Afghanistan.

Why?

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Drug Traffickers Are Spoofing Border Drones by Wingman4l7 on Tuesday December 22, 2015 @11:59AM (#10778794)
Why do you think? Because that's what's on offer by the military contractors who have manufacturing plants in those senator's districts -- so that's what they buy.

Or, if you prefer the faith-in-humanity answer: career politicians don't have an understanding of statistics.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Drug Traffickers Are Spoofing Border Drones by Wingman4l7 on Tuesday December 22, 2015 @04:12PM (#10780420)
To add to my other, now un-editable response: inertia may also play a role -- the existing procurement processes for the drones have already been worked out; it's probably a lot easier to make an additional order for the same product.
[ Parent | on HN ]