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Comment by AtHeartEngineer | Hacker News Reader

Would you rather be in the room with decision makers, trying to make sure it doesn't go over the line, or go in the wrong direction? Or just don't participate, not know what's going on, and have less competent "yes-man" in your seat. This is my daily struggle, it keeps me up.

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Usually when I'm confronted with such conundrums it's a signal to me that I'm thinking about the problem too narrowly. Surely being at the table, unless you are the one making decisions, is lending yourself to someone else's cause. If you weren't a yes man one way or another you'd probably be thrown off the team anyway and replaced by another yes man. Maybe you get to sway them towards competency but you aren't changing their end goal.

There are other ways of changing the world than working with those who perpetuate violence.

I think the better question to ask is.. who stands to gain from slowing down the pace of innovation in the US military? Basically.. competing nation states. In a world full of liberty loving friendly democracies I might think more parity in military capability is desirable. In the world we have.. we basically have to be able to win a war against major the hostile major military powers.. at the same time (Russia, China, etc).

The decision makers won't put you in the room with them. They will take the weapons you built, pay you for them, and use them on whomever, and whenever they see fit.

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