“When a young man, I read somewhere the following: God the Almighty said, ‘All that is too complex is unnecessary, and it is simple that is needed’ … So this has been my lifetime motto – I have been creating weapons to defend the borders of my fatherland, to be simple and reliable." - Mikhail Kalashnikov (Nov. 10th, 1919 - Dec. 23rd, 2013)

2444552 ;_;

2444552
neva4get

2444552

My salute to a decent person that only wanted to protect his country and comrades
RIP Kalashnikov

2444552 My condolences to his family. He did what he thought would make his country safer, and I salute him for that.

Покойся с миром.

2444552
And the death of a designer of deadly weapons is talked about in a forum about the non-bastardness of humans?
I mean, rest in peace and whatnot, but he's hardly someone I'd point to for an example of our better natures.

He designed a weapon that has been misused by those with evil intents. I do not condone that.

I do, however, admire his desire to defend his homeland from threats from abroad. Mikhail Kalashnikov, I respect you and salute you.

2444612
He did what he thought was right, and did so in order to protect the nation he loved. What's bastardly about that?

I may not have agreed with you on a lot of issues, but you always did have my respect for being willing to do what it takes to defend those you held most dear. God bless.

2444612 I disagree. His goals were noble in the sense that he wished to help make it easier for his brothers-in-arms to keep his nation safer. Although the weapons which he designed have been used for a lot of bad in this world, the same can be said about the designs of Eugine Stoner, the Father of the M-16 rifle. Both had the goal of making tools that would help the troops better able to come home safe.

If you wish to demonize someone for something they designed that has killed a lot of people, then you must also demonize Henry Ford, whomever it was that first thought of fermenting juice, and Alfred Nobel, who invented Dynamite. (who later went on to create the Nobel Peace Prize)

2444612
He designed a weapon to defend his country. What are armies supposed to do, use dildoes?

2444626
He had no control over the proliferation of his weapon. All he had control over was wether he gave his weapon to the Red Army, and why. Those two factors are noble, so I would say there's nothing wrong with what he personally did.

I think you should use another word besides "condone". It implies MK was in the moral wrong instead of the terrorists, and who actually gave the terrorists weapons.

2444612
He didn't develop the weapon to be proliferated through the third world. He built the AKM, RPK, PKM, RPK, and hundreds more in order to protect the country he loved. It was the politics of the time that sent the weapon to the fame it takes today. He developed the weapon to avoid the suffering he'd seen among his countrymen in the Great Patriotic War, not as an instrument of death.

"I'm proud of my invention, but I'm sad that it is used by terrorists, I would prefer to have invented a machine that people could use and that would help farmers with their work - for example a lawnmower."

2444552 If he's in heaven, god speed. If he's down below, the devil better watch his ass, because he'll have the damned outgunning the demons in about a week.

er ein großer Mann war

2444681>>2444661>>2444657>>2444643
Countries mean nothing compared to human life. I don't care why he designed a weapon, I don't care that said weapon wound up in he hands of guerrillas and terrorists.
I can't respect him for designing a weapon. I can't respect anyone for designing a weapon. I know absolutely nothing about this man, or if he has done something I can respect. All I know about him is that he designed a weapon, and I don't respect that.

2444821

Countries mean nothing compared to human life.

Countries are human life. If a country can defend itself then the people in the country don't die.

2444552

The Man who was a living example of how the U.S.S.R. could have been, should have been. RIP

2444821
So you hate the inventor of a tool, who meant the tool to be used for good, and couldn't control the proliferation?

Your name is rather inappropriate, given your thought pattern.

2444872 Maybe "Potatobrony" would have been a better name for him...

Aw man, I saw this on imgur too, I thought i was just another knee-jerk post. Damn, he actually died? ;_;

2444821
Given that weapons (even the AK series) save more lives than they take, I find your hatred not only misplaced, but soaking in ignorance.

2444892
Thank you, ad-hominem.
2444872 You call killing people good?
I don't.
2444857
Countries are arbitrary tracts of land, generally with governments. I'd hardly equate that with human life, much less the people living in said country.
I'll say it plainly, I consider, when making moral judgements, the life of a rational being as having infinite value. I'll not judge people on a scale and weigh one against another.

2444925
Ignorance? The lives of people are not to be bartered with like a sum of money or mere goods.

2444988
I call killing people in defense good. I call killing people in a just war good. I call killing when it is appropriate good.

I'd hardly equate that with human life, much less the people living in said country.

War has never stopped on the battlefields. War has always, in every war in history, been taken to the streets, to the civilians. Losing a war does not mean the destruction of national boundaries, it means being slaughtered, forced to throw away your culture, or worse. The Kalashnikov was designed during the worse bit. It was designed during a war of simple extermination. The slavs as an ethnic group would've been wiped off the map had it not been for the Red Army.

War has never been clean. Total War is a concept that has existed since the Greeks, and has extended since.

2444988

Countries are arbitrary tracts of land, generally with governments. I'd hardly equate that with human life, much less the people living in said country.

The reason said land has any value is generally because of the people living in it.

I'll say it plainly, I consider, when making moral judgements, the life of a rational being as having infinite value. I'll not judge people on a scale and weigh one against another.

Objects have no inherent value. It's their use.

One of the uses is defending the lives of rational beings, which as you said have infinite value.

Well, he did outlive the country he wanted to protect by more than two decades. Is that good or bad?

2445019
Here's the difference between me and you, and likely between me and most of the posters here.
I don't call killing good, no matter what reason it's done for, no matter who does it. In my eyes, killing is simply never appropriate.
And of course war isn't clean or good- that's what I have been saying this whole time. I have never made claims to the contrary. I won't make claims to the contrary.
On the other hand, it is, at least, implied by some of the responses I've received.

2445032

The reason said land has any value is generally because of the people living in it.

Objects have no inherent value. It's their use.
One of the uses is defending the lives of rational beings, which as you said have infinite value.

Then I fail to see why we are at some form of disagreement.

2445011
You ignore the fact that a weapon can easily save lives as it can take them, and routinely do those weapons save more lives. Your dismissal of that shows your ignorance.

The lives of people are not to be bartered with like a sum of money or mere goods.

Congratulations, you just committed a non sequitur, as nowhere in my statement did I even hint that peoples lives are to be treated as currency.

Although even your statement in itself is ignorant of the facts of life. As a military officer, it was my job to be willing to spend the lives of those under my command in order to save more. If I had to send five men to their deaths in order to save fifty, so be it. It's a tough call, but they need to be made, and from your own statements, I wouldn't trust you to make them.

2445104

it was my job to be willing to spend the lives of those under my command in order to save more. If I had to send five men to their deaths in order to save fifty, so be it.

I hope you realize that's exactly what I was getting at with my analogy.

2445118

I hope you realize that's exactly what I was getting at with my analogy.

It's a tough call, but they need to be made, and from your own statements, I wouldn't trust you to make them.

Again, you have shown why I would never entrust the lives of others to you. You'd rather save five warriors at the expense of fifty others. Your line of thought has killed more more people than any weapon humanity has ever made.

2445078
I value human life too. It's just that if I had to choose between an innocent person and a murderer, I'd choose the innocent person.

2445102
Because you're saying that defending lives is bad.

2445078

I don't call killing good, no matter what reason it's done for, no matter who does it. In my eyes, killing is simply never appropriate.

Here is a scenario for you to consider:
You're walking down the street, minding you're own business one evening. Someone runs up behind you and knocks you to the ground, with the intent to repeatedly knife you, for whatever perceived reason that he has. Now, at that moment, when he is about to start stabbing you repeatedly, and most likely ending your life, you happen to have a .357 on you in an appropriate carry holster. Would you just let the man murder you, or would you draw your weapon, and defend yourself?

Hold on, I'm not done. Let us alter the scene a bit.

You're walking with your daughter (that, someday, you may have) and it is two guys that grab her and take off with intent to brutally rape, and then murder her. You have your .357. would you let them rape and then kill your own daughter, or would you stop them?

Not so simple, is it?

2445169
My line of thought leads to a lack of weapons or wars in the first place.
Furthermore, ideas, whether one agrees with them or not, will always be a more dangerous weapon than the many multitudes of weapons on the face of our planet.
Such is their nature.
To top it off, you say I gauge the lives of five more than that of fifty. This directly violates the entire premise of my argument:

The lives of people are not to be bartered with like a sum of money or mere goods.

To say I value one life over another is in opposition to my argument.
In fact, it's the very reason you disagree with me.
2445175
I'm not saying defending lives is bad. I'm saying destroying lives is bad.

2445268 It is simple. I wouldn't have a gun in the first place.
I die. If I can combat him without killing him, I will, even if it's only to buy time for my daughter.
But in this scenario, I will surely die, regardless of whether or not my daughter flees.
So be it.

No. We're not doing this. This same damn thing happened with the Nelson Mandela thread and many other threads before it.

Enough.

Go find a political debate forum or something like that if you really want to do this.

2445318
Would you rather have one murder alive and one innocent person dead, or one murderer dead or one innocent person alive?

2445318

My line of thought leads to a lack of weapons or wars in the first place.

Actually, it doesn't. In fact, the only people who would still have weapons with your line of thought are those who wish to do evil.

Furthermore, ideas, whether one agrees with them or not, will always be a more dangerous weapon than the many multitudes of weapons on the face of our planet.

Because your idea will kill more people than it will help. History has proven that time and time again.

To say I value one life over another is in opposition to my argument.

Then you missed the point. It's the fact than when either options leads people to dying, the value of one life equals that of another. Your decision to not sacrifice the lives of five people would result in the deaths of ten people for every life you "saved".

Basically, you are unfit for in leadership role that involves peoples' safety because you are intent on not recognizing the difference between spending lives and wasting them. And it's only because of people who recognize the difference that you are able to have this impractical ideal to begin with.

I'm not saying defending lives is bad. I'm saying destroying lives is bad.

You are saying that defending lives is bad when it involves destroying another. So in other words, you chose to let lives be destroyed because you can't defend those lives.

2445337

If I can combat him without killing him, I will, even if it's only to buy time for my daughter. But in this scenario, I will surely die, regardless of whether or not my daughter flees.

Then I am glad I am not related to you by blood, because your actions would likely get me killed.

2445337 In the 2nd one, your own daughter would be just as dead, and where as you seem to have the belief that it is better for a father to allow a daughter to die, than defend her life, I have lost ANY remaining shred of respect I might have been able to find for you.

Maybe you should go join the Humans ARE Bastards group, because you are the WORST kind of bastard out there... the type that should be sterilized at birth, so that the world world not have to be reinfected by your cowardly bullshit.

One. Simple. Request.

That's all I had.

Thread locked.