[tremblane]

Trying to remember the specifics of the training we got when I was in the US Air Force on the rules concerning nukes. This is the gist of it:

Above all: Don't lie.

The default is "neither confirm nor deny". For example: somebody asks if there were nukes on the plane that just crashed? Can't say. Even if you know there weren't, you can neither confirm nor deny.

You MAY deny if it would benefit safety. For example: someone started a rumor there was a nuke on a plane that crashed nearby and panic/riots are starting. An official statement saying there was no nuclear material involved could help settle things down.

You MUST confirm if there is a safety concern. For example: There really was a nuke on the plane that just crashed nearby and people need to evacuate ASAP. Get that confirmation out now and get people away from the situation.

In other words, when it comes to nuclear things with the US military, "no official confirmation" means exactly nothing, other than there is/was no public safety concern.

edit: I never looked at the regulations, this was just told to us in tech school. But I just looked it up and there actually is a reg for that:https://www.esd.whs.mil/Portals/54/Documents/DD/issuances/do...

[vintermann]

Well, about safety concerns, I don't feel so confident that the US military would put safety of civilians in another country over the safety of their own institutions. They may well think the worst threat to the safety of Dutch civilians is that Dutch civilians get mad at them and won't let themselves be protected anymore.

[mistermann]

> Above all: Don't lie.

> The default is "neither confirm nor deny". For example: somebody asks if there were nukes on the plane that just crashed? Can't say. Even if you know there weren't, you can neither confirm nor deny.

"Can't say" is a lie (as it is physically possible to say). "I have been ordered to say 'Can't say', even though I actually do know the truth" would be not lying.

Not that it matters because no one really cares about fine-grained, actual truth, I'm just pointing out a neat part of our righteous, democratic culture.

> In other words, when it comes to nuclear things with the US military, "no official confirmation" means exactly nothing, other than there is/was no public safety concern.

If one was to pay attention to official US announcements over the years, one might realize that "no official confirmation" in the above could be replaced with anything and remain correct, due to their long, diverse track record of lying and getting caught.

Of course, everyone lies, it is a fundamental part of our culture and "getting things done", I'd just rather we stop representing ourselves as being something other than what we really are.

[chipsa]

If someone was under a NDA, and you asked them about stuff covered by the NDA, and they answered "I can't say", most people would not call that a lie. "Can't say" implies that aren't allowed to say, not that they won't say, but are allowed to.

[mistermann]

Begetting Maya, Neoliberalism, democracy is our most sacred institution (coupled with "Why does everything suck so much!!!???"), etc.

[Fnoord]

Can't say is a so-called white lie, its why the more diplomatic cannot confirm or deny is preferred. OP refers to lying as saying A while its nowhere near the truth. For example, all that RU propaganda is an entire different league.

UA have a nice way of summarizing: its complicated. Also a white lie. Both are show stoppers, they don't encourage further dialog.

[mistermann]

> Can't say is a so-called white lie....

White lies are still lies.

>... its why the more diplomatic cannot confirm or deny is preferred.

This is an appealing story, but neither of us has a way of knowing the comprehensive truth of why our various public officials lie, in fact. A substantial amount of propaganda has been written that seems to have rendered us unable to realize this, but it is objectively true, for what should be obvious reasons.

> OP refers to lying as saying A while its nowhere near the truth. For example, all that RU propaganda is an entire different league.

A substantial proportion of our communication is also in the forms of misinformative memes and catchphrases like "an entire different league". This can (or is almost guaranteed to) cause 3rd party readers to form incorrect beliefs about the relative quality and magnitude of American vs Russian propaganda. The fact of the matter is: not any one single person on the planet possesses this knowledge. So what do we do instead: we literally make things up. It is like we exist within a stage play, created by and starring us, where we write the script as we go along, but pretend that we are doing something else.

> UA have a nice way of summarizing: its complicated. Also a white lie.

It isn't complicated? What is "it" in this case?

>Both are show stoppers, they don't encourage further dialog.

Which I believe is the point of a lot of the popular memes that can now be seen in the wild: stop people from thinking, and cause them to form a confident, incorrect belief prematurely - basically, make the public hallucinate a virtual reality that has been designed for them.

The degree to which this "conspiracy theory" (gasp!) is true vs all of this being simple emergence, I can only speculate. But regardless, the problem is there, it can be understood, and it is physically possible to improve upon it, just as the enlightenment, the scientific method, etc demonstrated that it is possible for humanity to gain substantial control over the physical realm, if one can manage to find a way to try.

Pardon the vitriol, but this never-ending and never talked about situation really bugs me.

[vintermann]

"Can't say" is usually understood to mean "Can't say without disobeying orders or otherwise angering superiors". But yeah, it wouldn't hurt the people saying it to acknowledge that it is their choice.