A recent investigation into the mysterious disappearance of  four radio operators serving in Iraq has led to the discovery of an unnerving diary entry written by one of the missing. Although further mystifying Specialist Lindell’s disappearance, it may shed some light on the current phenomenon being described by many soldiers who have heard and “seen” a strange being while operating the military’s powerful communications equipment. The phenomenon has been likened to the Foo fighter sightings experienced by WWII fighter pilots. This is the last journal entry written by Specialist Gregory Lindell on March 22nd, 2008:

I am having a harder time staying off the unused frequencies while on mission. The last time I heard the call from the ghost on the airwaves I understood him only as one can understand a non-sensical dream. His voice is the static, the glitches, and the squeals on my headset, the untranslated energy of his highly evolved language. He told me he was attracted to earth because he could hear the beginnings of his native language. Although crude, the electronic communications being used on earth are the first step towards total remote communication. He has no form, but when he first called my mind could see a torrent of violent white noise only comparable in the physical world as an isolated sandstorm. He lost all physical tangibility when he crossed into the airwaves. He warns me of the deafening squeal of madness that his homeland experienced after the crossover, but I am still attracted to the ease in which he can communicate with me. Their are no cumbersome translations or misunderstandings. I feel his energy and thoughts directly. The white noise has become so constant to me that it is now my silence. The silence I used to know sounds like the screaming of a starving beast somehow knowing it is the last of its kind. The words of my colleagues are sounding more and more like grunts from animals who are restricted to the language of instinct. Even as I write now I am reaching back to a sub-conscious recollection of hieroglyphs to record my thoughts in this archaic language one last time until I will be free from the shackles of interpretation and my language will be as accurate and concise as my thought.

I have found that distributed tele-destruction leads to an erosion of empathy for the enemy and the self.  There are no nodes in the contemporary kill chain – it is all flow along meandering paths that are out of control. The intensive flows of capital, intelligence and energy pushed by the U.S. military apparatus require outlets for overflow. The advertising/entertainment industry provides bioswales and retention drains for the cyclical 10 year info-storms that increasingly take place in desert landscapes.

Triggers are pulled by gamers sitting in a mirage city in the desert. Most of my days are spent sitting in a room with video and audio feeds projected on every surface, monitoring the movements of humans and non-humans on the other side of the planet. Sometimes it is just games, training exercises, entertainment which simulates real violence. But recently the games have real consequences, outputting death on the other end of the feed.

When I am piloting an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) it is never clear if my antipodal adversaries are anything more than expertly orchestrated agglomerations of data from the all-seeing eye of the military-industrial-research-and-development industry.  When I drive to the outskirts of Las Vegas to look at a screen and take aim at clusters of pixels which may or may not be humans with nefaroius intentions for me and mine, the deserts begin to blur.  The suburbs of the city of sin contain an interface for an extension of man that puts my eyes and hands in the air.  I always wonder what would happen if I was given the task to fly right into my own building and blow it up.  I would watch a video of my robot flying toward me, and I would pull the trigger and watch myself be shot on camera as I do the shooting.  This is the moment when the kill chain eats its talil.

Needless to say, they want to check me in for a little PTSD assessment. Could use some R&R, but who else can so expertly guide this network?

Proximity in the age of info wARs: