Richard Ford 🌐

China Tech Entrepreneur, Cloud Computing & Product/Service Market Development. Opinions are my own.

[Richard Ford 🌐 @richardford]

@SoFloAntonio @LinkedInHelp Man you're one ugly looking beta male.

[Richard Ford 🌐 @richardford]

@forallcurious Photos from space and the moon say otherwise.

[Richard Ford 🌐 @richardford]

@DamonStrong Seems reasonable… hammer versus gun. Why are US cops so easily freaked out and scared? Seems they are hiring the wrong people for the job. A hammer shouldn't scare or threaten anyone.

[Richard Ford 🌐 @richardford]

@bret_hb @James_Weyer_ @FOXSports @FIFAWorldCup @TheAthleticFC @TheAthletic @AdamCrafton_ Journalists used to do - you know, journalism and research and fact find and report objectively. The sooner legacy media dies the better.

[Richard Ford 🌐 @richardford]

@lanebernice94 @James_Weyer_ @FOXSports @FIFAWorldCup 100%. Always some victim being offended and finding fault and drama. God it is painful.

[Richard Ford 🌐 @richardford]

@JyeTristianLFC @James_Weyer_ @FOXSports @FIFAWorldCup Asking an American to understand cultures outside of their own? lols. That'd be the day.

[Richard Ford 🌐 @richardford]

@James_Weyer_ @FOXSports @FIFAWorldCup Dude….. really?

[Richard Ford 🌐 @richardford]

@BossPamz_157kw @F1 Nope. Colapinto's…..

[Richard Ford 🌐 @richardford]

@j3lte How dodgy is Utah?

[Richard Ford 🌐 @richardford]

@jeremybernier This is normal. I spent a lot of time in China. People or groups always self select on common themes. Be it language, culture, sport, food, hobbies, etc.

For example, I found it hard to relate to Europeans, except those that were engaged in the Rugby scene or Tech scene!

[Richard Ford 🌐 @richardford]

@BrentHodgson Being compelled to testify is a sign that someone is guilty? You do know that in trials many people are called as witnesses and they are cross examined by both sides. The number of witnesses called is not a metric that sustains guilt. The content of their cross examinations is.

[Richard Ford 🌐 @richardford]

@Desdura1 @friendlyjordies Testified, as in called witnesses. Do you know of all the cross examination? They are witnesses to both sides in the court room. All are able to cross examine. Don't conflate having to turn up in court as being a fact or evidence of guilt.

[Richard Ford 🌐 @richardford]

@SandraEckersley @B_dubya91 But what was in those statements? 20 people giving evidence is an action. There are all sorts of things that people can give evidence for. And all sorts of questions and info that both sides can cross examine on. Just stating that 20 people gave evidence is not evidence itself.

[John Ʌ Konrad V @johnkonrad]

Something is really bothering me about the Ben Roberts-Smith case.

Nobody likes being a hypocrite. Unlike most, I actually go for a walk when I suspect myself of being one.

On one hand, this prosecution stinks of liberal bias.

Out of thousands of potential war crimes cases the social justice warrior police chief could have pursued, she picked THE most decorated soldier on the entire continent. That isn’t justice. That’s a public humiliation ritual.

On the other hand, I do believe actual war criminals should stand trial regardless of rank or honors. And I know what’s coming: “John, Roberts-Smith already lost the 2023 defamation case. Justice Besanko found he committed the murders.”

Yes. On the balance of probabilities. 51 percent. That’s the civil standard. Criminal conviction requires 99 percent.

The same fragile evidence that barely cleared a coin flip is now supposed to send a man to prison for life.

Here’s why my post is not hypocrisy.

When the school got hit in Iran weeks ago, I said mistakes aren’t war crimes, but if it was intentional or grossly negligent, someone should be court-martialed. That strike is recent. Physical. Investigable.

The Roberts-Smith allegations are 20 years old. And here’s what the Brereton Inquiry, for all its 510 witnesses & four years of work, could never get:

No crime scene access. The Taliban didn’t let investigators into Uruzgan.
No Afghan witnesses interviewed.
No secured scene.
No blood-spatter analysis.
No DNA
No autopsies.
No recovered bodies.
No weapons tied to victims.

The investigators themselves admitted they “lacked access to Afghan crime scenes and were missing the physical evidence that would normally anchor a murder prosecution.”

So what’s left? Memory. Twenty-year-old memory from men in the fog of war.

The science is unambiguous. Countless research studies confirms memory is reconstructive: later suggestion, media exposure, and repeated questioning distort it. This is the textbook misinformation effect.

Confidence and accuracy decouple within months, let alone decades. Studies on soldiers who suffer PTSD show the gaps get even larger.

I admittedly don’t know 🇦🇺 law but US courts admit decades-old testimony but warn juries it is inherently fragile, not scientific proof. Australia is treating it as load-bearing concrete.

The media says “20 former soldiers testified against him.” Fine. Was all their testimony actually against him? How clear was it? Did 20 people watch him murder a civilian in broad daylight? And even if they did, you still have to prove the dead man wasn’t Taliban. In Uruzgan. In 2009. Without a body.

Some will say I’m being pedantic.

Yes. I. Am.

Because Ben Roberts-Smith was charged with murder, and under war-crimes law the same act can be framed as murder, willful killing, or killing a person hors de combat depending on the framing.

How it gets framed sets precedent for every future war.

And here’s the question nobody in Canberra wants asked:
Why is the trigger-puller in the dock while the officers who wrote the rules of engagement, approved the missions, and signed the after-action reports keep their pensions?

The Victoria Cross winner hangs. The chain of command walks. Past “War crime” cases with more hard evidence remain “unsolved”

That isn’t accountability. That’s a scapegoat ritual.

You do not get a Victoria Cross just for killing. You get it for extraordinary gallantry, valour, self-sacrifice & devotion to duty in the presence of the enemy.

And here is what Australia just told every soldier watching: the reward for a VC is fame which will make you a target for future show trials built on 20-year-old memories, prosecuted by a police chief with no combat but more ribbons on her uniform than you.

If murder can be proven without hard evidence decades later.

That isn’t justice even if he is guilty. Proof of guilt matters.

That’s a Marxist humiliation ceremony leading to national strategic disarmament by lawfare.

[Richard Ford 🌐 @richardford]

@Desdura1 @friendlyjordies We can know but we can't judge. We are not his peers. If they need a jury it should be one filled with servicemen who has served in combat.

[Richard Ford 🌐 @richardford]

@SandraEckersley @B_dubya91 Civil trials. Based on character imputations. Not hard evidence that is tested.

[Richard Ford 🌐 @richardford]

@dr__dwayne @AverageAusMan @goodfoodgal Allegedly.

[Richard Ford 🌐 @richardford]

@Godzilla843062 @Reuters I didn't say it did. What I said is that none of us here are in a position to judge. None of us. This is a sad day, no matter what the verdict is. And the majority of us should remember just who we are and what we have not done or experienced before we try to judge others.

[Richard Ford 🌐 @richardford]

@Desdura1 @friendlyjordies Yes. However it is not for us to judge. We are in no position to judge a person who we trained to kill and then sent to one of the most hellish environments known to man. To fight an unconventional and merciless enemy too.

Shit happens. We are not to judge.

[Richard Ford 🌐 @richardford]

@SandraEckersley @B_dubya91 Umm.. should he not get a fair trial before any judgement or talk of punishment ensues?