Red Hat builds software that helps military aircraft find and kill targets more efficiently. They'd rather you didn't know that.
The IBM-owned company has been quietly pulling a 2024 white paper called "Compress the kill cycle with Red Hat Device Edge" from the internet. Links now return 404 errors. Archived copies still sit on the Wayback Machine.
The document explains how Red Hat Device Edge lets AI systems "increase the accuracy of airborne targeting and mission-guidance systems" and speed up the "sensor-to-shooter cycle" in what the military calls F2T2EA: Find, Fix, Track, Target, Engage, Assess. It talks about sharing "near real-time sensor fusion data with joint and multinational forces to increase awareness, survivability, and lethality." Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon, BAE Systems, and Boeing have all built Red Hat's edge computing into their military systems.
Thom Holwerda reported the story for OSNews. "It feels like Red Hat is trying to have its cake and eat it too," he wrote. The company wants defense contract money. It also wants its reputation as the friendly face of open source.
IBM has been here before. Edwin Black's book "IBM and the Holocaust" documented how the company provided technology services to Nazi Germany. Now its subsidiary sells edge computing to defense contractors and tries to scrub the evidence when someone notices.