First of all, let me state my stance on this. I may not agree with the killing of the bluepill and I do wish there had been a way around it. However I can see the reasoning behind it and am safe in the thought that the machines had calculated this as the most efficient and safe way to go about things.

Secondly, for those who are complaining about the route taken:

Yes he was killed, yes he was overwritten and yes the program was used to gain information about Zion. Look at the last point, ultimately good; I'm sure you'll agree. "Then why couldn't we have done that using a decoy bluepill or something?" I hear you ask, quite simple really, why bother? Why bother when there is a bluepill they already want to recruit and think he's as normal as any other? Then why did we have to kill him, one might ponder, yes unfortunately we had to kill the bluepill in order for this to be possible and yes we did have to partially overwrite him. However the machines had calculated this to be the safest possible course of action in order to be sure the program would remain undetected.

Hopefully that will clear some minds... Or make some, more inquisitive; time will tell.

[ Osterlind ]

"What about his bluepill family and friends?"

"How could you do such things?"

What? What happens when you recruit each bluepill on this extraction spree of yours? They leave their life just to end it in the Real following your battle-standards. Everytime a bluepill is extracted, their existance is erased from the Matrix. No one remebers who they are, nor do they care. It's why no one comes looking for you even after you've been extracted. You only remebered the life you lived, nothing more.

As for killing this bluepill?

Pfft, don't be weak.

This is a war, if it wasn't for Zion starting this whole ideal in the first place, maybe the chain reaction leading to this bluepill's death would have taken a different turn? It's truthfully Zion's fault for the Machines having to result to such drastic events.

But in my own eyes? To quote a famous war tactition...

"One death is a tradgedy, a million deaths is a statistic."

This bluepill's death is only a statistic that will help the Machines win the war. No one likes a copper-top dieing, but if Zion didn't run off into their own little hole-in-the-ground, maybe this could have been avoided.

What? What happens when you recruit each bluepill on this extraction spree of yours? They leave their life just to end it in the Real following your battle-standards. Everytime a bluepill is extracted, their existance is erased from the Matrix. No one remebers who they are, nor do they care. It's why no one comes looking for you even after you've been extracted. You only remebered the life you lived, nothing more.

Ballak wrote:

What? What happens when you recruit each bluepill on this extraction spree of yours? They leave their life just to end it in the Real following your battle-standards. Everytime a bluepill is extracted, their existance is erased from the Matrix. No one remebers who they are, nor do they care. It's why no one comes looking for you even after you've been extracted. You only remebered the life you lived, nothing more.

Not true, unfortunately. (( There's a critical where a Bluepill tells us about one of their friends, who was extracted. They don't know what happened to them, of course, but they remember them existing. ))

"Never send a human to do a Machine's job"

 I never realized how much I hated that line...

No, it WAS necessary.  Zion and EPN refuse to stop awakening bluepills.  If we have to kill one to give them pause, then so be it.  His death was a means to a reaction.

This is the real world, folks.  This is also war.  All this idealistic banter does nothing.  You can't save everyone, so you save as many as you can.  Majority rules, eh?

Garu wrote:

No, it WAS necessary.  Zion and EPN refuse to stop awakening bluepills.  If we have to kill one to give them pause, then so be it.  His death was a means to a reaction.

This is the real world, folks.  This is also war.  All this idealistic banter does nothing.  You can't save everyone, so you save as many as you can.  Majority rules, eh?

It's people like you that perpetuate the myth that Machinists are somehow less human because of it.  You're a redpill, too, right?  How'd you have liked it if someone showed up and killed you before you made the choice for the sheer fact that you were being offered a chance to take the red, huh? As far as you knew, you were doing nothing wrong.  You'd have never known you'd be serving "a greater good" by it either.

It's people like you that perpetuate the myth that Machinists are somehow less human because of it.  You're a redpill, too, right?  How'd you have liked it if someone showed up and killed you before you made the choice for the sheer fact that you were being offered a chance to take the red, huh? As far as you knew, you were doing nothing wrong.  You'd have never known you'd be serving "a greater good" by it either.

First, you have absolutely no knowledge of my past and the circumstances that led to my awakening.  Don't presume you know anything about me.  I've been working with the Machines for nearly 3 years now.  I am commited to this organization and accept the bad with the good.  If you want to hold hands and bear the flag or our organization when it suits you, fine.  In the meantime, there's a job to be done.

There's the rub.  Every one of you Machinists that thinks this was a good operation needs to take a minute and think.  You were ALL potentials once.  What if the system had decided that your death would have served the greater good before you were even offered the choice between red and blue?

It was not his fault that he questioned his reality - we all did.  The poor man may have even chosen the blue, but we'll never know that now, thanks to you.

Before you continue blindly following orders, consider the real greater good.  You may think you work with the Machines, but this proves yet again that your only options are get in line or get dead.

There's a line between following orders blindly and follow orders because you trust who they are coming from.  It's easy to take the morale high-ground and cross your arms and tell someone how much they just messed up.  But it takes conviction to go against a belief to do something you know in the end will benefit.

We killed Mr Manohar out of necessity, not because we were bored.  There's a method to the madness.

Machinists: Claiming the moral high ground and 'protecting the innocents' since 1999.

Seriously, what were people expecting?  Anyone with half a brain knows the Machines couldn't care less about a human life. 

Or is it just a case that if the Machines kill a bluepill it's ok, but if Zion or EPN ever killed one it'd be a cold heartless murder.

GGmachinists.

While I may not agree with the tactics that were taken, I feel based on what I've read and noted that a few points are being ignored. Mainly, and I could be mistaken I wasn't there the entire time, but wasn't this a bluepill that was on the list to be recruited by Zion? After all, that's how the Agents got the name, right? How does that make him an 'innocent bluepill'. If anything, Zion opened the door for him to become a red pill with plans on pursuing it, and the fact that they weren't prepared to protect him in regards to the situation doesn't mean that they can just claim ignorance. Yes, a life was taken, but if Zion is going to stand around and complain about a tactic that they should have been ready for, since the Machine intelligence has dictated that no more awakenings will be allowed, then maybe they should stop contacting people in attempts to recruit them. You can only claim ignorance once after all, and Zion opened the door. Agent Pace simply closed it before the awakening could be carried out. That is, assuming he didn't take the blue pill. But in all honesty, when a calculating machine program tells you no more awakenings, be prepared for the consequences when you decide to go against it.