Pentagon Says Ferguson Did Not Get All That Military Gear From Pentagon

[bigtree]

. . . where the hell did it come from?

One day after two Missouri members of Congress met with Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel to express their concerns over a Defense Department program that provides local law enforcement agencies with surplus property, the Pentagon said that most of what it makes available to police does not include so called tactical gear or weapons.

Pentagon Press Secretary Admiral John Kirby told reporters that 95 percent of the property transferred to local law enforcement through the 1033 program is “shelving, office equipment, communications gear, that kind of stuff, furniture,” said Kirby.

Kirby said it is important to know that the military is not the only source of tactical gear used by law enforcement in this country. He said that after seeing images of heavily armed police in Ferguson, he can understand how people would look at that and say "Well gee, look at all that military gear.” But he quickly clarified that it did not come from the U.S. military, "it doesn’t belong to us and we didn’t provide it to them.”

As for equipment Ferguson has received from the program, Kirby said that included two “soft-skinned” Humvees, meaning without armor, a generator and a trailer.

Reps. Lacy Clay, D-St. Louis, and Emanuel Cleaver, D-Kansas City, described their meeting Thursday evening with Hagel as being “productive, expansive and very encouraging.” But in his press briefing Friday, Kirby said that Hagel had not made any decision on conducting a review of the program, instead describing the defense secretary as “still very much gathering information about it,” Kirby said. A day before Hagel met with the congressmen, he met with members of his senior staff and asked “lots of probing deep questions about this program and how it’s operated,” said Kirby.


read more: http://news.stlpublicradio.org/post/pentagon-says-ferguson-did-not-get-all-military-gear-its-program

related:

President Obama has ordered a comprehensive review of the government’s decade-old strategy of outfitting local police departments with military-grade body armor, mine-resistant trucks, silencers and automatic rifles, senior officials say.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/24/us/in-washington-second-thoughts-on-arming-police.html?smid=tw-share&_r=0

NYT reports:

JUNE 8, 2014 - War Gear Flows to Police Departments
AUG. 15, 2014 - Mapping the Spread of the Military's Surplus Gear
AUG. 19, 2014 - Background: Data on Transfer of Military Gear to Police Departments

[bigtree]

1. .

[jwirr]

2. I guess we will see. Hopefully appoints good people to the review.

[Uncle Joe]

3. Kicked and recommended.

Thanks for the thread, bigtree.

[pnwmom]

4. Then where did they get it and how easy is it to buy? n/t

[Lee-Lee]

5. That kind of gear is what most departments get

Keep in mind a lot of neighboring departments responded there as well, I am sure most of the armored vehicles belong to other local agencies.

[EX500rider]

6. Easy enough to get thru online vendors..

...like this:





http://www.uscav.com/productinfo.aspx?productid=10916&tabid=548&catid=2777