Gun-smuggling cartel figures possibly were paid FBI informants

[Ichingcarpenter]

Source: LA Times

Reporting from Washington— Congressional investigators probing the controversial "Fast and Furious" anti-gun-trafficking operation on the border with Mexico believe at least six Mexican drug cartel figures involved in gun smuggling also were paid FBI informants, officials said Saturday.

The investigators have asked the FBI and the Drug Enforcement Administration for details about the alleged informants, as well as why agents at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, which ran the Fast and Furious operation, were not told about them.


The development raises further doubts about the now-shuttered program, which was created in November 2009 in an effort to track guns across the border and unravel the cartels' gun smuggling networks. The gun tracing largely failed, however, and hundreds of weapons purchased in U.S. shops later were found at crime scenes in Mexico.

The scandal has angered Mexican officials and some members of Congress. Investigators say nearly 2,500 guns were allowed to flow illegally into Mexico under the ATF program, fueling the drug violence ravaging that country and leading to the shooting death of a U.S. border agent.

Read more: http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-cartel-guns-20110717,0,6972222.story

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Heck of a job Holder...

[buckrogers1965]

1. And smugglers are on our payroll why?

I'm going to guess that these six more than likely import the most guns to Mexico and export the most drugs to the USA.

[madokie]

5. This may at first glance seem out of place but hang with me

Previous to reagan's hold on the White House it was nigh on impossible to find any pot around here except for about 4 months out of the year. all during the Carter and Ford administrations this was true. Then came ronnie and his goons and all of a sudden you could get pot on about any street corner around here, cocaine and methamphetamine too where neither was available around here unless you went to Mexico and procured your own. Come to find out in the oliver north years they were importing drugs to sell as a means to finance the Anti-Ortega forces. We later find out.
So yes I'd bet the smugglers are fbi and are up to no good such as financing anti Chevaz bullshit.

[PuffedMica]

2. The program began in 2005 under the Bush Administration

It was named Project Gunrunner and it was started by the ATF during the Bush Administration in Laredo, Texas. From its humble beginnings as as a pilot program in 2005, Gunrunner progressed to a national program in 2006.

The secrecy of the Bush Administration supported by the ATF kept what was happening from public view, and shielded it even from the view of the Obama Administration. Now that the activities have blown up in the face of the ATF, the media only has blame for our President.

[Upton]

3. Not so..

while it's true Gunrunner was started by the ATF during the Bush administration, the Fast and Furious aspect of it did not begin until 2009 under Obama..

Fast and Furious was part of Project Gunrunner, a broad A.T.F. program aimed at stemming the flow of guns to criminal groups in Mexico. Since it began in 2006, Gunrunner has seized more than 10,000 firearms and led to the arrests of more than 800 suspects.

In 2009, A.T.F.’s Phoenix office began Fast and Furious, in which agents monitored but did not disrupt the sale of guns from American stores to suspected “straw purchasers,” people who obtain guns for criminal organizations. The goal was to track the guns to a major drug cartel.


http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/16/us/16guns.html?_r=1&smid=tw-nytimes&seid=auto

[IamK]

4. That is correct... its all Holder

[EFerrari]

6. Inconceivable!

[bemildred]

7. The true face of the drug war, corrupt to the core. nt

[roomfullofmirrors]

8. the conspiracy develops.