Thoughts on Corrupt Generals

[mmonk]

The attacks were no mystery. What puzzled Turkish police was the weapons' origin. Glocks are high-quality sidearms, but by last year they had practically become common street weapons in Turkey. More than 1,000 had been taken from criminals, guerrillas, terrorists and assassins all over the country, and authorities believed tens of thousands more had found their way onto the black market

-snip-

There are many more where those came from. At least three U.S. government agencies are now investigating the massive "disappearance" and diversion of weapons Washington intended for Iraqi government forces that instead have spread to militants and organized gangs across the region. The potential size of the traffic is stunning. A report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office last month showed that since 2004, some 190,000 AK-47 assault rifles and pistols, bought with U.S. money for Iraqi security forces, have gone missing.

-snip-

Major U.S. arms transfers began when Gen. David Petraeus was commander of the Multi-National Security Transition Command--Iraq (MNSTC-I), better known as Minsticky. Its mission was to train, arm and organize Iraq's military and police forces, but the Iraqis' weapons came via the State Department, and the supply line was actually run by private contractors.

-snip-

It is starting to look like a conspiracy theorist's dream? Or just what Sibel Edmonds was talking about all along? And the State Department keeps popping up in these kind of stories.

-snip-



http://tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com/talk/blogs/connecticut_man1/2009/02/thoughts-on-corrupt-generals.php

[catnhatnh]

1. K&R

just because I think Fat Denny needs more exposure....

[mmonk]

3. Yes he does.

[ihavenobias]

2. I don't really know much about this topic.

But K & R because it's interesting.

[mmonk]

4. Thanks.

It's a long sordid story of narcotics trade, money laundering, nuclear black market, arms black market, bribes, pseudo trade organizations, spies, and abuse of the state secrets privilege.

[catnhatnh]

9. Sibel and Lukery...

Eventually a LOT is going to be public laundry and I'm eager for it. Sy Hersh promised breaks starting last month and I'm hoping he breaks news stories and doesn't save up for a book. We've waited a LONG time for an accounting and I believe it is happening. If it fails I see no alternative to revolution.

[mmonk]

11. Much of that dirty laundry won't air with the state secrets privilege

stay out of jail card.

[catnhatnh]

16. I honestly believe that is still under review. N/T

[mmonk]

21. Sibel's case? I haven't noticed any movement.

[Ghost in the Machine]

5. K&R!

Thanks for posting this... 190,000 arms missing.. along with billions of dollars.... where did it go???

[mmonk]

17. Somebody knows.

And you're welcome.

[Greyhound]

6. Good post. I noticed one thing that makes no sense to me.

We are buying and supplying the AK-47 to our allies. I understand the reasons for this, the M-16 and variants are really too maintenance intensive and expensive for the people conditions they will be used in.

What I want to know is why haven't we designed our own version of this rifle? Why are we spending our tax dollars to purchase them from, I assume, the Russians? It's not like we couldn't improve on that 70 year old design, keep it simple, rugged, and cheap, like the AK, but waste those dollars on an American product. One thing we do/did very well is small arms, and the money is better spent at home isn't it?

[mmonk]

7. Originally, we used to ship arms to terrorist groups and blame them

on the Soviet Union. I presume the practice of providing AK 47's never changed.

[14thColony]

12. Many of our allies also have and have made the AK-47 or variants

Many of the ones we provided to the Afghan Army (before the dumb decision to switch to M-16s) were Romanian, Polish, or Czech models.

If the long and painful 40+ year history of the M-16 is any indication, we'd probably over-engineer the hell out of our own AK-47, likely resulting in little more than a very expensive M-16 chambered for 7.62mm.

[mmonk]

13. Yes, that's true. Where originally, we used to ship them for other purposes

and to avoid trace of procurement, I suppose we decided to stay with them later.

[Greyhound]

15. See, that's what I'm curious about. I understand the unimaginably cumbersome procurement process

for our equipment (when I say understand I mean I understand that nobody really understands it, but am aware of it), but I see no reason we shouldn't build a better, cheap, stamped metal design that would rival, if not surpass, the AK.

It could be lighter, more accurate, perhaps use more readily available materials, something (how about self cleaning?). Kalashnikov was a freaking genius, but so were Williams and Browning and I know we have somebody that can address some of the shortcomings of the AK.

It's not a big deal, but when I read that it just struck me that there's something even more perverse than usual about this.

[14thColony]

18. Not to over-simplify

but I would think it's a basic cost-benefit analysis. For the expenditure of millions of dollars and 5-6 years of development time, we might come up with a weapon that's, say, 10% better than an AK-47 (however you want to calculate that), but due to the need to re-coup R&D costs and make a tidy initial profit for the manufacturer, they will have to cost $750 per unit for the first 100,000 units. But I can buy perfectly good AK-47s now for $150 or less per unit, and in seemingly endless numbers, so is the extra 10% improvement worth it?

And I would submit that any major improvements that were needed to the AK-47 design have already been accomplished in the AKM, AK-101, AK-103, and AK-107 versions, which are already developed and in production as well.

[Greyhound]

20. That makes sense, thanks. n/t

[tblue37]

8. Well, sur-prise, sur-prise! (/Gomer Pyle) nt

[leftstreet]

10. Jeez. That reads like a transportation hub report.

Drug Flow/Transit.

Turkey remains a major route, refining center and storage, production and staging area, for the flow of heroin to Europe. Turkish-based traffickers and brokers operate in conjunction with narcotics smugglers, laboratory operators, and money launderers in and outside Turkey. They finance and control the smuggling of opiates to and from Turkey. Afghanistan is the source of most of the opiates reaching Turkey. Morphine and heroin base are smuggled overland from Afghanistan and Pakistan via Iran. Opiates and hashish also are smuggled to Turkey overland from Afghanistan via Turkmenistan, Azerbaijan, and Georgia. Traffickers in Turkey illegally acquire the heroin precursor chemical, acetic anhydride, from sources in Western Europe, the Balkans and Russia. For fiscal year 2004, 2,304 liters of acetic anhydride were seized in, or destined for, Turkey. Some criminal elements in Turkey reportedly have interests in heroin laboratories operating near the Iranian-Turkish border in Iran. Turkish-based traffickers control much of the heroin marketed to Western Europe.

:crazy: :crazy: :crazy:

[mmonk]

14. Yep. It was also a major financing source for the rebellion in Afghanistan

against the Soviet backed government there and continues to be a source of wealth and trade there.

[conscious evolution]

19. K&R

[Renew Deal]

22. How many companies manufacture AK-47's?

Is it just one company that owns the design? Or are there many companies manufacturing them?

I know this isn't really related to the topic.

[14thColony]

23. Izhevsk Machine Tool Company owns the exclusive license

for the AK-47 (design finally patented in 1999), but in the meantime since 1947 a lot of countries and/or private gun manufactuers have or still do make either copies of the AK-47 or close derivatives of it. The Russian government asserts that all unlicensed produciton after 1999 is illegal (which is correct), but they might as well be trying to stamp out DVD piracy for all the luck they'll have. It's thought that over a million new AK-47s or derivatives are built every year even now.

The AK is one of the great small arms of military history. Kalashnikov was a genius if only for that design alone. People keep making and using the AKs because they were designed to be simple as hell, easy to make, and as close to unbreakable as any automatic rifle ever will be. Kalashnikov was am infantry sergeant recovering from wounds in WWII when he designed his AK, and he wanted a weapon that he was sure would never let his fellow soldiers down.

In Afghanistan we kept an AK around (not totally legally) because the 7.62mm bullet will reliably crack an engine block and stop a vehicle, whereas the same can't always be said for the 5.56mm M-4/M-16 round. Stopping power like a freight train, and I was half sure I could run over it with my truck and it would still work.