Pentagon sold contraband military hardware to Iran
Why am I not surprised? From the Associated Press ...
If Ronald Reagen were alive, I'd ask him why we did that. Correct me if I'm mistaken, but didn't we end up going to war or something over there like, a couple times?
Oh yeah. Right.
Oh. Wait.
*GULP*
I suppose this means we're going to war with Iran now ...
WASHINGTON - Fighter jet parts and other sensitive U.S. military gear seized from front companies for Iran and brokers for China have been traced in criminal cases to a surprising source: the Pentagon.Remember, that one time, when we sold all those Weapons of Mass Destruction to Iraq? And then we told their dictator to 'Go Ahead' and gas the Kurds?
In one case, federal investigators said, contraband purchased in Defense Department surplus auctions was delivered to Iran, a country President Bush has branded part of an "axis of evil."
In that instance, a Pakistani arms broker convicted of exporting U.S. missile parts to Iran resumed business after his release from prison. He purchased Chinook helicopter engine parts for Iran from a U.S. company that had bought them in a Pentagon surplus sale. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents say those parts did make it to Iran.
Sensitive military surplus items are supposed to be demilitarized or "de-milled" — rendered useless for military purposes — or, if auctioned, sold only to buyers who promise to obey U.S. arms embargoes, export controls and other laws.
Yet the surplus sales can operate like a supermarket for arms dealers.
"Right Item, Right Time, Right Place, Right Price, Every Time. Best Value Solutions for America's Warfighters," the Defense Reutilization and Marketing Service says on its Web site, calling itself "the place to obtain original U.S. Government surplus property."
Federal investigators are increasingly anxious that Iran is within easy reach of a top priority on its shopping list: parts for the precious fleet of F-14 "Tomcat" fighter jets the United States let Iran buy in the 1970s when it was an ally.
In one case, convicted middlemen for Iran bought Tomcat parts from the Defense Department's surplus division. Customs agents confiscated them and returned them to the Pentagon, which sold them again — customs evidence tags still attached — to another buyer, a suspected broker for Iran.
If Ronald Reagen were alive, I'd ask him why we did that. Correct me if I'm mistaken, but didn't we end up going to war or something over there like, a couple times?
Oh yeah. Right.
Oh. Wait.
*GULP*
I suppose this means we're going to war with Iran now ...
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