[ctdonath2]

Oversimplified for brevity...

The official goal was to identify international smuggling & criminal use of American-originated guns.

The plan was to direct gun dealers to sell to suspicious buyers, knowing the guns would be smuggled across the border. Under GWB, the guns would be stopped at the border (with the imperative NOTHING crosses the border) and perpetrators arrested. Under (well, _somewhere_ under) BHO, the “stop ‘em at the border” imperative was relaxed and the guns allowed to cross, with the intent that they would later be found at crime scenes and, as such, connections could be traced from violent crimes to known and implicated involvees.

Who authorized it is...problematic. Involving federal gun laws, international crime, foreign diplomacy, and other very-high-level concerns, such an operation MUST be known & authorized by no less than Attorney General Holder (for the domestic criminal factors), Secretary of State Clinton (for foreign issues), and President Obama (for joining the two). Thing is, all of them claim to know nothing...but are refusing to release documented proof of who knew what.

What went wrong was that Border Agent Brian Terry was killed with one of these smuggled guns. So were other US agents.
What went wrong was that other US agents were killed investigating this operation.
What went wrong was that the operation could _only_ succeed if people died. Hundreds of Mexicans did.
What went wrong was that certain high-level administrators were not concerned. Accountability was not demanded. Heads did not roll.
And Senator Issa started investigating.
And a number of involved peons blew a lot of whistles. And gave Issa critical documented proof.
And Holder was just convicted of “contempt of Congress” for not cooperating.
And Issa just published detailed documents with Holder’s fingerprints all over ‘em, detailing what Holder claims didn’t happen or didn’t know.

Oh, and some time back at a fundraiser with a gun-control group, BHO made a cryptic comment about working on “something under the radar”.
Seems the _real_ goal was to invoke international outrage over “lax” US gun laws, thus giving a new path to severe restrictions on the 2nd Amendment.
And what went wrong was a lethal illegal operation was authorized and operated from the highest office ... and all eyes are looking there.

[eureka!]

More importantly, Obama/Holder's guns did not have tracking devices, the Mexican Government was not informed and the plan was supposedly intended to allow agents to track criminal networks by finding the guns at crime scenes, i.e., after they were used. How many were used and not left at the crime scenes? Who leaves their guns at crime scenes? Hmmmm. Maybe someone that wanted them to be found so as to blame "American" gun sellers. This stinks to high heavens.

While the presstitutes in the MSM don't care, the Terry/Zapata families do. Oh, and the 300 (so far) dead Mexican's families probably as well.

[dead]

Nice summation.

Except this:

What went wrong was that the operation could _only_ succeed if people died. Hundreds of Mexicans did.

The dead Mexicans was not "what went wrong" - it went exactly as designed by the Executive branch of the US government.

[Tenacious 1]

Concerning your responses...

I expect you are all theorizing as the rest of us and I suppose Issa is (create a crisis to legislate).

I do not believe in conspiracies. But if someone simply gave orders to not stop the guns at the border, then that becomes the keystone of the investigation. Who, then, gave that order and why?