Posted on 09/17/2015 9:31:40 AM PDT by Trumpinator
The Secret Arms Deal Behind America’s Syria Fiasco
A multimillion-dollar deal with a minuscule arms dealer led to the death of a US citizen, delays in arming Syrian rebels, and the purchase of weapons from a pro-Russia dictatorship — all for a pile of defective 30-year-old weapons.
posted on Sept. 17, 2015, at 11:00 a.m.
Aram Roston BuzzFeed News Reporter
At the heart of the high-stakes U.S. program to train and equip Syrian rebels to fight ISIS is a multimillion-dollar arms deal that the Pentagon farmed out to a tiny, little-known private company called Purple Shovel LLC. A BuzzFeed News investigation, based on inside documents and confidential sources familiar with the Syria operation, has found:
▸ Purple Shovel, through the subcontractors it selected and oversaw, tried to sell the U.S. thousands of Russian-style rocket-propelled grenades that were considered unreliable because they were manufactured three decades ago, before Mikhail Gorbachev came to power in the Soviet Union.
▸ The U.S. government rejected them, and that delayed to the effort to stand up the Syrian rebel force.
▸ An American contractor, 41-year-old Francis Norwillo, was killed in a weapons explosion in Bulgaria while training with such outdated grenades.
▸ The U.S. violated its own policy and gave Purple Shovel approval to acquire millions of dollars’ worth of high-tech missiles for the rebels from Belarus, a dictatorship that is under sanctions by the European Union. Belarus, which has supplied weapons to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime and is accused of human rights violations, is normally off-limits to U.S. arms dealers. But the U.S. military and State Department agreed to make an exception, allowing 700 powerful anti-tank missiles to be purchased, with U.S. taxpayer funds, for the rebels.
(Excerpt) Read more at buzzfeed.com ...
Yet this July, eight months later, Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter testified that only 60 Syrians had been trained. Later, in a devastating blow, the Syrian commander trained by the Americans was captured along with some of his soldiers by Islamist rebels from the Jabhat al-Nusra group. And this week, the commander of Central Command, General Lloyd Austin, testified that only four or five of the U.S.-trained rebels were actually deployed and fighting ISIS.
While those fiascoes are known, the problems with Purple Shovel’s multimillion-dollar arms contract have not been reported until now, and they show that troubles with the high-profile effort run deeper than previously realized.
Remember how many Dimocrap dimwits whined about Iran contra.....
How many of them did far worse and AGAINST our countries best interests with the Syrian arms boondoggle...
I want to see the Democrat party collapse and splinter into a half-dozen wacko groups that would be entertaining...but never stand a chance of getting elected.
If things like this continue to come out, and the Democrats are stuck with Hillary, I would expect to see a landslide that would greatly eclipse 2010.
The objective in Libya and Syria was never about winning.
The objective in Libya and Syria was to overthrow the government, steal all the dictator’s wealth and then kill him.
Aren’t those Democrats some sweethearts?
A Republican President fights a communist dictatorship in our back yard, and the Democrats go berserk.
The Democrats overthrow governments in the Middle East? No problem.
Our free and impartial Press is right on top of this.
Hahahahahahaha!
This is like worse than Iran/Contra.
What did Hillary Clinton know and when did she know it?
“At the heart of the high-stakes U.S. program to train and equip Syrian rebels to fight ISIS”
A lot of propaganda in that statement. The rebels are not going after their ISIS allies. They are being armed by us to go after Assad. And ISIS will waltz in an take over as soon as that happens.
Those went to ISIS.
I believe when it is all over we will find out that Obama was arming ISIS from their beginning. He was planning on using them to take down Assad. He couldn’t control them once he armed them.
I think this should be very obvious to anyone who has been paying attention. But, virtually everyone seems to be very afraid to even hint at this... probably because this is still very much an ongoing operation. Obama still wants ISIS to win Syria... and probably Iraq and beyond.
If Russia winds up really going after ISIS, this could force this issue into the open... and then some people are going to have a lot of explaining to do.
Reading your comment gave me a sinking feeling in my gut - like dread. Why? Because it rings as true.
Russia’s only goal in Syria is to further destabilize it so that they can ultimately grab control over it, its various resources, and to gain a strategic military position in a critical place in the Middle East, all for their own personal expansionist aims. Nothing more. Putin seeks to restore the old Soviet Union, or something very much like it.
He stated in 2005 that he thought the demise of the Soviet Union was the “worst geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th Century”.
He stated more recently that he feels (communist mass murderer) Stalin deserves statues in his honor. And there are plenty of Stalin statues in Russia still to this day. Stalin is believed responsible for the killing of over 20 million people, some of which when he intentionally caused a famine in the Ukraine.
Russia is building a military base along the Ukrainian border, signaling its preparing for long-term support of the pro-Russian separatists fighting for Ukraine. The massive base - scheduled for completion in April - will house ammunition depots and barracks for several thousand soldiers, and will be used to train soldiers, reported Reuters. The Reuters reporter investigating the new base was temporarily detained and accused of being a Ukrainian spy. Russian officials didn't respond to Reuters questions about the purpose of the base and whether it's connected to the fight for Ukraine. ..."
Moscow will reportedly provide Russian troops in Syria with an advanced antiaircraft missile system as part of its military support for Syrian president Bashar Assad.
"This system is the advanced version used by Russia, and it's meant to be operated by Russians in Syria," a Western diplomat who is regularly briefed on US, Israeli, and other intelligence assessments told Reuters.
And as The Daily Beast's Michael Weiss points out, any antiaircraft missiles deployed by Russian troops in Syria won't be directed at ISIS, since ISIS has no air force.
In fact, none of the rebels do — only government forces have access to aircraft.
Russia has substantially increased its military presence in Syria over the past two weeks under the guise of helping the embattled Assad fight ISIS and other extremists. ..."
(Excerpt) Read more at Business Insider ...
either that or purple shovel is prolly owned by roger clinton or tony & hugh rodham
Bkmrk.
Maybe Russia was already sounding the alarm bells - which makes this line of thought even more ominous:
From 2013: http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/09/04/us-syria-crisis-russia-congress-idUSBRE9830N620130904
Putin presses US Congress over Syria, says Kerry lied
In remarks that could raise tension further before he hosts President Barack Obama and other G20 leaders on Thursday, Putin also said U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry lied to Congress about the militant group al Qaeda's role in the Syrian conflict.
"They lie beautifully, of course. I saw debates in Congress. A congressman asks Mr Kerry: 'Is al Qaeda there?' He says: 'No, I am telling you responsibly that it is not'," Putin said at a meeting of his human rights council in the Kremlin.
"Al Qaeda units are the main military echelon, and they know this," he said, referring to the United States. "It was unpleasant and surprising for me - we talk to them, we proceed from the assumption that they are decent people. But he is lying and knows he is lying. It's sad."
Putin did not give any more details.
In an exchange with a senator, Kerry was asked whether it was "basically true" that the Syrian opposition had "become more infiltrated by al Qaeda over time. Kerry said: "No, that is actually basically not true. It's basically incorrect".
So I found this article:
http://www.heraldonline.com/news/article31183583.html
Warnings of jihadists among Syria’s rebels came early, were ignored Obama administration’s picture of Syrian moderates either dangerous naivete or an outright lie, according to government’s internal assessments Read more here: http://www.heraldonline.com/news/article31183583.html#storylink=cpy
But the Putin crowd here told us Russians would save Christians and would never play games... (Sarc off)
http://freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3337968/posts
Warnings of jihadists among Syria’s rebels came early, were ignored
Obama administration’s picture of Syrian moderates either dangerous naivete or an outright lie, according to government’s internal assessments
Intelligence revealed extremists were recruiting or routing mainstream fighters, Free Syrian Army no match for better-armed jihadists
Read more here: http://www.heraldonline.com/news/article31183583.html#storylink=cpy
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