The “Gunwalker” scandal started at cleanupatf.org. Well it actually started at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (and Really Big Fires), where someone had the bright idea to allow rifles to travel from the U.S. to Mexico. Or maybe even “walk” them into Mexico themselves. All so the ATF could justify federal funding and garner kudos by busting said smugglers. Eventually. But not before a Mexican drug gang used two ATF-enabled weapons to murder Brian Terry, an agent for U.S. Customs and Border Protection. Hang on; two weapons? What are the odds? Either the ATF was extremely unlucky in this firearms fiasco or . . . they must be responsible for a large number of deadly weapons falling into the hands of criminals. Now that I’ve had a little time to poke around the site, I’ve discovered the possibility that there may be 3000 smoking guns . . .
Have any of you non-ATF employees reading these posts ever ask yourselves ‘where is the adult supervision in that organization?’ [ED: TTAG’s Chris Dumm’s exact words.] As ‘gunwalker’ continues to gain attention, the guys in the Phoenix Division rumored that the number of ‘waked’ [sic] guns could be as high as 3,000.
So, where is the adult supervision that says ‘this case is not going anywhere and we are doing more harm than good so STOP?’ These cases were approved by the RAICS, ASIC, SAIC and HQ managers. [ED: anyone know what they’re talking about?] So the question is why?”
And the answer is . . .
Well the word from Phoenix is that the SAIC Newell wanted to be able to track where these guns were going in Mexico. As such, the analysts have made pretty charts with lines showing where these guns have turned up. I am not sure how that stems the flow of guns South, especially considering these guns usually get recovered alongside dead bodies.
Let’s stop and think about that. A branch of the United States government was supplying weapons to Mexican criminals who used them to murder Mexican citizens. Why are we only outraged in the usual myopic sense (i.e. if a plane crashes in an African forest and no Americans died did it really happen)? At the risk of stating the obvious, this is madness. The ATF should be shuttered before they start setting fires to clear up those crimes. Madness.
So, there is an Iron River! And ATF steers the boat.
And owns it. And fuels it. And staffs it. And fills it with cargo.
RAICS, ASIC, SAIC and HQ managers.
RAICS- Regional Agents In Charge (plural)
ASIC- iirc, Assistant Special Agent In Charge
SAIC – Special Agent In Charge
A branch of the United States government was supplying weapons to Mexican criminals who used them to murder Mexican citizens.
SOP. Our government does this kind of stuff all day, every day. We are guarding the opium poppy fields in Afghanistan. There are valid strategic reasons for it, but at the end of the day, GIs are guarding a good chunk of the world heroin supply at the source.
The only reason this has gotten any traction at all was the tragic death of Agent Terry. Even getting killed and being famous doesn’t always help prevent a coverup (see: Pat Tillman). Ops are exposed every day, the only question is whether the exposure gets contained and disappears from view quickly or not.
Though it was soft pedaled, it was interesting that the story has finally been picked up by a liberal MSM outlet, the LA Times.
http://ow.ly/3Rlgy
I’m not optimistic you’ll be seeing this on the evening news any time soon. Not that it matters, of course, because no one watches the evening news any more. Maybe the House oversight committee issues subpoenas and holds hearings on this. At least that’s now a possibility.
“adult supervision”
What they need is a never ending time out. The fact is they don’t even know how many Newell guns have ended up getting to the very people that shouldn’t get them. It’s the very thing they say they want to put a stop too. The war on drugs. The war on terror. The whore that is the ATF. It’s all a buisiness of incompitance and back stabbing to keep their jobs.
There is a posting for the SAIC job in Phoenix for ATF on USAJOBS.gov. I guess the old one has been moved.
You need an update to seperate the FACT of GUNWALKER – Bush program that shut down immediately when they lost sight of a few weapons and inherent danger of that with FAST AND FURIOUS – Obama Regime… intentionally not tracking thousands of high powered weapons to build case for anti 2A but whistleblowers came forth and got demoted and branded immediately. Some whom went to lengths of own time to track weapons only to be told to …WAIT FOR IT…. STAND DOWN… Where we hear that lately in the breaking Obama Regime scandals… Benghazi Much? And big kicker is it was gunrunning scandal to syrian jihadis IMHO.