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.