April 19,
2008: The U.S. has been going after illegal arms brokers more energetically of
late. Currently, negotiations are under way with Thailand, to extradite Russian
arms merchant Viktor Bout from Thailand to the United States. Thailand arrested
Bout last month, when he was lured to Thailand by a U.S. sting operation
(offering Bout a large sale to Colombian rebel group FARC). Bout has moved
millions of weapons (AK-47s, RPGs, mortars, machine-guns) to similar groups all
over the world since the 1990s. Bout is now openly trying to use his
connections with the Russian government to get out of Thailand (where he is
still in jail.) The Russians have been applying some diplomatic pressure on
Bout's behalf, and the fear is that Bout will find the right person to bribe in
Thailand, and make his getaway.
More
recently, police arrested an American, Peter Spitz, in Florida, for trying to
sell ten Russian helicopters (apparently Mi-8s) to Zimbabwe. Spitz was caught
in a sting, and he boasted of having 30 Russian made helicopters and warplanes
in Central Asia (Kyrgyzstan). The five Central Asian states that used to be
part of the Soviet Union, inherited thousands of Russian aircraft and
helicopters when the Soviet Union was dissolved (and the new states owned
whatever Soviet military equipment was on their territory at that time.) These
new nations had no need for most of these aircraft, and could not afford to
operate them. So Spitz is basically a broker, and was trying to sell the ten
helicopters for nearly $8 million. Zimbabwe is under an arms embargo, and Spitz
was not licensed to do these kinds of deals anyway. But he could have hired a
Russian air cargo company to move the helicopters to Zimbabwe.
Lastly,
another Florida operation, AEY, Inc. got a contract to deliver $298 million
worth of ammo to the Afghan security forces. The U.S. Department of Defense was
subcontracting this to AEY, which turned out to be just another broker, who was
buying up low quality (very old, and usually poorly maintained) ammo from
Eastern European nations (Albania and Hungary were mentioned), and trying to
pass it off as recently manufactured and up to spec. But what really got AEY,
Inc. in trouble was trying to buy some ammunition from China, which U.S. firms
are forbidden to do. In any event, AEY, Inc. lost the contracts.
The U.S.
is going after these gunrunners more aggressively because, without easy access
to weapons and ammo, a lot of the large scale mayhem around the world would not
be possible. Without assault rifles and lots of ammo, these untrained thugs are
a lot less bold, and dangerous.
