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The Pentagon lost track of sensitive equipment from a $750 million program to help U.S. soldiers spot roadside bombs — and some of it wound up for sale on eBay, Craigslist and other websites, according to a Navy intelligence document obtained by The Intercept.
The report went on to state that “more than 32,000 pieces of equipment were issued” under the program, and the items “are NOT for civilian use and are controlled under the International Traffic in Arms Regulations.” The devices went missing because the military units had poor control over equipment distributed to them, according to the intelligence brief.
JIEDDO has been heavily criticized over the years for expending large sums of money without attaining clear results. According to a 2012 report by the Government Accountability Office, JIEDDO had spent over $18 billion yet lacked an effective way to oversee its programs.
– From the Intercept article: Sensitive Military Gear Ended Up on eBay, Craigslist
Another day, another example of the inconceivable incompetence of the U.S. government.
Just yesterday, I published a post titled, Can’t Make This Up – U.S. Providing Aid in Fight Against ISIS in Iraq Alongside Iranian Troops. Here’s an excerpt in case you missed it:
The U.S. has started providing Iraq with aerial intelligence in the stalled battle to oust Islamic State from Tikrit, drawing the American military into closer coordination with Iranian-backed militias spearheading the offensive.
Military officials said they aren’t working directly with Iran. But the intelligence will be used to help some 20,000 Iranian-backed Shiite militia fighters who make up the bulk of the force that has been struggling for weeks to retake the strategic city.
Quite interesting, since last I checked Iran was the most evil, horrific existential threat to humanity on planet earth.
However, it appears providing aid to Iran in Iraq and losing $500 millions in weapons to al-Qaeda in Yemen wasn’t bad enough. America had to put a cherry on top of it all by losing military equipment from a $750 million program, some of which ended up for sale on eBay and Craigslist. Can’t make this up indeed.
From the Intercept:
The Pentagon lost track of sensitive equipment from a $750 million program to help U.S. soldiers spot roadside bombs — and some of it wound up for sale on eBay, Craigslist and other websites, according to a Navy intelligence document obtained by The Intercept.
The March 12, 2014 document is titled “Diversion and Illegal Sales of Restricted USG Optical Systems” and is marked “For Official Use Only.” It lists 13 websites where the military equipment was listed for sale, including Craigslist, eBay, texasguntalk.com and sportfishermen.com, among others. “Items have been marketed as sporting goods; hunting equipment; bird-watching equipment and camping supplies,” the report notes.
The report went on to state that “more than 32,000 pieces of equipment were issued” under the program, and the items “are NOT for civilian use and are controlled under the International Traffic in Arms Regulations.” The devices went missing because the military units had poor control over equipment distributed to them, according to the intelligence brief.
The bomb-detecting equipment was provided as part of a larger program called RCOS/Keyhole, which was funded by the Pentagon’s bomb fighting agency, known as the Joint Improvised Explosive Device Defeat Organization (JIEDDO), and administered by the U.S. Navy.
JIEDDO has been heavily criticized over the years for expending large sums of money without attaining clear results. According to a 2012 report by the Government Accountability Office, JIEDDO had spent over $18 billion yet lacked an effective way to oversee its programs.
The Intercept found an eBay listing from Dec. 2014 for one of the pieces of equipment listed in the the NCIS document — the OASYS-BAE Systems Universal Thermal Monocular; it was listed for sale in Dec. 2014 for $6,000, with free standard shipping. Another item, currently listed for sale, is a CNVD-T Clip-On Night Vision Device Thermal System; it is advertised for $16,599.00 in “new condition!”
NCIS did not respond to email queries or a phone message requesting comment on the report.
Naturally.
For related articles, see:
Can’t Make This Up – U.S. Providing Aid in Fight Against ISIS in Iraq Alongside Iranian Troops
More Foreign Policy Incompetence – U.S. Humanitarian Aid is Going Directly to ISIS
Afghan President Hamid Karzai Slams U.S. Foreign Policy in Farewell Speech
America’s Disastrous Foreign Policy – My Thoughts on Iraq
Foreign Policy: CIA Documents Show the U.S. Helped Saddam Hussein Use Chemical Weapons
In Liberty,
Michael Krieger
Easy solution. Make the selling/buying of ANY military equipment punishable by Death. That includes copfuks buying Humvees and other shit. Kill ’em all, I say.
When I was on ft hood, you could get anything. Anything people. One of our e6’s got in a fight with his wife and she ratted him out for basement full of stuff. Claymores to plastic, to at4 dragons along with aks and other stuff. I was one of the guards when he was waiting in the day room to go to his courtmarshal. He never came back.
Duckhunter, let me guess, you were military police right? In my experience the MP’s were the most corrupt and criminal bunch on every base I was ever at. MP’s far exceeded all others in terms of monthly Courts Marshal offenses, Sex crimes, domestic abuse/violence, theft, burglary, financial crimes, extortion, you name it! I could understand the desire to steal shit like cases of cigarettes or liquor but but many stole shit like runway landing lights (off of active runways) and helmets belonging to A-10 pilots and g-suits.
The military supply chain including disposition really is a joke. They sold a complete F-18 Super Hornet (in pieces) at a DRMO auction. Some guy bought it for some ridiculous amount of money like $20k or something. The plane was re-built and an airworthiness certificate was applied for which threw up a few red flags. An investigation was done and the case went to court. The buyer prevailed but had to allow the military to de-mil the plane so that it could not carry weapons. I think it is still the only Super Hornet in the world in civilian hands.
You would not believe some of the shit I saw as a civilian, dependent child and later as a dependent spouse. I knew a bunch of guys that used military transports to haul plane loads of liquor, turkish carpets and all manner of goods to bases all over that they then sold others. Business was good when you had no overhead. THe fruad, waste and abuse was incredible and I imagine that active duty members saw far more of this that I could ever dream of.
Funny, I stomped a few Monkey Pricks ass while at Fort Hood … no sorrier bunch of suck ass wannabees ever enlisted .
Who give a shit!! Just keep printing, send the paper overseas for oil, we’ll keep making weapons. MOAR profits!!
I got a job as a civilian in a military commissary not too long after high school. It turns out that the GI’s training me had been arrested for theft and were living in the stockade being released each day to go to work until their trial was over. They left one day for court and were convicted and imprisoned that day. I had been hired to replace one of them.
Shortly after that they offered a contract for all that work to a civilian company and I went to work for them for quite a bit more money. In the end though they just exchanged occasional illegal theft for legalized institutional theft. It would have been cheaper to keep the GI’s even with their theft!
interesting …stuff easily to be stolen , will often be. An old friend was a supply Sargent during WWII tasked with a company of blacks charged with loading supply ships headed to various theatres during the war. Thievery had become such a problem that a paratrooper unit was called in to restores some law and order at the crack of a bat…according to him , thievery after that rather brutal attitude adjustment was severely curtailed.
But , it gangsterism wasn’t just unique to the black soldier…e.g.:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2332814/The-wartime-TRUTH-Army-tried-hide-How-gangs-U-S-deserters-terrorized-WWII-Paris-reign-mob-style-violence.html
Others, like Weiss, fought until their faith in their immediate commanders disappeared. Was it a form of madness or a dawning lucidity that led them to desert? Glass does not claim to be able to answer that question to which Weiss himself had devoted his latter years to addressing to no avail.
Others still deserted to make money, stealing and selling the military supplies that their comrades at the front needed to survive. Opportunists and crooks, certainly, but not cowards – the life they chose was every bit as violent and bloody as battle.
50,000 American and 100,000 British soldiers deserted during World War II. Yet according to Glass the astounding fact is not that so many men deserted, but that so few did.
Only one was executed for it, Eddie Slovik. He was, until that point, by his own assessment the unluckiest man alive.
Military MPs and LEOs have much more in common than we are willing to recognize.
I’ve known a lot of LEOs, and a more outside the law bunch I have rarely encountered.
And we are forced to hail them as heroes and accept their word as truth, justice and the American way.
Absolute power corrupts absolutely.