ATF Project Gunrunner

Two thousand five hundred thirty eight posts on TFL, countless Congressional hearings, a Contempt of Congress vote, and now a civil lawsuit!
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Amazing what happens in a culture of "we have a higher level of knowledge"

Murder is still murder last I checked....
 
BGutzman said:
Murder is still murder last I checked....
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True, but the actual murder was committed by the person or persons who were on the other side in the gunfight that killed Agent Terry.

However, any and all of the BATFE agents who knowingly and willingly participated in allowing (and encouraging, and facilitating) the illegal sales of the firearms used and the transportation of those firearms across an international border contrary to U.S. law, Mexican law, and international law, most assuredly should be charged with conspiracy to commit various firearms offenses; with being an accessory to various firearms offenses; with aiding and abetting the commission of various firearms offenses; and possibly with being accessories to the murder of Agent Terry.

They should NOT be allowed to hide behind "the Agency told me to do it, I was only following orders." That approach was discredited at Nuremberg, it should not be allowed here in the U.S. Further, if any of the BATFE people involved were ever in the military, they should know that under the UCMJ a soldier not only does not have to follow an unlawful order, he/she is required to disobey the unlawful order and to report it up the chain of command.

Seems like pretty good motivation to obey any order you're given, right? Nope. These articles require the obedience of LAWFUL orders. An order which is unlawful not only does not need to be obeyed, but obeying such an order can result in criminal prosecution of the one who obeys it. Military courts have long held that military members are accountable for their actions even while following orders -- if the order was illegal.
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http://usmilitary.about.com/cs/militarylaw1/a/obeyingorders.htm

I fully understand that the BATFE is not operating under the UCMJ, but the principle that one cannot hide behind an order to commit a crime should certainly translate into the DOJ itself.
 
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That raises the question of whether agents are acting unlawfully when they receive approval to allow the straw purchases (the whole Fast and Furious operation). Think in terms of the DEA allowing drug purchases to proceed or using undercover agents or cooperating witnesses to make sales or purchases. The transactions would be unlawful if not done for law enforcement purposes. Would not the same be true for ATF agents? I understand the difference between drugs and guns and how Fast and Furious was so miserably planned. But does that make it unlawful?
 
Wyoredman wrote:

Two thousand five hundred thirty eight posts on TFL, countless Congressional hearings, a Contempt of Congress vote, and now a civil lawsuit!

And not one single charge has been filed in a court of law against a single person for breaking federal law for knowingly selling firearms to a prohibited person.

This is the real travasty here!

Law does not apply equally if someone at ATF or DOJ says so.
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I could be wrong here, but the above post strikes me as one of the shorter, certainly one of the more cogent seen here, on Operation Fast & Furioius.
 
Former Assistant Secretary of Defense of Mexico & generals indicted for drug smugglin

Six high-ranking members of the Mexican army, including four generals, have been formally charged with collaborating with drug traffickers
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http://www.insightcrime.org/insight...exican-generals-charged-with-drug-trafficking

You wonder how 26% of the weapons that the Mexican Army procured through the Direct Commercial Sales program wound up with the cartels... well now you now.

I haven't seen this story covered by any of the major U.S. news outlets (if someone else can find a story - then by all means prove me wrong), but I don't get how no one in the media can connect the dots back to our own State Department.

The traffiking obviously went on since F&F did move weapons, but I wonder if BATFE hadn't been making it so easy and in some cases even pushing it... I wonder how many guns would have actually moved to the cartels from legitimate gun dealerss.

Looking at the high level of cooperation between the cartels and the Army, I think its ludicrous to say that the cartles were arming themselves via straw purchases.
 
Seems to get "interestinger and interestinger", in particular respecting Luger carbine's post 2545.

I guess that corruption in Mexico is atttibutal to "lax U.S. gun laws" too and that reenstatement of the Clinton era so-called Assault Weapons Ban would immediately cure all the ills of the world, split ends and hangnails too.
 
This Facebook group "Remember Border Patrol Agent Brian A. Terry" does a great job of hitting the main points concerning Fast & Furious, and they do a great job of keeping the message clear and on-track. I follow this group on Facebook and I am impressed with how well they get the message across.

They republished the NRA's "TEN FACTS EVERY VOTER MUST KNOW ABOUT BARACK OBAMA’S FAST AND FURIOUS SCANDAL" (a great doc that captures the most important things about F&F IMO) and I think it's more effective coming from the "Remember Border Patrol Agent Brian A. Terry" Facebook group than from the normal NRA outlets.

http://graphics.nra.org/chriscox/ILA_FastFuriousFactSheet.pdf
 
Is anyone surprised the IG would blame all of it on the Phoenix office? And, with the report set to be released "in a few weeks," that will be just enough time to use it to refute allegations before election but not enough time to thoroughly poke holes in its conclusions.
 
Aguila Blanca wrote, if I understand correctly:

However, any and all of the BATFE agents who knowingly and willingly participated in allowing (and encouraging, and facilitating) the illegal sales of the firearms used and the transportation of those firearms across an international border contrary to U.S. law, Mexican law, and international law, most assuredly should be charged with conspiracy to commit various firearms offenses; with being an accessory to various firearms offenses; with aiding and abetting the commission of various firearms offenses; and possibly with being accessories to the murder of Agent Terry.
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Re the above, yes, they certainly should be, and then re the following,

They should NOT be allowed to hide behind "the Agency told me to do it, I was only following orders." That approach was discredited at Nuremberg, it should not be allowed here in the U.S. Further, if any of the BATFE people involved were ever in the military, they should know that under the UCMJ a soldier not only does not have to follow an unlawful order, he/she is required to disobey the unlawful order and to report it up the chain of command.
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They most likely will be, which strikes me as rather sad, possibly displaying a failing of understanding on my part.
 
and possibly with being accessories to the murder of Agent Terry.
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Agents Terry and Zapata. And possibly war crimes against Mexico. There's more than enough here to seek the death penalty. (the problem with that is they might testify against their bosses at the Cabinet level and beyond, and nobody wants that)

Nothing is going to happen. Obama and Holder and Napolitano and various congressional leaders will not allow anything to happen.
 
So if the new policy is to throw agents under the bus for actions approved by their supervisor/manager then this will lead to unrest throughout the bureau. Ouch. :(:eek:
 
I think the unrest was inevitable.

You had upper levels of BATFE collaborating with appointees to subvert the mission of BATFE and turn the bureau into a component of a propaganda machine - manufacturing events that the administration could then spin to support their agenda.

Subverting the mission of BATFE made for tension.

Having tactics and operations manipulated by non-BATFE politicos like Burke and friends made for tension.
 
The following might be somewhat "off-point", but it still bears on the thrust of this discussion.

Interested readers might view the following . articles@mises.org in particular the 30 August 2012 article. Takes a few miniutes to read, but time well spent, I think. Judge for yourselves.
 
If the local office id thrown under the proverbial bus for carrying out an operation that originated up the line, then we might expect the information flow from those local agents top significantly increase.
 
If the local office id thrown under the proverbial bus for carrying out an operation that originated up the line, then we might expect the information flow from those local agents top significantly increase.
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Fast and Furious originated with the Phoenix office of the BATFE: The Phoenix office of the BATFE sold the plan to the US prosecutor for AZ and, presumably, up the line to their superiors.

See Memorandum, US Congressman Issa, dated 3 May, 2012:

The ATF Phoenix Field Division began Operation Fast and Furious in the fall of 2009 after suspicious weapons purchases led agents to the discovery of an apparent Phoenix-based arms trafficking syndicate. Having been encouraged to devise grander strategies to stop the transfers of weapons to Mexican drug cartels, the Phoenix based agents devised a strategy that went beyond simple arrests or weapons confiscations. They would allow the U.S.-based associates of a Mexican drug cartel to continue acquiring firearms uninterrupted. In doing so, they hoped the weapons, after they were recovered at crime scenes in Mexico, could be traced and linked to cartel operatives including possible high-level financiers, suppliers, and possibly even king-pins.
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