A Disturbing Pattern that Benefits Terrorists
By Douglas Farah
There is a disturbing story in today's Washington Post on the role the U.S. weapons market plays in arming Mexican drug cartels.
"You're looking at the same firepower here on the border that our soldiers are facing in Iraq and Afghanistan," Thomas Mangan, a spokesman in Phoenix for the ATF.
The army of "ants" described in the story, carrying weapons south through the same routes they use to bring drugs north, is not new. What appears to be new is the sheer volume of weapons these criminal groups are able to acquire that move directly to the hands of the drug cartels, who can pay well for the merchandise.
It is interesting to note all the tricks used to distract border guards and others as the weapons traffickers, usually carrying small amounts of weapons purchased legally at U.S. gun shows, move across the border. These include using young women to carry the weapons, standing behind a young man that is clean but might arouse suspicion, and other tricks.
It is hard to believe that those from other groups-particularly Hezbollah, which has already had several militant arrested crossing into Texas, have not studied the MO and know how the system works as well as the traffickers. My full blog is here.