U.S. has lost 190,000 guns in Iraq
Sat, 04 Aug 2007 18:16:21 -0500 Summary: The U.S. government has accused Iran of arming militias in Iraq. However, it has come to light that the U.S. government cannot account for not only hundreds of thousands of weapons but as much body armour and helmets. $2.8 billion has been devoted to equipping Iraq’s security forces, yet it has become clear rival factions have infiltrated the Iraq military. The possibility of Iraqi forces being able to stabilize the country after a U.S. troop withdrawal is remote. A mid-July progress report was issued by the White House which criticized Nuri Al Maliki’s government as making unsatisfactory progress towards making the Iraqi military functionally independent. The report also notes “no momentum” to disarm militia members of rival factions. [Posted By antiguanoctane]
By Middle East Times
Republished from Middle East Times
The U.S. government cannot account for 190,000 weapons issued to Iraqi security forces.
The US government cannot account for 190,000 weapons issued to Iraqi security forces in 2004 and 2005, according to an investigation carried out by the Government Accountability Office (GAO).
According to the July 31 report, the military “cannot fully account for about 110,000 AK-47 assault rifles, 80,000 pistols, 135,000 items of body armor, and 115,000 helmets reported as issued to Iraqi forces.”
The weapons disappeared from records between June 2004 and September 2005, as the military struggled to rebuild the disbanded Iraqi forces from scratch amid increasing attacks from Sunni insurgents and Shiite militias.
Since 2004 the military “has not consistently collected supporting records confirming the dates the equipment was received, the quantities of equipment delivered, or the Iraqi units receiving the items,” the report said.
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