Editorial -- Roanoke Times, Roanoke Virginia

[DaveH]

Get smarter against gun smugglers - Roanoke.com

Editorial: Get smarter against gun smugglers
A government watchdog's warning should be taken to heart.

The Government Accountability Office says poor coordination among federal agencies makes gun-running across the U.S.-Mexican border even easier than can be expected, given the ease with which guns can be bought legally in the United States.

The flow of guns to criminal drug cartels on the other side of the porous border presents an urgent threat. The U.S. government needs to treat it as such.

The extreme violence of these illegal drug syndicates is wreaking havoc in the national life of an ally and neighbor. That should be reason enough for America to do all legally within its power to identify and break up gun-smuggling rings.

If further motivation is needed, policymakers should ponder the fact that -- like the illegal drug trade that accounts for both the reason and means behind the gun buys -- the violence will be impossible to contain.

A draft of the GAO report, leaked last week to news organizations, cites intelligence reports that the cartels have armed themselves not only against the Mexican government, but to gain and maintain control of illegal drug distribution in the U.S.

Legal gun sales in this country facilitate this illicit trade.

According to federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives data collected over the past three years, more than 90 percent of firearms traced after being seized in Mexico are from the United States.

It's hardly a mystery where many of them come from. The ATF agent in charge of its Houston division noted in a New York Times story in April there are about 1,500 licensed gun dealers in that area alone.

They are required to report suspicious sales of handguns, but not of rifles, like AK-47s. Many, perhaps most, dealers do so anyway, but with so many outlets to buy from, the cartels easily arrange straw sales that appear innocent.

Then there are the private sales at gun shows, which in some border states, as in Virginia, require no criminal background check.

With all the legal barriers law enforcement agencies face, they need to deploy every resource efficiently to slow the illegal trade.

The GAO report specifically blames poor communication between ATF and Immigration and Customs Enforcement for undermining gun-running investigations.

Spokesmen for the two agencies say they are updating an agreement on joint investigations. Immediately would not be too soon.

[DefensiveCarry.com]

[fogish]

"According to federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives data collected over the past three years, more than 90 percent of firearms traced after being seized in Mexico are from the United States."

So of the seized firearms that can be traced 90% of them can be traced to the USA. What is the percentage of seized firearms that can be traced? How many firearms are seized per month and year and how many of each model that are seized are sold in the US each month and year? Everyone here must know that Drug Cartels with all of their money are not reliant on people buying guns from dealers in the USA and then smuggling them across the border.

[falcon1]

"According to federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives data collected over the past three years, more than 90 percent of firearms traced after being seized in Mexico are from the United States."

So of the seized firearms that can be traced 90% of them can be traced to the USA. What is the percentage of seized firearms that can be traced? How many firearms are seized per month and year and how many of each model that are seized are sold in the US each month and year? Everyone here must know that Drug Cartels with all of their money are not reliant on people buying guns from dealers in the USA and then smuggling them across the border.

Indeed, any member of a cartel that bought from legitimate dealers in the U.S. would be helped to "kick the oxygen habit" by his peers, for paying top dollar for items which could be bought much more cheaply through illegitimate means.

[ccw9mm]

So of the seized firearms that can be traced 90% of them can be traced to the USA. What is the percentage of seized firearms that can be traced?

No telling how truly low that "90%" statistic really is until one knows how many guns exist in Mexico and the percentage of all guns in Mexico that have been seized. Is it 1%? Less? To let it lay there and allow the unwashed to infer that 90% of all guns in Mexico come from the U.S. ... well, that's simply propaganda designed to help shut down guns in the U.S. Social control by design.

The mere fact that entire boat loads of AK47's and other small arms can be acquired for centavos on the peso from other sources, including its southern border, strongly supports the idea that this is propaganda of the first order.

Being cartels, why would they get a handful of guns via means where they need to stick their heads out of their holes, instead of simply acquiring them all via the underground in mass quantities? Being powerful enough to run drugs around the planet, does anyone truly believe they're incapable of doing the same with small arms from anywhere/everywhere?

[miklcolt45]

"According to federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives data collected over the past three years, more than 90 percent of firearms traced after being seized in Mexico are from the United States."

So of the seized firearms that can be traced 90% of them can be traced to the USA. What is the percentage of seized firearms that can be traced?

Several days after this came out, the reported percentage of traceable firearms seized in Mexico was 17%(IIRC). (Not reported by most mainstream media outlets after these figures became available. Lies, damned lies, and statistics.)

Most of the guns supplied to drug cartels came from Russian mafia-style operations or Mexican army defectors.

[edr9x23super]

Yes, I agree with that assertion; in addition to the previous facts stated, the ATF will not release their evidence regarding the "90%" figures they purport to have.

I have a problem believing this, especially when the Mexican drug cartels are using hand grenades, RPGs and mostly automatic weapons in their fights over there. Those are all strictly controlled, especially the explosives. So where are they getting that kind of hardware?

Not from the United States!

[PNUT]

Those guns in the hands of the narcos are the ones that we've sent or sold to their Gov.....gee, I wonder how they got them ?
These cartels have billions, they don't buy a couple at a time from a gun shop.
How the heck can anyone even believe this stuff ? Who arms an army one gun at a time ?