Posted on 10/18/2015 7:01:22 AM PDT by frithguild
Needless to say, what’s happening in Syria is a nightmare for those who have been forced by circumstance to bear witness to the intractable violence. The plight of the hundreds of thousands of refugees fleeing the country is unfathomable and the situation facing those who remain is even worse.
For military and political strategists in Washington, Syria’s civil war represents a different kind of nightmare. The Russia-Iran nexus is just about the worst possible outcome for the US, whose status as global hegemon was already fading in the face of an ascendant China.
Put simply, the partnership between Washington’s two worst geopolitical enemies represents a kind of “sum of all fears” scenario and to make matters worse, the alliance between Tehran and Moscow looks as though it will apply to Iraq as well, raising the spectre of the US being kicked out of the country it “liberated” after 9/11.
And while there’s nothing funny about the plight of the Syrian people, there’s quite a bit to laugh at when it comes to this latest (and perhaps greatest) US foreign policy blunder which is why we found the following bit from Defense News particularly amusing. Apparently, the Iran-backed (and US supported) Shiite militias battling ISIS in Iraq aren’t getting the kind of logistical support they need from Washington and so they have begun attaching Russian guns to Abrams tanks and firing Iran-stamped ammo. Here’s more:
Earlier this month, Shia militiamen in Iraq dropped off an American-supplied Abrams tank at a US-supported repair facility where workers were surprised to find an attached Russian machine gun plus Iranian ammo, Defense News has learned.
The MIA1 main battle tank — one of 146 frontline tanks the US sold to Baghdad — was transported through the Green Zone to a US-supported Iraqi service facility at al-Muthanna that was established as part of the Pentagon’s Foreign Military Sales (FMS) program.
The tank was equipped with a Russian .50-caliber machine gun and Iranian-stamped 12.75-mm ammunition, according to a source at the facility.
“Once all the ammo was removed, as per procedure, by Iraqi personnel, we noticed Iranian markings on the back of the shell casings. Seems they put a Russian machine gun with Iranian ammunition on an Abrams tank.”
As Washington scrambles to adapt to the myriad, Iranian-backed Shiite militias fighting alongside its US-trained and -supplied partners in Iraq, new manifestations of shifting alliances may threaten the relevance of US end-use monitoring in that war-torn country.
The US-Russian tank hybrid could constitute twin violations of Iraq’s FMS agreements with Washington, due to unauthorized use by Shiite militias and the unsanctioned addition of the Russian gun and Iranian ammo, Pentagon officials say.
“Any time you do a foreign military sale, there’s a requirement that you do end-use monitoring, and it’s a violation if you do alterations,” Vice Adm. Joseph Rixey, director of the Pentagon’s Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA) told Defense News.
Interviewed in Washington this week at the annual Association of the US Army conference, neither Rixey, the Pentagon’s FMS chief, nor Maj. Gen. Mark McDonald, chief of the US Army Security Assistance Command, had knowledge of the event recounted to Defense News. However, both men suggested that their Iraqi customers had an obligation to report such occurrences in a timely and accurate manner.
“If they brought it into the maintenance facility, then that should be reported to our US folks there, and then we can have a discussion about how, ‘This is not what we’re going to do,’” McDonald said.
McDonald was deputy commander at the time the Iraqi tank deal was concluded, and noted that the FMS contract includes a maintenance package that covers the facility in question. “We eventually got them to buy the maintenance and training package, so I do know there is an ongoing maintenance effort going on over there under our FMS contract, with a US company doing the maintenance.”
The in-country source noted that it was the first time he had encountered the hybridization of the Abrams to accommodate the Russian gun and Iranian ammo.
“It could be an isolated event or it could mark the beginning of something worrisome. It’s too early to tell … but given the strange bedfellows over there in the Amber Zone, you never know.” Yes, “you never know”, but what appears to have happened here is that because the Iran-backed Shiite militias are more adept than the Iraqi army on the battlefield, they’re the ones driving the tanks.
As a reminder, here’s their assessment of America’s role in providing support for the ground campaign against ISIS in Iraq (via Reuters):
Allied Iranian-backed Shi'ite militias who are leading the fight against Islamic State in Iraq, say the United States lacks the decisiveness and the readiness to supply weapons needed to eliminate militancy in the region.
And so, because of this “lack of decisiveness and readiness”, the militiamen improvised and slapped a Russian machine gun on a US-supplied tank and loaded it up with Iranian ammo.
As noted above, these soldiers aren’t really supposed to be driving these things which makes the following description of what unfolded when they dropped it off for service down right hilarious:
“They brought it in through Iraqi checkpoints, back-rolled it off the trailer and then drove away.”
It’s just and aftermarket upgrade.
General Dynamics designed and sold a remote weapon’s station. An operator in the vehicle fired the 50 cal with a joystick. I don’t know if the Abrams got this upgrade or if it was just for the Stryker. But it drastically reduced the ammo expended; orders of magnitude lower. The operator could kill any target with a three round burst (the minimum, as I recall) without ever being exposed to danger. It was amazingly effective. I hope none of these were given away as they will certainly fall into Russian and Iranian hands. Both are adroit at copying.
this piece boils down to lawyers bitching about contract terms
lawyers arguing over the coating on a pinhead
This is one of the major things that concerns me. If in fact we send our military back in to harm’s way in Iraq. Imagine cresting a hill in a Humvee, only to find an Abrams tank in front of you and closing...
Slimes are little murder puppets that are only loyal to satanallah.
Nature abhors a vacuum.
“This is one of the major things that concerns me. If in fact we send our military back in to harm’s way in Iraq. Imagine cresting a hill in a Humvee, only to find an Abrams tank in front of you and closing...”
I can’t recall the mean time between failures of the Abrams, but if we stop maintaining them they won’t last long. I’m pretty sure the ones they got were used continuously for several years. The design was to use the tanks once a year for exercises in Germany and then flat out daily for six months to prevent the Soviets from running through the Fulda gap.
When I was cut from GD I looked at jobs available worldwide. Basically all the positions maintaining the tanks in Iraq where open as the US was leaving and those people aren’t stupid. But, apparently, they did fill them.
Yeah. Just as they were “shocked” to “find” weapons in the hands of Mexican drug cartels.
I’m more worried that they were given a main battle tank, which I believe still had some classified tech.
Asad brought this nightmare on his people by supporting terrorism.
A bad pun set to landscape! Excellent!
Lol
Kind of a cross between Orwell and Catch 22.
“I’m more worried that they were given a main battle tank, which I believe still had some classified tech.”
There is no classified tech on the tank. It is fully evolved, mature technology. Except for the software, which is fist rate and accounts for most of what it does, it is actually old tech.
“The US-Russian tank hybrid could constitute twin violations of Iraq’s FMS agreements with Washington, due to unauthorized use by Shiite militias and the unsanctioned addition of the Russian gun and Iranian ammo, Pentagon officials say. “
Ha! We’ve got em now! They are so going to lose in court.
There are many informative posts that I would have not seen if they were only posted once. I spend a lot of time here but not all of it.
Don’t worry, Obama will investigate and find out how this happened!
I appreciate that. But the rule and protocol is still to avoid duplicate posting and do a title search (at least) before posting.
Not that I want to sound like a self appointed Mod or anything. God knows I only recently got back from being banned. The last thing I want to do is draw attention to myself, hell, JimRob is probably thinking he made a mistake already.
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