Posted on 06/06/2012 12:28:02 PM PDT by neverdem
Sealed applications for wiretaps – approved by senior DOJ officials and obtained by the Oversight Committee – detail gunwalking efforts
WASHINGTON— Today, House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Darrell Issa confronted Attorney General Eric Holder with new documents showing that senior Justice Department Officials in Washington were given specific information about reckless tactics in Operation Fast and Furious. In a letter, Issa rebuked the Attorney General for his continuing efforts to mislead Congress about both the contents of the wiretap applications and details of who knew about and gave approval for reckless tactics. While refusing to produce the subpoenaed documents, Holder has previously denied knowledge of and cast doubt on the possibility that the wiretap applications contained information about reckless tactics.
“The wiretap applications show that immense detail about questionable investigative tactics was available to the senior officials who reviewed and authorized them. The close involvement of these officials – much greater than previously known – is shocking,” Issa wrote to Holder. “Throughout the course of the congressional investigation into Operation Fast and Furious, the [Justice] Department has consistently denied that any senior officials were provided information about the tactics used in Operation Fast and Furious. The wiretap applications obtained by the Committee show such statements made by senior Department officials regarding the wiretaps to be false and misleading. You have repeatedly either denied involvement by senior officials in Fast and Furious, or asserted that the wiretap applications do not contain rich detail about irresponsible investigative tactics.”
Wiretaps utilized in Operation Fast and Furious were intended to allow investigators in Arizona to listen to the phone calls of suspects as part of a strategy to reveal evidence of involvement by high level Mexican cartel associates. The six applications for wiretaps, which have been sealed by a federal judge, detail specific actions taken by agents in Operation Fast and Furious. This includes conscious decisions not to interdict weapons that agents knew were illegally purchased by smugglers taking weapons to Mexico.
The wiretaps, as required by federal law, were submitted to Washington for approval by senior Justice Department officials in the Washington based Criminal Division of the Justice Department. They were approved under the authority of Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer of the Criminal Division. To justify the need for the invasive law enforcement tool, Justice Department officials use robust and detailed information to explain the evidence used to merit its use and why other tactics are not sufficient to achieve the goals of the operation.
Information contained in the wiretaps had been subpoenaed by the Oversight Committee, but the Justice Department had refused to turn them over to investigators. Obtaining them answers some of the questions the Committee and House leadership have warned(PDF) Attorney General Holder he must fully address to avoid contempt proceedings. To date, Holder has not responded to this letter. As the wiretaps have been sealed, the committee cannot publicly release them but copies have been sent to the committee minority and the wiretaps are available for review by Members of the Committee.
Click here for the letter from Chairman Issa to Attorney General Eric Holder(PDF?)
So Holder may be able to insulate himself from being "the brains" behind F&F, but he'll have to admit that he had no idea what the people working directly for him were doing.
Mark
Moles could be elsewhere too, I suppose. Or just plain sell-out diplomats. But F&F does seem far more logical as a way of stealth arming Mexican drug cartels, assuming someone who wanted that was in a crucial control position, than as a means of trying to manipulate international sentiment about gun control.
Something stinks in the state of Denmark (or as Archie Bunker would put it, Denver), however you look at it. I hope Issa gets to the bottom of it, but I’m not wildly hopeful.
To prove the point that CIA trumps all, the DEA...part of the DOJ.. did not approve of the Davila scheme. It went forward anyway. So here comes over a ton of cocaine into the Miami Airport and onto the streets of Miami.
Drug walking??
What were they thinking. You got to know this isn’t a bunch of closet libertarians.
There is no way all of these ops could go on without State Dept. approval. There is no way all of these things could go on, with State Dept. involvement, without _______’_ approval.
So why would the CIA arm Drug lords????
They arm groups to serve a purpose.
In this case, look to Sinaloa
Jesus Vicente Zambada Niebla
For people who just can’t get that this was likely a CIA operation...in whole or in part...
the Classified Information Procedures Act was invoked in the case of Jesus Vicente Zambada Niebla - a Kingpin of the Sinaloa Drug Cartel - who claims he was a CIA asset.
Are you people who don’t believe the CIA was involved following the trail so far.
So who got the guns????
http://articles.latimes.com/2011/oct/08/nation/la-na-atf-guns-20111009
What does Zambada Niebla claim?? US made a deal with Sinaloa.
Is he making it up?
Invoking CIPA would suggest there is plenty that the US wants to hide.
After post #38 just who would that be?
“I agree. AFAIK they were not involved in F&F at all. “
For one, you.
Might I remind you that the vicious Zetas are rivals of Sinaloa.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/aug/11/was-cia-behind-operation-fast-and-furious/
Grenade Walker on the other hand was limited to arming one cartel. It did supply weapons that could tip the balance of power between one cartel and another. (more importantly it could tip the balance of power between the cartel and the Mex gov) Grenade Walker has been identified as CIA and State Dept. approved.
I like connecting dots that are on the paper not dots I imagine would go nicely if only they were there. YMMV
“the CIA angle is being floated to give Boner cover to make this go away”
I don’t believe that. The Prosecution invoked CIPA in the Sinaloa Drug Cartel case. The two people that were offered were two people who were also involved with the Guantanamo Bay case.
“Mr. Zambada Niebla believes that the documentation that he requests [from the US government as part of his court case] will confirm that the weapons received by Sinaloa Cartel members and its leaders in Operation ‘Fast & Furious’ were provided under the [immunity] agreement entered into between the United States government and [Chapo Guzman confidante, DEA cooperating source and possible CIA asset] Mr. Loya Castro on behalf of the Sinaloa Cartel….”
A Drug Lord being prosecuted disagrees with you.
The WashTimes article you linked only cites Plumlee and Jordan as sources but as the article I linked about those two shows they never connected the CIA with F&F. The author you cited is connecting dots that aren't on the paper.
Phil Jordan, a former CIA operative and one-time leader of U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration’s El Paso Intelligence Center, claims that the Obama administration is running guns to the violent Zetas cartel through the direct commercial sale of military grade weapons:“From the intel, it appears that a company was set up in Mexico to purchase weapons through the U.S. Direct Commercial Sales Program, and that the company may have had a direct link to the Zetas.”
If the ATF is supplying the Sinaloas (with Calderón’s tacit approval and/or help) and State is playing for the Zetas, where does that leave the rest of America?
Let me say AGAIN, CIPA was invoked in Sinaloa Drug Lord case. That is very telling. Let me remind you , most of the guns in Fast and Furious went to Sinaloa according to Issa.
Now read this story carefully
You claim that the CIA was arming the Zetas.Do you really believe that they would allow the Sinaloas to be armed without their approval.
That is absurd.
There are two plausible explanations. They armed the Zetas but it got out of control.
Or they want there to be a bloodbath and are arming both sides at the same time.
In any event, NO WAY IN HELL that the CIA did not give approval to Fast and Furious. Are you going to pretend they didn’t know it was happening???????????????????????? as they were arming the Zetas???????????????????????????????????
I didn't claim that.
That is what you are saying
” Grenade Walker has been identified as CIA and State Dept. approved.””State is playing for the Zetas, where does that leave the rest of America? “
....the CIA angle is being floated to give Boner cover to make this go away....
Yup. Right on both counts.
Funny that you left out the other recent president with deep ties to the CIA. You're pretty close to nailing it, but you have to realise it's not a partisan thing. Everybody's wheels get greased. That's what keeps it going.
Funny that you didn’t notice that I’m not the one pushing the kooky CIA theories.
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