[Travis McGee]

I saw these almost daily flying out of the Green Cove Springs FL air park last year, where rumor has it the CIA has a little "secret" air base. The rumor was that the CIA was training Afghan pilots to fly them in Florida, and one of the big problems was the pilot trainees kept disappearing into America.

Sounds pretty stupid to bring the Afghan pilots all the way to FL to train them, but that was the story I heard.

I think it's also reasonable to assume that the "Afghan pilot training" story is at least partly a cover for U.S. acquisition of these Russian helos. A U.S. Chinook is readily identifiable as an American chopper, but CIA spooks could fly these Russian helos all around Central Asia, Africa etc and not lose their cover.

[Gen.Blather]

“Sounds pretty stupid to bring the Afghan pilots all the way to FL to train them, but that was the story I heard.”

I imagine it’s a lot easier, cheaper and SAFER to train them here. And, to find qualified people to train them here, as opposed to the huge bonus it would cost them to send a contractor there. Even private wiring technicians in danger areas are earning well over $100k.

[TADSLOS]

Travis, those are contractor IPs being checked out in the Mi 17 in FL prior to deployment to Afghanistan to train Afghan army pilots.