U.S.A. – (Ammoland.com) – “Mexican Cartels Overwhelm Police with Ammunition Made for the U.S. Military,” The New York Times claims in yet another hit piece attempting to blame the right of peaceable citizens to keep and bear arms for the homicidal depredations of lawless foreign degenerates. “Drug syndicates have used .50-caliber ammunition, produced at a plant owned by the U.S. Army and then smuggled across the border, in attacks on Mexican civilians and police.”
The target is the Lake City Army Ammunition Plant, and to make its case, The Times presents a handful of anecdotes along with herd-spooking handwringing over “armor-piercing incendiary .50-caliber rounds” and the like.
“True” to form, the article barely addresses foreign sources and leaves unacknowledged the astounding corruption driving the cartel/Mexican government alliance. That’s so readers can be led to the conclusion that the problem is with U.S. gun laws and the U.S. commercial supply chain.
It’s the same tactics that led to Operation Fast and Furious “gunwalking,” and ATF’s homicidal plot to smooth the way for more citizen disarmament edicts by ensuring guns found at cartel crime scenes could be traced to U.S. gun stores. (Note: Some of the links in this post are from discontinued websites, now only available via the Internet Archive, and as such, may load slowly.)
Admittedly, guns and ammunition can still be transported south from the U.S. to Mexico, but that’s more an issue of border control than anything else, and the Trump administration has done much to secure the open borders left deliberately unattended by Democrats in terms of both people and contraband. Back in 2011, it had been documented that ordnance was crossing into Mexico over border—its southern one, including hand grenades, which can’t be bought at gun stores, and leading to the conclusion that “Some have been taken/bought/stolen from the Mexican army itself.”
And not just the army. Corruption and criminality in government are ways of life. Mexico’s top enforcer, former Public Security Secretary Genaro Garcia Luna and his top commander, were embedded assets. A good rule of thumb for Mexican politics is that attaining and retaining power can depend on whether the cartels want someone in or out.
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So, just because some seized ammunition casings are stamped with the initials “L.C.” doesn’t tell us how the ammo ended up in criminal hands. And it’s hardly surprising that The Times showed no interest in investigating authorized sales to the Mexican government.
It’s also not surprising that this renewed attack is being picked up by other media outlets, creating in effect a narrative to be promulgated and amplified. Again, another tactic used to attack “gun rights” from the Fast and Furious playbook is being dusted off.
“Nearly 80% of weapons seized by Mexico’s current administration come from the US,” El Pais International declares.
We’ve seen such claims before, including assertions that “American gun sellers supply the cartels with 95 to 100 percent of their guns, according to the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.” Here’s the trick they’re pulling:
According to ATF’s Tracing Center, 90 percent of the firearms about which ATF receives information are traceable to the United States.
Do you get that? The ones submitted for tracing. That’s very different from the total number.
From a report a year-and-a-half before Fast and Furious “gunwalking” was exposed:
In all, the military has 305,424 confiscated weapons locked in vaults, just a fraction of those used by criminals in Mexico…
A fraction? You mean there are…millions?
The Mexican government has handed over information to U.S. authorities to trace 12,073 weapons seized in 2008 crimes…
And from a 2011 Stratfor Global Intelligence report:
This means that the 87 percent figure relates to the number of weapons submitted by the Mexican government to the ATF that could be successfully traced and not from the total number of weapons seized by Mexican authorities or even from the total number of weapons submitted to the ATF for tracing. In fact, the 3,480 guns positively traced to the United States equals less than 12 percent of the total arms seized in Mexico in 2008 and less than 48 percent of all those submitted by the Mexican government to the ATF for tracing. This means that almost 90 percent of the guns seized in Mexico in 2008 were not traced back to the United States.
What we’re seeing is a practical repeat of what the anti-gunners and their media amplifiers were telling the American public prior to “Gunwalker” in an attempt to swindle them out of their rights, one only (temporarily) halted when the murderous criminal scheme was exposed.
It’s incumbent on Second Amendment advocates to be aware of what the arms prohibitionists and what the DSM (Duranty Streicher Media), of which The Times is a “leader,” did then so they can defend against and refute what they’re doing now. Understand that .50 caliber hysteria is a ploy—the same bad actors don’t want you to have .223 or 5.56, or 7.62×39, either, as the goal—revealed through their own past words and actions, is a monopoly of violence everywhere in Everytown.
It also opens the door to another question. Since it’s documented that .50 BMG rifles “represent an extremely small fraction of total firearm homicides” in this country where they can be legally owned, what are the prohibitionists telling us they think about Mexican nationals, and why is it that Democrats clamoring for gun bans are also so violently against deporting illegal aliens?
ATF’s Hidden Gun Registry: How a ‘Tracing System’ Became a Billion-Record Database
About David Codrea:
David Codrea is the winner of multiple journalist awards for investigating/defending the RKBA and a long-time gun owner rights advocate who defiantly challenges the folly of citizen disarmament. He blogs at “The War on Guns: Notes from the Resistance,” is a regularly featured contributor to Firearms News, and posts on Twitter: @dcodrea and Facebook.
The following is from a BATFE Press Release; Mexico Crime Guns Traced 2011-2023 to U.S.A. Top 5 Sources Dirrecion Gen De Industria Militar 4,064 Lone Wolf Glendale, AZ. 785 USA Military Surplus 640 Danny’s Pawn McAllen, TX. 429 Sprague’s Sports Yuma, AZ. 328 I Have sold products to #5 on this list for 20 years (known them for over 35). They dispute the 328 number, and believe it to be vastly inflated. BTAFE has refused to identify even one of these “328” To them, so they can check their records to detemine who purchased what and when. Why does BATFE… Read more »
I don’t think I’ve ever seen a .50BMG case that didn’t say ‘LC’ on it. So I wouldn’t be a bit shocked to find them in Mexico.
Now tell us what percentage of American-made guns and ammo that are lawfully sold to the Mexican Government/military later end up in cartel hands?
So much for the “American Free Press” tradition of being the guardian of the Rights of the people. Ideology and bias have caused “NEWS” organizations like the NYT to jump the fence, working against the interests of the American people and in league with the only side that can bring tyranny into our lives!
Many articles have said that the Mexico government and Mexico military purchase guns from the USA for their police and soldiers. Many Mexican city police use handguns made in the USA. The problem is when Mexican police and Mexican soldiers either give their guns or sell their guns to the cartels. The drug cartels have billions. They purchase chemicals to make illegal street drugs from China. North Korea. The cartels also purchase firearms from China, North Korea, Russia, Iran and Cuba. Money talks. The cartels buy full auto AK-47’s, RPG’s, hand grenades, land mines, rocket launchers, military drones ( which… Read more »
‘ including assertions that “American gun sellers supply the cartels with 95 to 100 percent of their guns, according to the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.” ‘
I would tend to believe ATF on this one. After all, one of those “gun sellers” was ATF. They actually sent agents into gun stores who coordinated with Washington D.C. higher-ups to bypass mandatory background checks, bought firearms, including Barrett .50BMG rifles with TARP stimulus money, then turned said rifles over to cartel folks and watched as they were “walked” across the border.
David, if you are not already familiar with it, take a look at “GAO Firearms Trafficking Report d09709”. If you dig (and I mean dig) through the data you come up with about 11% of cartel guns come from the U.S.. It’s also where Obama came up with his eighty-some percent numbers he used in his anti-gun speeches. Reviews of the report by other parts of the government (appended) were kind to call it “misleading.” If author Ford is still employed by the GAO, he should be fired forthwith. Nice photo at the top. For those who are not up… Read more »
Informed Americans know that all the machine guns and AP ammo in the hands of the cartels largely comes from the Mexican military. The Mexican government is so corrupt, one could consider it a failed state. We all know the real government of Mexico is the drug cartels!
We all know the anti-gunners twist, turn and contort information to lend a thin veil of credibility to their invalid, patently false claims. We all also know the pro-gun sites will untwist those claims, albeit to a smaller, niche audience. While the WAPO is struggling so badly these days to stop the hemorrhaging of its subscriber base, and while it has laid off so many of its staff, perhaps this is the optimal time to submit this article to them and lots of others too. That esteemed publication may discover the potential to win back a healthy portion of their… Read more »