Security: In addition to stockpiling over a billion bullets
and thousands of semiautomatic weapons the feds would deny U.S.
citizens, the vehicle of choice for fighting the counterinsurgency war
in Iraq is appearing on U.S. streets.
The sequestration question du jour is why the Department of Homeland
Security, busy releasing hundreds, if not thousands, of deportable and
detained illegal aliens due to budget constraints, is buying several
thousand Mine Resistant Armored Protection (MRAP) vehicles?
And just who are they intended to be used against?
This acquisition comes on top of the recent news of the stockpiling
by DHS of more than 1.6 billion (with a 'b') bullets of various
calibers, enough by one calculation to fight the equivalent of a 24-year
Iraq War, and the ordering of some 7,000 5.56x45mm NATO "personal
defense weapons" (PDW) — also known as "assault weapons" when owned by
civilians.
Additionally, DHS is asking for 30 round magazines that "have a capacity to hold thirty (30) 5.56x45mm NATO rounds."
The Department of Homeland Security (through the U.S. Army Forces
Command) recently retrofitted 2,717 of these MRAP vehicles for service
on the streets of the U.S. They were formerly used for counterinsurgency
in Iraq.
These vehicles are specifically designed to resist mines and ambush
attacks. They use bulletproof windows and are designed to withstand
small-arms fire, including smaller-caliber rifles such as a .223
Remington. Does DHS expect a counterinsurgency here?
After IEDs began to take a toll on U.S. military forces in Iraq, the Pentagon ordered a large supply of MRAPs.
"They've taken hits, many, many hits that would have killed soldiers
and marines in uparmored Humvees," Adm. Michael Mullen, chairman of the
Joint Chiefs of Staff, said in a recent interview.
A DHS officer, Robert Whitaker, stationed in El Paso, Texas, recently
proudly described the agency's new armored toy as "Mine-resistant ...
we use to deliver our team to high-risk warrant services ... (with) gun
ports so we can actually shoot from within the vehicle; you may think
it's pretty loud but actually it's not too bad ... we have gun ports
there in the back and two on the sides as well. They are designed for
.50-caliber weapons."
This is needed to serve warrants? Perhaps it might have been useful at Waco.
So the question is what does DHS need 1.6 billion bullets, 7,000 Ar-15s and 2,700 armored vehicles for?
What are they anticipating or planning for, and why are few in the
media and Congress asking about it, particularly in the light of daily
apocalyptic bleats from the administration about sequestration cuts?
We have asked if this has anything to do with then-candidate Obama's
proposal for a national security force as powerful as the U.S. Army.
In a July 2, 2008, speech in Colorado Springs, Colo., candidate Obama
said: "We cannot continue to rely on our military in order to achieve
the national security objectives that we've set. We've got to have a
civilian national security force that's just as powerful, just as
strong, just as well-funded."
As Judge Andrew Napolitano, a Fox News contributor, recently opined
in the Washington Times, "The historical reality of the Second
Amendment's protection of the right to keep and bear arms is not that it
protects the right to shoot deer. It protects the right to shoot
tyrants, and it protects the right to shoot at them effectively, with
the same instruments they would use upon us."
No, we are not scanning the sky for black helicopters.
But we are concerned about an administration pushing for ever
stricter gun control and de facto gun registration in the form of
allegedly universal background checks to which criminals and gangbangers
won't comply is arming itself to the teeth.
If weapons of war don't belong on the street, Mr. President, explain these purchases.
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