Gunwalker: Gunning Down the ‘Bush Did It, Too’ Lie
When Associated Press reporter Pete Yost uncritically repeated claims by anonymous Department of Justice officials that the Bush-era Operation Wide Receiver was “the same tactic” used by the Obama Justice Department in Operation Fast and Furious and other operations, I called him out, knowing the claim was incorrect.
A later article by Sharyl Attkisson of CBSNews found a dealer who participated in Wide Receiver, and acting ATF Director B. Todd Jones (himself possibly implicated in Gunwalker) agreed that gun-walking had occurred while President Bush was in office. Yet something felt wrong, but I couldn’t recall the information I had previously heard to rebut the claim.
Luckily a reader had a better memory than I, and led me to the June 15 article by Jim Shepherd in The Outdoor Wire. Shepherd’s piece reveals just how different the botched sting of Wide Receiver was from the intentionally criminal Fast and Furious:
In Operation Wide Receiver, Tucson agents allowed the sales of more than 500 firearms to known straw purchasers. Like Gunrunner/Fast and Furious, the operation apparently backfired.
Some firearms in Wide Receiver were equipped with RFID tracking devices. In Wide Receiver, it seems the illegal purchasers seemed more than slightly knowledgeable of the ATF and how to take their aerial and electronic tracking procedures down.
Knowing the time aloft numbers for virtually all planes used in government surveillance, the buyers had a simple method of getting their purchases across the border undetected. They simply drove four-hour loops around the area.
As surveillance planes were forced to return to base for refueling, the smugglers simply turned and sprinted their cargo across the border.
The RFID tags also turned out to be problematic.
Rather than making large enough holes for the tags to be laid out inside weapons, agents force-fit them into the rifles.
That cramming caused the antennae to be folded, reducing the effective range of the tags. And an already short battery life (36-48 hours maximum) meant that should purchasers allow the firearms to sit, the tracking devices eliminated themselves.
Thar’s quite a bit of difference between the two operations.
Wide Receiver sought to track and interdict guns being smuggled south using a combination of RFID-tracking devices embedded in the shipments and overheard surveillance aircraft. Wide Receiver failed because of the limitations of the technology used, compounded by the ineptness of its installation and the unexpected resourcefulness of the cartel’s gun smugglers.
As a result of the mistakes made in Wide Receiver, guns were lost: approximately 450 made it into Mexico. As a result, the botched operation launched in 2006 — and in this instance, actually botched — was shut down in 2007.
Compare the mistakes of Wide Receiver to the operations launched under Eric Holder’s Department of Justice, which had the advantages of learning from the postmortem failures of Wide Receiver two years before.
Fast and Furious used neither tracking devices nor aircraft, ran interference for smugglers with local law enforcement on multiple occasions, and federal agents were not allowed to interdict weapons.
Wide Receiver shut down within a year after 450 weapons went missing in a botched law enforcement operation. Fast and Furious purposefully ran at least 2,020 weapons to the Sinaloa cartel without any intention of arresting the straw purchasers and smugglers. Other operations in other states — CBS News’ Attkisson cites allegations of “at least 10 cities in five states” — allow the possibility that (if the other operations were as prolific as Fast and Furious) Holder’s Department of Justice may have intentionally sent more than 12,000 guns into criminal hands in the U.S and Mexico, enough to arm three U.S. Army brigades.
Law enforcement operations sometimes go horribly wrong, and every indication is that Operation Wide Receiver executed by the ATF during the Bush administration while Alberto Gonzales was the attorney general was a “keystone cops” operation of the first magnitude. It was a horrible failure.
But Fast and Furious was no accident.
Nor was it within spitting distance of being a law enforcement operation. Fast and Furious and the alleged gunwalking operations based in Houston, Dallas, Charlotte, Indiana, Tampa, and elsewhere were specifically designed to assure that straw purchasers and cartel weapons smugglers would be under the de facto protection of the Obama adminstration, with no attempts at interdiction and with interference on behalf of the criminals being traced to the ATF, FBI, and DOJ.
Let us hear no more false comparisons: Wide Receiver was botched law enforcement, while the gun-walking programs of the Obama administration were intentionally criminal — and arguably terrorist — acts, arming violent narco-terrorists waging war on a U.S. ally.
Thank you for the great article! I have been hearing that “it started under Bush”. Now I can intelligently reply about what happened.
I really hope that Issa is able to get those responsible, the families of the victims need to have someone held accountable.
I think your last two paragraphs sum things up very nicely Mr. Owens.
The whole cover-up for F&F and sister operations is descending into absurdity. When Obama began appointing his czars and forming his administration I was horrified and described it as a ‘freak show’. (No offense intended to circus workers)
Their performance is on par with that description. They are imploding. Very soon, knowing the jig is up and that prosecutions are inevitable, someone will come forward and spill all of the beans in return for immunity.
Given the recent introduction of a bill in the house to seal presidential records, I am betting that somewhere is proof-positive that Obama was instrumental in this whole affair. Will we ever know the full extent and true motives behind the gunwalking?
One big quibble about the last two paragraphs: Mexico is by no means a U.S. ally. The damage that country does to us on a yearly basis with regard to immigration alone could far more accurately depict them as an enemy state. Let’s not kid ourselves here.
They are still our neighbor, and by no means do we have a hostile relationship. It would be nice to keep it that way.
There are strong indications that Mexican Pres., Calderon, is complicit in this lethal mess. More than one observer thinks that he and zer0 agreed to F&F in private WH meetings.
Who introduced the house bill and when? Do you have its number or some way I can track it?
Thanks
http://pajamasmedia.com/tatler/2011/10/05/democrats-introduce-bill-to-seal-up-obamas-presidential-records/
Thank you!
Great pains and monies have been taken and spent to seal the truth of Obumbo’s past. Now the Marxists controlling the American Government via the Democrat Party will do everything they can to seal the truth of Obumbo’s presidency. Evil knows or has no end!
Government officials and employees have nothing to fear for their contempt of the law. We make special prisons for them that closely resemble a country club.
And here you’ll find the full text of the bil:
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c112:H.R.3071:#
…someone will come forward and spill all of the beans in return for immunity
This offer works amazingly well, when it’s immunity from being hanged.
Given the recent introduction of a bill in the house to seal presidential records…
And this could pass how? And those who intro’d the bill should be re-elected instead of prosecuted why?
When, oh when, will any organization, “activist”, politician, blogger, WHOMEVER!
— get the families of the murdered border agents involved?
Don’t you know if it was under the candy-ass Republican regimes these families would be front and center on Oprah, Dr. Phil, in the House gallery in the State of the Union speech, in the NYT Magazine, Time, Newsweek, etc.
It works, Idiots! Stop mumbling and do what the Bolsheviks do. It works!
I agree.
It worked for the two border guards (sorry, I forgot their names)sent to prison for doing their jobs…their families were front and center, and now they are out.
Ramos and Compean(sp)
Brian A. Terry was a BP Agent and Jaime Zapata was an ICE agent. David Codrea and other Gun Rights Examiners have been reporting on the denial of Terry’s parents being given Victim Status.
http://www.examiner.com/search/google?query=David+Codrea%2C+victim+status&cx=partner-pub-7479725245717969%3A9ze01gmnpyp&cof=FORID%3A9&ie=ISO-8859-1&sa=Search
And there you have the truth of LSM bias against truth and the American way (at least the former American way). The media is hard at work hiding these stories from the public and no self denying LSM Marxist pretending to be a journalist working in the Media will or ever would allow the victims of the Democrat policies to be allowed on their propaganda spewing Networks.
Bob Owens on this story is like having a barking terrior on your pants leg who won’t let go! Keep it up! Calling out the MSM on their own duplicity takes a lot of balls.
Thank you for giving us the ability to refute the “Bush did it, too!” meme.
Bush’s “Wide Receiver” was a sting that was outsmarted by the gunrunners, so it failed, but “Project Gunwalker” was a criminal conspiracy from the git-go. It never was intended to interdict guns and get the cartels. Remember Obo’s “under the radar” promise to the Bradys? This is it: the deliberate entrapping and smearing of dealers on this side of the border, and padding the numbers of U.S. guns in the hands of the drug cartels, all for the purpose of justifying more gun control. I guess they didn’t like it when we pointed out that the guns traced to the U.S. counted for only 17% of the total guns confiscated.
Fortunately, it wasn’t able to stay under the radar.
And it’s a safe bet that Obo’s in it up to his eyeballs.
Now we can say, “Obama lied, people died”. And in his case, it wasn’t even in war.
ATF announces shuffling of top staff:
http://www.govexec.com/story_page.cfm?articleid=49002&oref=todaysnews
As the rats start rearranging the deck chairs, to mix metaphors.
THE BUCK STOPS HERE.
Any way you cut this, it’s bad.
Putting guns in the hands of the bad guys is always an idiotic idea. If the concept started under Bush in any, it was wrong. If it was resurrected and expanded under Obama’s administration, it is still/even more wrong.
If Holder knew, he is liable. Legal consequences need to follow.
If he didn’t, he has no control over his office, is incompetent and needs to resign. Legal consequences, if any, need to follow.
We are a nation held together by the rule of law, and equality and justice for all under the law. If the AG of the US breaks the law, s/he must face that law. Publically, openly, and fairly. That is the American way.
“We are a nation held together by the rule of law, and equality and justice for all under the law. If the AG of the US breaks the law, s/he must face that law. Publically, openly, and fairly. That is the American way.”
As great as those principles are, Holder doesn’t seem to embrace them himself. We saw that with his decision on the New Black Panther Party.
I am listening to Obama’s press conference. Is this guy for real? He is lying through his teeth and everyone in the press knows it. Everyone watching knows it.
Solyndra started under Bush. ( And was rejected under Bush )
He has confidence in Holder to get to the bottom of the F&F operation. Holder has been aggressive in going after gunrunning. ( As a participant )
Wall street engaged in bad practices that were not illegal but should not have been allowed. (Democrats passed laws allowing them )
He even repeated the bridge is falling down crap. ( completely untrue )
I cant watch anymore. I am going back to my forster.
The dates are important. In 2006, RFID technology was coming out of the labs, and reinventing inventory control, a State of the Art killer app. The community of experts was small, but growing, the typical needs and means interfaces seen in developing any new technology. Technical issues such as needed transmission range, battery size and life, frequency, location in product and inventory information are vital.
To implement this new equipment in a life threatening enterprise should have demanded access to the best experts to install it in weapons. If dummies shoved the device in, thus destroying its transmission range, it indicates too much muscle and not enough brains in the organization.
But not criminal intent.
Op Wide Receiver served as a proof-of-concept that showed the operation should be stopped until some major problems were addressed, if not killed altogether because the problems were insurmountable without disproportionately huge commitments of manpower and money.
So, what did the ATF under Holder/Obama do? Why, resurrect the whole thing, subtracting the pitiful safeguards that existed and multiplying the rest by five.
Operation Wide Receiver is just a diversion. Bob Owens has done a good job refuting it. However, Left/Libs are not going to listen, they’ll just repeat the “Bush did it” mantra. The point is; how did the DOJ/BATF expect to track the F&F firearms without tracking devices? ‘splain please.
Most politicians, being cautious, do not want to accuse Holder of lying under oath. But, using the “reasonable person” standard, who can say that Holder did not lie under oath?
The # 1 question: What was the purpose of F&F? The cynic in me says to get a bunch of “wetbacks” killed, blame it on US gun laws and confiscate guns? If I were Mexican or of Latin descent I would be extremely pissed off that these Mo-Rons in DOJ thought that lives were expendable to achieve their goal(s).
Lives are always expendable to Marxists/totalitarians to achieve their goals. How many millions did Stalin and Mao kill?
The ends justifies the means in their mindset.
Bob Owens – You deserve a Pulitzer for all your reporting on this!!
“… Wide Receiver was botched law enforcement, while the gun-walking programs of the Obama administration were intentionally criminal — and arguably terrorist — acts, arming violent narco-terrorists waging war on a U.S. ally.”
Not just criminal and terrorist, but – given that their purpose was the infringement of rights our Constitution says “…SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED(PERIOD!) – TREASONOUS AS WELL!
Treasonous is the correct word.
Are there any grownups left in government?
It sure sounds like guns were allowed to walk under the Bush Justice Dept. to me.
Wayne, short answer, the cover up is worse than the crime, famous words used against Republicans only.
johnt…..good point. I suspect it’s true that “Fast and Furious” was motivated by the O’Bama administrations desire to embarrass gun rights advocates. Until it blew up in their faces, they were licking their chops over using it, somehow, to revoke the 2nd amendment. However, I don’t see that that case has been made yet. Until Issa, Grassley and the boys can make that case, “Furious” and “Receiver” remain two botched (and incredibly stupid) ATF operations…. one under O’Bama and one under Bush.
Wayne – try the eyes first – normally they open a pathway to the brain that allows you to absorb what is printed – sure the ears do a similar task but you do have to really listen!
In your case it might just be a lot easier to go to Wall Street – put on your UAW cap – and shout “Bush did it first !”
Do be careful – things could turn mean!
What a very snide comment Rhodesway. Try engaging in intelligent discussion for a change why don’t you? I favor right to work legislation (anti-union) and voted for Bush both times… and am proud of it. The contention that Guns didn’t actually walk under the Bush administration ….the one Mr. Owens would have us believe… doesn’t hold up. Are you so much of a sycophant you can’t see it?
Intent doesn’t matter to you? Under Bush the intent was to trace. Under Obama, the intent clearly was NOT to trace, because they didn’t even try.
Also, as to motive — there’s a PJmedia story from a few days ago detailing the types of weapons that Obama’s administration forced into the cartel market. They’re NOT the guns the cartels necessarily want, but ARE the guns the gun-banners think would be easiest to ban. PLUS, it appears the straw-buyers were being told BY THE US GOVERNMENT to buy those weapons in particular. Add that together and it comes up to a scheme to target particular weapons by pumping up their numbers in Mexican crime scenes.
if only it were the one gun running operation, but it is not:
Operation Gunrunner–in which the government authorized the sale of weapons with the intent of letting these weapons fall into the hands of Mexican drug cartels, which were used to Kill an American border agent.
Operation Castaway–in which the government authorized the sale of weapons knowing they would fall into the hands of Honduran gangs, such as MS13 and the Mara Salvatrucha and the rival Mara 18, An estimated 20,590 people died violently here in the last five years, according to the Madrid-based nonprofit Observers of Violence in massive shoot outs to control the drug industry.
Project Gangwalker the ATF and the DOF allowed the straw purchases of weapons which eventually ended up in the hands of United States gang members in Indiana” Operation Community Shield,” individuals are from El Salvador, three are from Mexico, one is from Honduras and one is from Haiti. ICE said the individuals are members or associates of the following street gangs: MS-13, Sur-13, and Zoe Pound. Charged in connection with the shooting of an Indianapolis police officer last week are gang members, the Marion County Prosecutor’s Office Gonzalez-Ramirez is a member of the Puros Vatos Locos street gang, and Taboada-Perez is a member of the SCT-13 gang. Both have tattoos that express allegiance to those gangs, authorities said. and other weapons have been found at crime scenes in that state and surely have spread out from there to other gangs.
Now picture gang bangers in armed flash mobs, And just where did that army that Obama formed disappear to?
Add to that a state governor that thinks there should be no elections for two years until the congress can fix the problems they are facing. And Obama does not think that Americans understand democracy as well as he does.
It all leads to the UN small arms treaty that Hillary signed off on all to disarm the American populace.
And all these are now excesses to suspend the second amendment rights of the citizens.
It all sounds treasonous to me
Fast and Furious was literally an act of war by the United States government on the Republic of Mexico.
It is truly amazing isn’t it. That one bloated Gov’t bureaucracy could launch an operation that would result in the violent deaths of possibly tens of thousands of another countries citizens. Makes a good argument for reducing the size of Gov’t.
Muffingate and Cupcakes
Bureaucrats at the Department of Justice deny hosting conferences featuring cupcakes for which the department paid $16. apiece–not to mention $10. for cookies, coffee at a buck an ounce and snacks at $32. a head–even after its own Inspector General rebuked them for excessive spending and the DoJ agreed to monitor such expenditures more closely.
As per Obamian protocol, the DoJ recovered its fumble, then punted–to the previous administration contending most of the conferences in question took place under George W. Bush’s watch. In effect, Attorney General Eric Holder’s department said, We didn’t do it, Bush did it, but we won’t do it again.
With all the charges of racism, gun running, and lying that have been lodged against Holder, $16. muffins and $10. cookies, etc. are the least of his, and our, problems but, still, it must be confer an extraordinary sense of entitlement to be able to waste precious tax monies when the nation is gasping.
Closely related to what CBS dubbed “Muffingate” is the allegedly-racist Berkeley cupcakes scandal; both muffins and cupcakes are baked goods.
NPR, which technically stands for National Public Radio but could more accurately be described as Nationally-susidized Public Radicals, took great umbrage at last month’s demonstration of racism in action at the extreme University of California at Berkeley. NPR’s Michel Martin felt the campus Republicans were unoriginal, intellectually dishonest, willfully ignorant of what minorities have endured in the past, and should “man up.”
What Martin didn’t say was that this was Obamatime, payback time, so suck it up, honkies!
The Berkeley College Republicans–yes, there are a few sane kids out on the Left Coast–had hosted a “diversity bake sale,” which seems innocuous enough. However, it was the dastardly right wing pricing structure for the cupcakes that got NPR’s collective shorts in a wad.
The goodies were offered for sale to white students at $2. each, to Asian-Americans at $1.50, to hispanics for $1.00, to women for $1.25, to African-Americans for seventy five cents, and to Native Americans for a quarter, quite the bargain for the ladies, Latinos, blacks, and Indians, not so much for Asians and Caucasians.
Staged as a protest against legislation to establish race as a factor in admissions by the University of California, to judge college applicants not on their qualifications–or character content–but by the color of their skin, . . .
(Read more at http://www.genelalor.com/blog1/?p=5682.)
Another big point was that the Bush program was shut down internally when they determined it was failing, while fast and furious might still be going on today if it hadn’t gone public with whistle blowers. Also the Bush programs whole goal was to arrest the dealers before they got the guns to Mexico, they just did it badly, while fast and furious didn’t even try to stop the guns from getting to Mexico, and in some cases actually helped them get there.
I wonder, is there any disaster that Obama has cused that he does not try to blame on Bush.