The empire tries its hand at military procurement

You can't make this stuff up.

A couple of days ago, when the U.S. military death toll in Iraq passed 4,000, the New York Times filled four full pages with photographs of each of the most recent 1,000 victims. It was an impressive, solemn tribute to the fallen.

Today, its cover story reported that the $300m worth of ammunition ordered by the US to supply the Afghan army is defective and mostly useless, manufactured over 40 years ago and covered with corrosion. The cartridges were supplied by AEY Inc., a ridiculously unqualified company run by a 22-year old with no background, no office, and only one employee. While he wasn't stalking or assaulting his ex-girlfriends, he bought the arms from the Albanian military through a network of shadowy middlemen. It seems the military has known about AEY's problems for some time but only suspended their contract two days ago when they learned the Times was about to publish the story.

"Put very simply, many of the people involved in smuggling arms to Africa are also exactly the same as those involved in Pentagon-supported deals, like AEY's shipments to Afghanistan and Iraq," said an arms trafficking researcher quoted in the Times article. "[A]n examination... suggests that Army contracting officials, under pressure to arm Afghan troops, allowed an immature company to enter the murky world of international arms dealing on the Pentagon's behalf -- and did so with minimal vetting and through a vaguely written contract with few restrictions," the Times authors carefully summarize.

Meanwhile, Dick Cheney and Condi Rice have been pounding the pavement in foreign capitals in the last few weeks, trying to drum up more countries to contribute troops to the "war against terror" in Afghanistan.

The Afghan soliders might wonder what message the U.S. is sending them by asking them to shoulder the fight against the Taliban with defective ammunition.

European countries such as Germany which are being entreated to join the war might wonder whether if they did, they would be joining a struggle led by a dysfunctional military.

And the families of the fallen U.S. soliders and U.S. taxpayers might wonder whether the struggle "against terror" for which they have sacrificed is instead really a cynical ploy to encourage the illicit international arms trade, corrupt regimes, destabilize nations, and ensure that only the U.S. has the military strength to provide "security".