Various conspiracy type sites such as Firebagger Waterbody have broke the "news" that the Department of Homeland Security is buying thousands of armored MRAP vehicles. At which point I say... "huh?!"
So I head over to the Navistar site referenced by the Firebaggers, where Navistar helpfully notes that an upgrade of the current MRAP chassis leaves them with 2,717 rolling chassis already paid for by the Federal government. And Navistar would love, love I say, to sell bodies to put on those things to do any number of things from dump trucks to armored SWAT team carriers.
Still, no Department of Homeland Security there. So next thing I do is head over to Federal Procurement Data System and download their data set for the Department of Homeland Security. The latest data as of April 3 is available (they release data quarterly), and given how Federal procurement works, DHS certainly would not be getting anything with less than three months notice, so ... 425 megabytes of XML later, I have a database with contracts indexed by DUNS number. So I grab every Navistar DUNS number and search the database for *any* occurrence of *ANY* Navistar DUNS number in Department of Homeland Security contracts issued for the first quarter of 2012 and... nada.
Now, granted, a contract might have been issued since April 4. But you certainly wouldn't see vehicles rolling off the line with DHS markings on them yet, because these were rolling chassis -- i.e., nothing but a frame and drivetrain -- and it would take Navistar *time* to build bodies to put on them and put markings on those bodies. If a contract was issued on April 5, just how likely do you think it'd be that Navistar managed to work with *their* subcontractors to get everything needed to assemble bodies for these frames and managed to assemble even a *single* body for *one* of these frames in *SIX WORKING DAYS* since the contract was let? Yet the conspiracy sites have a PHOTO of one of these supposed DHS MRAP vehicles! Or, should I say, a PHOTOSHOP?
So anyhow: On a scale of zero to 100, I put the likelihood of DHS buying thousands of MRAP's at somewhere between zero to 1. The reason why I rate it above zero is that things on the Mexican border are not looking good right now -- and in case you didn't know, the Border Patrol *is* under the Department of Homeland Security now, and has been under fire multiple times from the Mexican drug gangs. It may be that the DHS has decided that armored trucks are necessary for the safety of Border Patrol patrols along the Mexican border and is procuring some. But if so, there has been no contract let yet, unless that happened in the past week -- and certainly no vehicles have rolled off the lines yet, despite any photoshops supposedly proving otherwise.
-- Badtux the Un-paranoid Penguin
If people really want a conspiracy that will cause them to go into contortions, how about the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA) that will be voted on by the House on the 23rd? It is everything that SOPA was and more.
ReplyDeleteMaybe some Iraq surplus vehicles are being transferred from DOD to DHS property accounts? In principle, transferring Federal equipment from one property account to another is no big deal. In practice, it's rare that people who need something know people who have it and don't want it. But after a war ends, it can happen.
ReplyDeleteThe "surplus" Iraq vehicles are sitting in depots in Kuwait -- the US has not brought them back to American shores and never will, the demands of Empire dictate that they will be used again. It's sort of like the surplus M1A1 tanks that were left in Kuwait after Desert Storm in 1991, when President George H.W. Bush decommissioned two entire armored divisions at the termination of that little exercise in slaughter and flew their crews home on air transports to be returned to civilian life. Those tanks were used to re-invade Iraq twelve years later. Until the oil runs out, the Empire needs military vehicles in theatre to protect its oil. My guess is that not a single piece of military equipment currently deployed there will ever make it back to the US except as spare parts, like these Navistar rolling chassis that are the result of an "upgrade". (That's actually a *downgrade* in offroad capability, but I'll discuss that later).
ReplyDelete- Badtux the War Penguin
THIS IS PRETTY DAMN INTERESTING.
ReplyDeleteThe conspiracy handbook specifically states in Article I, Section A, that in order to be considered a conspiracy, it must contain at least one reference to an arcanely obscure factoid which the average joe has neither the means nor the will to check out for himself.
ReplyDeleteSection B of the same Article states that this factoid must contain scary words and/or pictures that will frighten the average joe's grandmother.
Totally off-topic, but I think you'll love it, and feel a bit of species pride, at no extra charge.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.bestweekever.tv/2012-04-17/newt-gingrich-penguin-bite-photo/
Cheers!
JzB
I know where I *wish* that penguin bit him. And it ain't on the finger. Unless you're talking about the 11th finger. The little finger, on Newtie.
ReplyDelete- Badtux the Vicious Penguin
You put more thought and effort into this than it deserved. I guess you occasionally feel the need to dig hard for some obscure left-wing stupidity to provide a slight counter-balance to the rampant overt reivh-wing stupidity that drops everywhere like elephant turds on Main Street after the circus parade has passed by.
ReplyDeleteYou know what seems significant to me about this? Not the specific details of the maybe-false, maybe-true domestic truck-tank. No, what's significant is that the leftier left-wingers have the same level of paranoia under the Hopey Administration as they did under realPresident Cheney. Granted, people in the Firedog camp are no fans of President Zero (which is why I respect them) but the fact that they'd fear him as much as the previous band of fascists shows how deligitimzed the government has become. We R so fcked, definitely.
Tux -
ReplyDeleteCross-species homo-eroticism is for Santorum, not Gingrich.
Can't tell your right-wing nut cases without a program.
Cheers!
JzB