I have a simple question:

[originalpckelly]

If Iran is supplying these RPGs and EFPs to Iraqis, and it is directed by the Iranian government, why are they including markings on the weapons which might be traced back to Iran?

That really doesn't seem to make any sense to me. If I were running a covert operation like that, and I was specifically manufacturing materials for the Iraqi insurgency, I wouldn't include those markings and I'd also try and make my weaponry look like it came from another country.

It would seem to me that these people are really stupid if they're doing that. How common is it to use the Latin alphabet on Iranian weapons?

http://www.usatoday.com/news/pdf/iran-in-iraq.pdf

I want to hear other countries analysis of this information before we listen to it. There are probably countries in Europe with the ability to look at weapons and determine their origins.

I wonder if these weapons are being supplied on the black market.

[joneschick]

1. ummm. der

image here of finger to nose. duh.

[originalpckelly]

3. ???

:shrug:

[joneschick]

6. kind of a "no shit sherlock" kind of moment.

sorry, I may be rum impaired. :hi:

[originalpckelly]

12. Oh, I get it...

[originalpckelly]

2. The RPG's in that PDF are for a Soviet System:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RPG-7

[originalpckelly]

4. The marking "AT" stands for Anti-Tank...

I'm going to look further to find out more.

[Jackpine Radical]

8. HE=High Explosive

LOT 3 = LOT 3

Wow. Farsi seems to be a lot like English. I knew they are both Indo-European languages, but I never dreamed they are that similar.

[originalpckelly]

10. I wonder why the markings are in English, is that standard practice?

[Jackpine Radical]

20. If it's any help, US mortars are 81mm.

And no, it's not standard AFAIK for the munitions of non-English-speaking nations to be marked in English.

[originalpckelly]

22. And Iran uses a different calendar...

I wonder, however, if they use the western system for their weapons.

In one of the picture comparisons, on page 11 of the PDF, it looks like the mortar casings have similar markings, but they are in different fonts, and one casing looks to have more info on it than the known Iranian one.

[magellan]

5. Ah ha! Remember that article from a couple of weeks ago

...in one of the British papers about the weapons being supplied to Iraq from Romania? I've just looked and can't find it, but will keep searching.

[originalpckelly]

11. Please, I'm looking this stuff up to check it out and see if I can't find these weapons markings...

that would be wonderful, and if they have pictures that would be even better!

[magellan]

16. No pictures as I recall

The other article that mentioned the black market Romanian weapons was one of those great British ones where the journalist actually spoke with insurgents. It was more recent than the USA Today one, which focused on the Saudi funding of weapons for Iraq Sunnis.

I'll keep looking for the British article and any photos I can find of these weapons.

[originalpckelly]

18. Thanks, maybe we can bat this down.

It looks like Iran has a different calendar.

[magellan]

14. Here's one article about Romanian weapons being smuggled into Iraq

...and who's financing it. Not the one I was thinking of, but it makes the point:

Saudis reportedly funding Iraqi Sunni insurgents - USATODAY.com
Updated 12/8/2006 7:29 AM ET

CAIRO (AP) — Private Saudi citizens are giving millions of dollars to Sunni insurgents in Iraq and much of the money is used to buy weapons, including shoulder fired anti-aircraft missiles, according to key Iraqi officials and others familiar with the flow of cash.

Saudi government officials deny that any money from their country is being sent to Iraqis fighting the government and the U.S.-led coalition.

But the U.S. Iraq Study Group report said Saudis are a source of funding for Sunni Arab insurgents. Several truck drivers interviewed by The Associated Press described carrying boxes of cash from Saudi Arabia into Iraq, money they said was headed for insurgents.

Two high-ranking Iraqi officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the issue's sensitivity, told the AP most of the Saudi money comes from private donations, called zaqat, collected for Islamic causes and charities.

Some Saudis appear to know the money is headed to Iraq's insurgents, but others merely give it to clerics who channel it to anti-coalition forces, the officials said.

In one recent case, an Iraqi official said $25 million in Saudi money went to a top Iraqi Sunni cleric and was used to buy weapons, including Strela, a Russian shoulder-fired anti-aircraft missile. The missiles were purchased from someone in Romania, apparently through the black market, he said.

snip...

http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/iraq/2006-12-08-saudis-sunnis_x.htm

[SpiralHawk]

7. "I did not have Black Ops with those RPGs." - Commander AWOL

"I have a perfectly good excuse (as uusal).
I was busy having Black Ops with Jeff Gannon.
That's my story, and I'm sticking to it."

- Commander AWOL

[originalpckelly]

9. The markings on the RPG 7 have the wrong date format if I am correct...

don't the Iranians put the day of the month before the month? In other words:

"5 (for June) 31 (31st day of June) in 2006" would be the American style of listing a date.

The Middle Eastern style is "31 (31st day of June) 5 (for June) in 2006".

Secondly the fonts on the rounds look like they're different.

[originalpckelly]

17. Wait a second, they use a different calendar:

The year 1995 is 1373 in their calendar.

http://www.iranembassy.hu/economic_cbr.html

That's a document from the Iranian embassy about a document and its dating.

[originalpckelly]

19. Here is a Wikipedia article about their calendar.

I wonder if they use a different system of calendar for their weapons?

[Capn Sunshine]

21. And "HECHO EN IRAN" is kind of suspicious....

:wtf:

Not buying it. sorry. wouldn't be prudent.

[file83]

13. The other possibility is that the Iranian government isn't running a covert operation.

Point is, so what if they are manufacturing weapons and that arms dealers are getting them to market (Iraq)?

Isn't that the entire point of the Military Industrial Complex?

Not much point in making weapons if you aren't allowed to sell them to war zones, is there?

The Iranian Government isn't doing anything except making weapons and selling them to dealers. The dealers decide who they will sell them too.

U.S. made weapons find their way to war zones and war lords all over this planet every day. Does that mean we need to hide the source of manufacturing on the product? Of course not.

Don't get me wrong - I think there is no lower form of business: weapons manufacturing.

But that doesn't mean I think any country that makes weapons should be a target for invasion. To do so would be to argue that the U.S. should be invaded by every nation on the planet.

[originalpckelly]

15. I agree, but what the US government seems to be implying is that this...

is a covert operation by the Iranian Qods Brigade.

[magellan]

23. Yes, that whole powerpoint presentation stinks to high heaven

Just a casual look around the internet for 81mm mortar rounds in Iraq shows that our forces have been finding them forever, usually associated with Sunni insurgents or 'al Qaeda in Iraq'. Now why would Iran, a Shia state, be supplying the Sunnis in Iraq with arms?

The dates on those weapons are telling too, as you discuss. Besides the fact they're in English, they're in the American date format. Perhaps Iran has a secret enclave of American weapons manufacturers? Actually, seeing as the RPG-7 has been around for donkey's years, and our government has been surreptitiously selling weapons to many of these countries for just as long, the rounds could have come from ANYWHERE.

Only one appears to have foreign writing on it -- but whether it's Farsi or Arabic is conveniently impossible to determine from the bad photo.

[originalpckelly]

26. I know this is all very suspicious...

because quite frankly, it's almost impossible for us to know. Only third party countries with good intelligence services would be able to find out.

[originalpckelly]

28. And I have another simple question: Why are some in Farsi and others in English?

:shrug:

That would seem to be inconsistent, you'd think that they'd have a consistent scheme for weapons identification, if they are going to do it.

[spanone]

24. I imagine there are weapons in there from everyone, we need to get the fuck out, now.

[frogcycle]

25. i sense a dan rather moment here!

way to go, originalpckelly

keep digging, folks, and lets feed info to Countdown...

[originalpckelly]

27. I think so, they put too much information out...

I might not be the one, because I quite frankly don't know anything about this, but someone who does will find out. I'm just asking simple and common sense questions, ones that need to be answered.

[originalpckelly]

29. I wonder who "Michael.Sennett" is...

it's in the properties of the file.

[magellan]

30. Even if these weapons ARE Iranian, remember the MEK

Remember the US has been doing business with the MEK -- an Iranian terrorist group which opposes the Iranian Islamic regime -- in Iraq since the invasion, sending them into Iran to plant bombs, destabilize the government, and bring back "intelligence" on Iran's alleged weapons program. It's perfectly plausible that the MEK are providing some of this weapons "evidence" to the US so BushCo can turn around and say they have proof of Iranian meddling in Iraq.

There's a lot of reasonable doubt here.