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Such a rush to dhimmitude in Europe! Astonishing. From AP, with thanks to Jeffrey Imm:
VIENNA, Austria -- Iran has contracted to buy hundreds of high-powered rifles from an Austrian firm, the company's owner said Wednesday. The sale drew an indirect rebuke from the United States, but Austrian government ministries said no laws were broken.Wolfgang Fuerlinger, head of Steyr Mannlicher GmbH, confirmed the deal between his company and Iranian authorities and said U.S. Embassy officials had expressed concerns the arms could make their way to Iraq for use against American troops.
He said he could not confirm Austrian media reports that part of the order -- 800 long-range semiautomatic rifles that can penetrate thick metal, along with high-tech snipers' scopes -- was flown to Iran last month.The United States has strict embargoes in place against Iran on sales of weapons or technology or materials that could be used to make weapons.
Posted by Robert at February 10, 2005 11:05 AM
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This is a scary story. The excerpt does not mention it, but in the full article the weapons are described as the Steyr .50 HS. This rifle fires the .50 Browning Machine Gun cartridge, the same bullet fired by the Barrett rifles used by the U.S. military. Here is an article about the Steyr rifle:
http://world.guns.ru/sniper/sn64-e.htm
There was a recent "trash piece" on 60 Minutes in which Mike Wallace went after the Barrett company for selling the .50 rifles to civilians in the USA. Wallace's main point was that the rifles could end up in the hands of terrorists. Will Mike now discuss this piece of news?
Incidentally, a former Marine trained to use the Barrett .50 told me that they are very difficult to shoot accurately and a lot of training is required to properly use one.
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at February 10, 2005 12:05 PM
I remember reading a while ago (Bernard Lewis) that Europe has a long history of selling weapons to Muslim countries (mainly the Turks at that time). The fact that many of the weapons sold were turned against them didn't seem to matter. I suppose if the French or other European entity sold weapons it didn't concern them if they were used against a rival but eventually it comes home.
Posted by: johnb at February 10, 2005 2:06 PM
Austria? Would this be the same Austria most of whose citizens deliriously celebrated Anschluss, and which provided a higher percentage of death-camp personnel than Germany itself, but after the war's end painted itself as a victim, and not a willing collaborator, of the Nazis? Would this be the Austria that Karl Kraus so unforgettably limned in the ever-bright pages of Die Fackel, that one-man production in which he smote the misusers of German hip and thigh? The Austria, that caused Kraus to write "Truths and One-and-a-Half Truths," and "The Last Days of Mankind"? The Austria that Thomas Bernhard so acidulously etched? The Austria of Kurt Waldheim, who distinguished himself so at Operation Kozara and was present in Salonika during the famous Aktion (and not, as he would later claim, on leave in Vienna), and then later as an Intelligence Officer responsible for still other war crimes? Or of Jorg Haider, enjoying that fabulous castle in Carinthia that he inherited from his uncle who, in turn, had bought it for a song in 1938 from someone who was rather desperate to sell it for practically nothing because he needed to get out of Austria quite quickly (can anyone remember why?). Is this the Austria that the Americans, had protected from the Red Army, allowing it to be subject instead to a benign Four-Power Occupation which constrained that army?
Fortunately, those guns sold to Khomeini's epigones will not be much use against the kind of weapons that will be used to foil, one hopes, Iranian schemes and dreams. Those weapons will not be stopped by rifles. Weaponry of a quite different time will have to be employed in order to deal with Iranian schemes and sinister dreams.
But the American government should do what it can to remind Austrian companies, and the Austrian government, of the place of Austria in our now-unwinnable hearts and minds, into which a chill wind ex austriaco has blown.
Posted by: Hugh at February 10, 2005 2:41 PM
Hugh:
The best comment about Austria I have seen (I wish I had coined it) was: "The Austrians always try to convince the world that Beethoven was Austrian and Hitler German".
That kind of neatly sums it up.
Posted by: johnb at February 10, 2005 3:26 PM
After the war Austria demanded reparations from the Germans.
The then German chancellor Adenauer (who was not in any way tainted by the Nazis) rightly spoke: "Denen schicken wir die Jebeine Adolph Hitlers" (We shall sent them the remains of Adolph)
In spite of that, they still managed to get some 120 million out of the Germans. Wonder if the Germans ever claimed damages caused by this most famous son of Braunau, Austria...?
Posted by: Terminator at February 10, 2005 5:25 PM
Ha ha ha thats a good one alright, youse guys are funny; those guns dont work so swell in the sand either as they will jamb,go ahead make my day...click....oh shiite....blam...made in America.
they are not smart enough to operate these either because they are ignorant people,well i hope their ready for paradise and 72 virgins.
at February 10, 2005 7:49 PM
Certainly some of those rifles will end up across the border in Iraq in the hands of terrorist fighting American troops.
Posted by: RED at February 10, 2005 9:11 PM
"U.S. protests" -- Hmmm, I confess I feel like giving a serious beating to whoever, within the Austrian company, was responsible for the deal. Or better, I'd like to bankrupt him. Or best, both. Unless he really was too stupid to realize his high tech sniper rifles could easily end up in Iraq killing U.S. soldiers. And I don't even have any relatives stationed over in Iraq. Imagine if your son were over there. Wouldn't you really want to throttle the guy who sold those rifles, if he did it knowing the possible results, and either did not give a damn, or even hoped for a U.S. casualty? ...OK, I guess I wouldn't actually want to throttle him, but I'd like to see him zapped with a very stinging fine.
Posted by: ed at February 11, 2005 3:15 AM
"U.S. protests" -- Hmmm, I confess I feel like giving a serious beating to whoever, within the Austrian company, was responsible for the deal. Or better, I'd like to bankrupt him. Or best, both. Unless he really was too stupid to realize his high tech sniper rifles could easily end up in Iraq killing U.S. soldiers. And I don't even have any relatives stationed over in Iraq. Imagine if your son were over there. Wouldn't you really want to throttle the guy who sold those rifles, if he did it knowing the possible results, and either did not give a damn, or even hoped for a U.S. casualty? ...OK, I guess I wouldn't actually want to throttle him, but I'd like to see him zapped with a very stinging fine.
Posted by: ed at February 11, 2005 3:15 AM
"U.S. protests" -- Hmmm, I confess I feel like giving a serious beating to whoever, within the Austrian company, was responsible for the deal. Or better, I'd like to bankrupt him. Or best, both. Unless he really was too stupid to realize his high tech sniper rifles could easily end up in Iraq killing U.S. soldiers. And I don't even have any relatives stationed over in Iraq. Imagine if your son were over there. Wouldn't you really want to throttle the guy who sold those rifles, if he did it knowing the possible results, and either did not give a damn, or even hoped for a U.S. casualty? ...OK, I guess I wouldn't actually want to throttle him, but I'd like to see him zapped with a very stinging fine.
Posted by: ed at February 11, 2005 3:15 AM
Wow - what kind of bastard country would ever sell arms to the Iranians?
Yeah - only Nazi trash would do something that sucks that much.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran-Contra_Affair
Posted by: Timbo at February 12, 2005 3:37 AM
Thou art inexcusable, O man, whosoever thou art that judgest: for wherein thou judgest another, thou condemnest thyself; for thou that judgest doest the same things.
Romans 2:1
Posted by: Timbo at February 12, 2005 8:13 AM
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