The weapon was intended for insurgents, journalists assure.
The Pentagon bought Soviet-type weapons for Syrian rebels from Kazakhstan, Georgia and Ukraine. This was stated in the investigation of the Center for the Study of Corruption and Organized Crime (OCCRP) and the Balkan Association of Investigative Journalists (BIRN).
“The Pentagon hired an entire army of contractors and subcontractors, from rich military industrial corporations to firms with links to organized crime, which sent them to the Syrian rebels, who had long been at war with the Islamic State (IG), weapons and ammunition of the Soviet model for , reaching 2.2 billion dollars, “the investigation alleges.
Journalists claim that the Balkan and East European arms manufacturers, which are already working at full capacity to supply the Syrian war, are not able to meet this demand. Therefore, the US Department of Defense has turned to other suppliers from Kazakhstan, Georgia and Ukraine, while reducing the requirements for production standards.
The chain of arms supplies was realized separately from the already closed CIA program for arming insurgents fighting against Syrian President Bashar Assad.
According to the investigation, the Pentagon purchases weapons through two channels: through the Special Operations Command (SOCOM), which manages special operations in all types of US armed forces, and through Picatinny Arsenal, a military research and production organization in the state of New Jersey.
The weapons are transported from Europe to Turkey, Jordan and Kuwait both by sea and by air. Then, with the help of airplanes or trucks, it is distributed between US allies in the north and south of Syria.
According to the thousands of procurement documents analyzed by the journalists of BIRN and OCCRP, by May 2017 (for later periods there are no data), SOCOM acquired weapons from Afghanistan, Bulgaria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Czech Republic, Kazakhstan, Poland, Romania, Serbia and Ukraine ammunition for a total of $ 238.5 million.
In general, according to the estimates of researchers, the Pentagon intends to spend $ 2.2 billion on its Syrian allies.