Friday, March 28, 2008

Afghan Ammunition Fraud: AEY Inc. and 22-Year-Old Head Efraim E. Diveroli

The U.S. military has apparently been supplying its troops in Afghanistan with dud ammunition that's as much as 40 years old... and the company supplying the ammo, AEY Inc., is headed by a 22-year-old guy named Efraim E. Diveroli!

The good news is that the U.S. has suspended AEY Inc. as a supplier.

There are so many odd elements to this story I don't know where to begin. How does a guy so young become a major arms supplier, heading a company that provides the majority of the ammo U.S. troops are using in a significant war effort? You have to be 35 years old to be U.S. president, but apparently you can be barely drinking age to sell enough arms to overthrow a medium-size nation of global strategic importance.

AEY Inc. said it was selling the U.S. ammo made in Hungary, but in fact it was from China, and some of it was decades old. Some of it was shown to be improperly packaged and even corroding.

The father of Efraim E. Diveroli started AEY Inc., but it was originally a printing company. From printing to ammunition... not exactly a natural product transition, I would think.

The U.S. government is undertaking a criminal investigation of AEY Inc. to see if it knowingly misrepresented the products it would provide the Afghan security forces.

5 comments:

lymond said...

Whatever is uncovered in the investigation, this scandal makes it very clear the the Afghan war is an afterthought to this administration. By giving an important contract to a disreputable, cut-rate, untested arms provider, the Pentagon has demonstrated once again that Al Qaeda, Bin Laden, and the Taliban don't rate serious consideration. It has never been there priority to bring terrorists to justice. The war on terror remains an excuse for the neo-cons to pursue their American Millenium goals.

Dave B said...

I agree, Afghanistan has slipped back into chaos because it's had to take a back seat to Iraq. t's crazy that we could be supplying U.S. or Afghan troops with outdated munitions that could be duds or, even worse, a danger to the soldiers trying to use them.

Thanks for your comment.

Christopheclark said...

This link takes you to a company that delivered NOTHING,but still got paid.What has the US done since the article appeared?NOTHING

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2007/mar/20/iraq.uknews

Christopheclark said...

That's nothing.here's a link to a case,where the company delivered NOTHING,got paid by the US etc.What has happened to the people involved?NOTHING has happened,because the US does not want it to!!

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2007/mar/20/iraq.uknews

Dave B said...

christopheclark, thanks for the link. That's a pretty brazen scandal, and I hadn't heard of it at all.