Western Arms Flooding Black Market
Read Time:3 Minute, 59 Second
US investigative journalist says in interview that Western arm shipments are being diverted to the black market and corporate media are government mouthpieces
Western-supplied arms are being sold by Ukrainian commanders to smugglers in Poland, Romania and other states, veteran American journalist Seymour Hersh has claimed.
The Pulitzer Prize winner, speaking to Afshin Rattansi on his program ‘Going Underground,’ said the West is aware of this black market trade, as some reports about missing arms shipments have even appeared in the US media.
Hersh claimed that, according to his data, almost immediately after the conflict broke out between Kiev and Moscow last February, “Poland, Romania, other countries on the border were being flooded with weapons we [the US and allies] were shipping for the war to Ukraine.”
A Ukrainian recruit holds a US-made Javelin anti-tank weapon during training. © AFP / Daniel Leal
“Often, it wasn’t generals, it was colonels and others, who were given shipments of some weapons, [who] would personally resell them… to the dark market,” he explained.
The journalist noted that there was concern in the West last year that some of the arms sent to Ukraine, such as Stinger shoulder-launched missiles, could be used to “shoot down an airplane at considerable height.”
As for Western-supplied weapons ending up on the black market, “CBS wrote a story about it that they were forced to retract,” Hersh said.
When asked about why the piece was retracted, the journalist said the media is supporting the stance of the US government that “we’re on the side of Ukraine. We all hate Russia.”
Hersh was likely referring to the documentary “Arming Ukraine,” which CBS aired last August. The promo for the film, which included a claim by the founder of pro-Ukraine NGO Blue-Yellow, Jonas Ohman, that only 30% of military aid actually reached the frontline, was removed, while the documentary itself and the story accompanying it were redacted.
Russian officials have on many occasions warned about Western-supplied arms being smuggled outside Ukraine, thus deteriorating the security situation elsewhere around the globe.
“NATO military supplies intended for the Kiev regime end up in the hands of terrorists, extremists and criminal groups in the Middle East, Central Africa, Southeast Asia,” Russia’s Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said in October. At the time, she estimated the black market turnover at $1billion per month.
Photo illustration shows the suspected leaker Jack Teixeira, reflected in an image of the Pentagon in Washington, DC. © AFP / Stefani Reynolds
Hersh also slammed the New York Times over its pro-government stance and treatment of sources, and the way it helped the FBI track down suspected Pentagon leaker Jack Teixeira.
Teixeira, who posted classified US intelligence data on the conflict in Ukraine and other issues in an online gaming forum, was apprehended by the FBI last week. The arrest took place after the NYT and the Washington Post – in cooperation with Western-funded “open source investigations” outfit Bellingcat – tracked down the source of the documents and publicly exposed his identity. The NYT also located Teixeira’s home in Massachusetts and spoke with his mother.
“Don’t get me going on the press; the press is a no-win situation for me,” Hersh said when asked about the issue during the program.
The veteran journalist mentioned that he worked at the NYT for many years and “won a lot of prizes,” at a time when the paper was much better at protecting its sources.
“One of the most important stories I wrote [in 1974] about the CIA spying on American citizens had nobody named in it,”he said.
The NYT has shown itself to be completely “pro-Biden” as it doesn’t criticize the US president at all, Hersh argued. The Pulitzer Prize winner said that along with other major outlets, the paper did not report on his recent bombshell article blaming the Biden administration for the explosions on the Nord Stream pipelines in the Baltic Sea last September. They only published “counter stories given by the intelligence community,” the 86-year-old added.
Hersh went on to claim that Donald Trump “terrified” the media when he became US president in 2017 despite “all the mocking they did… And they’re terrified again. I’ll tell you there’s a lot of people very worried that we might end with Biden-Trump ticket in 2024.”
In such a situation, “you can’t be shocked that the Times would be – as a good citizen – turning to the FBI… of course, I am [shocked], but you can’t be.”
Source Going Underground/RT
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