Missile smokescreen in Moscow

international | anti-war / imperialism | news report Wednesday August 13, 2003 17:52 by Dagda

When the history of this week's 'breaking story' about the alleged smuggling of a Russian Igla surface-to-air missile into the USA is finally written, the subtitle should run as follows: 'State set-up; no relevance to terrorist threat'. JID sheds some light on a much hyped tale of stupidity, greed and political spin.

Despite the plethora of over-excited media headlines earlier this week, the classic 'sting' operation, which was organised by the Russian secret service (FSB) and the USA's FBI to entrap an alleged arms dealer allegedly seeking to sell an Igla missile to what he apparently believed was a group of Islamic terrorists in the USA, revealed little beyond the intelligence services' insatiable desire for positive publicity. Put bluntly, there was no realistic prospect of this sort of advanced weapon being supplied to anyone without the active collusion of the Russian state authorities.

Above all, most reports missed the main points. The real threat to the USA and its allies - and there is a genuine risk - comes less from hi-tech weaponry of the Igla variety than from the committed militant willing to commit suicide, which was demonstrated by Al-Qaeda on 11 September 2001. Moreover, Russia became involved in this 'sting' because its military has a well-deserved reputation for selling anything to anyone.