You have been lied to by the Government, again – and here’s how you know

As an investigator I learned two things early on: How to lie well enough to get the information I wanted, and the other is never to believe what you’re told. As Ronaldus Magnus (Ronald Reagan) loved to repeat, “Trust, but verify”. It is an old Russian proverb that I’m afraid many people have never learned.

Fox News recently ran a story by the Associated Press, presenting the Government’s case in the ammunition purchase. But it was poorly written and the reporter did not ask the right questions, nor did they do all their homework.

From the story:

ICE’s ammunition requests in the last year included:

450 million rounds of .40-caliber duty ammunition

40 million rounds of rifle ammunition a year for as many as five years, for a total bullet-buy of 200 million rounds

176,000 rifle rounds on a separate contract

25,000 blank rounds

This small segment highlights the poor research conducted by the AP reporter. Right off the top – The 176,000 rifle rounds were cancelled.

As we reported 2 October 2012:

Put this in the “I don’t believe it” file, but something unusual has happened. The Department of Homeland Security /Immigration Customs Enforcement (DHS/ICE) has CANCELLED their request to purchase 176,000 rounds of .308 hollow point boat tail ammunition. According to an email that was passed onto me, Harry at the Federal Service Desk stated that a notice could be cancelled for a variety of reason.

Another glaring issue is the “450 million rounds purchased”. What is not considered are prior year purchases. The following chart provides the breakdown of three branches of DHS that purchases ammunition: Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Customs Border Protectorate (CBP), and the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center (FLETC) over the past four years.

	2009	2010	2011	2012
ICE	575,759,800	487,200	350,004,000	165,012,000
CBP	1,000	77,400	88,000	250,000,000
FLETC	69,920	20,000	154,000	63,742,350

I could present a chart, but ICE’s purchases make the others seem insignificant. The large numbers are taking the total number of contracted purchases to the date the contract was signed. Many contracts were for 4 or 5 years. Click HERE for the Excel file.

If Mr. Obama’s administration had no ammunition at the very beginning, they certainly develop a stockpile very quickly.

Had the Associated Press reporter had done their job; they would have asked the following questions:

If FLETC requires 15 million rounds a year, how did they get their required ammunition in 2009, 2010, and 2011?
If FLETC borrowed ammunition from ICE, is it not possible that ammunition could be allocated to Mr. Obama’s Civilian Army Corps without public notification?
If FLETC has contracted out for 63,000,000 rounds of various ammunition in 2012, why then are they purchasing 200,000 rounds of .40 caliber JHP ammunition in December 2012 and 140,000 rounds of 9 mm and 100,000 rounds of .40 caliber February 2013?
If over 15 million rounds of .40 caliber JHP ammunition is required per year, why did ICE order 38 years of ammunition in 2009, and another 23 years in 2011?
If over 15 million rounds of .223 EP ammunition is required per year, why did ICE order 11 years of ammunition in 2012?
If over 15 million rounds of .40 caliber JHP ammunition is required per year, why did CPB order 13 years of ammunition in 2012?
Does the DHS Inspector General know that the December 2012 contract may have been fraudulently awarded?
If the grand total that we’ve come up with is: 1,405,455,670. That roughly translates to 1,000 people firing 1 round a second for 16 days, at what point has too much ammunition been purchased?

Transferring assets from one Department or Agency is as easy as filling out a sheet of paper listing the departments, assets, and quantities involved. Don’t be fooled. Bureaucracy has been around since Roman times. Bureaucrats know how to manipulate paper, and how to make it disappear.

And the silence becomes the lie.

This article first appeared at Prepper Podcast Radio Network.

Read other articles by James Smith HERE.

James is a father of four and grandfather to four. He and his wife of almost 30 years have been prepping since 2003. They live in a small town, with neighbors as close as 10 feet away and have raised chickens for 2 years covertly on less than 1/5 of an acre. He is a former corrections officer, insurance fraud investigator, and he served in the Navy for 6 years. He currently works for a corporation dealing with the disabled population and their benefits. He is the host of The Covert Prepper show and the Prepper Podcast Radio Network News, both heard on Blogtalk Radio.