Petraeus: 190,000 Lost Weapons A Clerical Error

Published: August 8, 2007, 2:48 pm

Tags: terrorism, politics u s, iraq, military issues general, iran

In a follow up to Monday’s report which stated that the United States could not account for 190,000 weapons provided to Iraqi security forces, General David Petraeus told Alan Colmes of Fox News Radio that the loss resulted from inadequate accounting practices. As I read the General’s contention, it seems that the U.S. military is arguing it lacked the means to record the serial numbers during the distribution process. “Some percentage” of weapons the U.S. military provided to the Iraqi army and Iraqi police units were not tracked by serial number because there were no procedures in place to do so within the Iraqi units, Petraeus said in an interview broadcast last night on Fox News Radio’s “Alan Colmes Show.” From a practical standpoint, Petraeus added, it was more important to get the weapons to the Iraqis as they started to enter the fight against a strong insurgency than it was to keep meticulous records. “We occasionally likened

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