Blade_Runner Loc: DARK SIDE OF THE MOON

A Politico investigation:

Obama’s hidden Iran deal giveaway

By dropping charges against major arms targets, the administration infuriated Justice Department officials — and undermined its own counterproliferation task forces.

By Josh Meyer

04/24/17 05:00 AM EDT

When President Barack Obama announced the “one-time gesture” of releasing Iranian-born prisoners who “were not charged with terrorism or any violent offenses” last year, his administration presented the move as a modest trade-off for the greater good of the Iran nuclear agreement and Tehran’s pledge to free five Americans.

“Iran had a significantly higher number of individuals, of course, at the beginning of this negotiation that they would have liked to have seen released,” one senior Obama administration official told reporters in a background briefing arranged by the White House, adding that “we were able to winnow that down to these seven individuals, six of whom are Iranian-Americans.”

But Obama, the senior official and other administration representatives weren’t telling the whole story on Jan. 17, 2016, in their highly choreographed rollout of the prisoner swap and simultaneous implementation of the six-party nuclear deal, according to a POLITICO investigation.

In his Sunday morning address to the American people, Obama portrayed the seven men he freed as “civilians.” The senior official described them as businessmen convicted of or awaiting trial for mere “sanctions-related offenses, violations of the trade embargo.”

In reality, some of them were accused by Obama’s own Justice Department of posing threats to national security. Three allegedly were part of an illegal procurement network supplying Iran with U.S.-made microelectronics with applications in surface-to-air and cruise missiles like the kind Tehran test-fired recently, prompting a still-escalating exchange of threats with the Trump administration. Another was serving an eight-year sentence for conspiring to supply Iran with satellite technology and hardware. As part of the deal, U.S. officials even dropped their demand for $10 million that a jury said the aerospace engineer illegally received from Tehran.

And in a series of unpublicized court filings, the Justice Department dropped charges and international arrest warrants against 14 other men, all of them fugitives. The administration didn’t disclose their names or what they were accused of doing, noting only in an unattributed, 152-word statement about the swap that the U.S. “also removed any Interpol red notices and dismissed any charges against 14 Iranians for whom it was assessed that extradition requests were unlikely to be successful.”

Three of the fugitives allegedly sought to lease Boeing aircraft for an Iranian airline that authorities say had supported Hezbollah, the U.S.-designated terrorist organization. A fourth, Behrouz Dolatzadeh, was charged with conspiring to buy thousands of U.S.-made assault rifles and illegally import them into Iran.

A fifth, Amin Ravan, was charged with smuggling U.S. military antennas to Hong Kong and Singapore for use in Iran. U.S. authorities also believe he was part of a procurement network providing Iran with high-tech components for an especially deadly type of IED used by Shiite m*****as to k**l hundreds of American troops in Iraq.

The biggest fish, though, was Seyed Abolfazl Shahab Jamili, who had been charged with being part of a conspiracy that from 2005 to 2012 procured thousands of parts with nuclear applications for Iran via China. That included hundreds of U.S.-made sensors for the uranium enrichment centrifuges in Iran whose progress had prompted the nuclear deal talks in the first place.

When federal prosecutors and agents learned the true extent of the releases, many were shocked and angry. Some had spent years, if not decades, working to penetrate the global proliferation networks that allowed Iranian arms traders both to obtain crucial materials for Tehran’s illicit nuclear and ballistic missile programs and, in some cases, to provide dangerous materials to other countries.

“They didn’t just dismiss a bunch of innocent business guys,” said one former federal law enforcement supervisor centrally involved in the hunt for Iranian arms traffickers and nuclear smugglers. “And then they didn’t give a full story of it.”

In its determination to win support for the nuclear deal and prisoner swap from Tehran — and from Congress and the American people — the Obama administration did a lot more than just downplay the threats posed by the men it let off the hook, according to POLITICO’s findings.

Through action in some cases and inaction in others, the White House derailed its own much-touted National Counterproliferation Initiative at a time when it was making unprecedented headway in thwarting Iran’s proliferation networks. In addition, the POLITICO investigation found that Justice and State Department officials denied or delayed requests from prosecutors and agents to lure some key Iranian fugitives to friendly countries so they could be arrested. Similarly, Justice and State, at times in consultation with the White House, slowed down efforts to extradite some suspects already in custody overseas, according to current and former officials and others involved in the counterproliferation effort.

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That's just the beginning. G'head read it all. It is a chilling report that reveals the nefarious conduct of our nation's worst president.

Loki Loc: Georgia

Liberal Hobbit Dancers will not read it, and if they do, they will be perfectly okay with any actions taken by their [still] God-King Obama "Praise Him! Hallelujah!"

teabo82

I know he was a crook I been telling people this especially preachers since 1977 God showed me him in 1977 that he was going to become President and destroy this country and all so that police would be k**led in the street like dogs I the 60 and I have proof across this country that ho that I told them these things and a lot of other things God told me also I know what are going to happen in the next ten years and be yound I have travel across America, Hatih and the Dominican preaching the gospel since 1962 anything that going to effect the human race God show it to me 10, 15 and 20 years before it happen real trouble times is just ahead of us

theotts

As usual, when you read something above a sixth grade level, you completely ball it up.
President Obama should be given another Nobel Prize for this brilliant gambit.
It is not the Kurdish m*****as who have ISIL on their heels. It isn't the corrupt, rachitic Iraqi army either. It's the Mahdi army, a Shi'a m*****a. Shi'a no longer fight their government in Iraq. Shi'a are uniting against their ancient enemies, the Sunni.It's no surprise w didn't see it - he 'thought they were all Muslims!' Bill Clinton was too busy fighting off the hyper-partisan jackals in congress. Reagan did make a deal with Iran, but a very bad one that showed Iranian leadership the stupidity and dysfunction of the US right.
Obama got them to fight our common enemy, the Salafists.
ISIL called Orangeade's Muslim ban the 'blessed ban' It has, in some degree, compensated the ISIL's mounting losses on the battlefield with gains in recruiting. So, decent people need trumpf to shut up and get out of the way. The Salafists have lost the momentum.
Way too sophisticated for the tools of trumpf, I know. But you no longer have the excuse of not being exposed to the t***h.

Loki Loc: Georgia

We already know you are a bigoted fool. There is no need to belabor the point.

theotts

Did you hear a kind of weak keening noise?
Sort of like a mortally ill sheep bleating?

Loki Loc: Georgia

I did, and it concerned me briefly until I realized it was just you.

nwtk2007 Loc: Texas

Yes, in an effort to get Iran to keep their part of a bargain to NOT become a nuclear power with the ability to launch them at far away targets, we release those who are involved in procuring materials and science to actually achieve that end. Brilliant.

Blade_Runner Loc: DARK SIDE OF THE MOON

WTF are you babbling about? We are not talking about the Sunni/Shia schism or Kirdish m*****as, Iraqi armies or ISIS or Clinton or Reagan, we're focused on the treasonous activity of ONE US president--Obama.

Decades of counterproliferation and counterterrorism intelligence work that tracked the Iranian weapons programs shot to hell in one fell swoop is a "brilliant gambit"? With the stroke of his pen, Obama handed Iran the keys to arms proliferation, including nuke development.

Obama released a bunch of Iranian prisoners, some of whom were accused by Obama’s own Justice Department of posing threats to national security,

Iranian arms dealers who supplied Iran with U.S.-made microelectronics with applications in surface-to-air and cruise missiles,

who supplied Iran with satellite technology and hardware,

who sought to lease Boeing aircraft for an Iranian airline that authorities say had supported Hezbollah,

who smuggled U.S. military antennas to Hong Kong and Singapore for use in Iran, providing Iran with high-tech components for an especially deadly type of IED used by Shiite m*****as to k**l hundreds of American troops in Iraq.

who conspired to buy thousands of U.S.-made assault rifles and illegally import them into Iran.

One of whom was part of a conspiracy that from 2005 to 2012 procured thousands of parts with nuclear applications for Iran via China. That included hundreds of U.S.-made sensors for the uranium enrichment centrifuges in Iran.

There's more, much more.

Newsflash, Robott, you can spin this with as much deflection as your 6th grade mind can muster, but try as you might, Obama gets no pass on this dangerous malfeasance. That cretin has made a really bad situation much worse.

If you convince the Nobel trustees to give that bastard another prize, tell them it shove it up his sorry ass.

theotts

I***t.
Exactly as I predicted: way beyond your comprehension.
You make me feel like Einstein among ditch diggers.

Louie27 Loc: Peoria, AZ

At least Einstein saw the light! You seem to never see the light.

Blade_Runner Loc: DARK SIDE OF THE MOON

I don't speak psychobabble.

theotts

You don't speak English either, do you child?
Don't spawn.

Loki Loc: Georgia

Among ditch diggers, you are probably an object of ridicule, just as you are among any group of people with an aggregate IQ of room temperature.

theotts

Every word from my previous posts, except you inverted the diction and mixed metaphors.
Loki, Norse god of petty mischief.
How apt.