Iranian Arms In Iraq--the "Smoking Gun"

The Telegraph is reporting that some 100 Steyr HS .50 sniper rifles have been found in Iraq. These sniper rifles have been traced back to a shipment made by Austrian gun manufacturer Steyr-Mannlicher via a legal sale from 2005. The rifle, according to its manufacturer

is a long range, high precision rifle, with an effective range of up to 1,640 yards (1,500 m).

It was designed as a single shot bolt action rifle, and is available in the caliber .50 BMG. The STEYR HS .50 features a cold hammer forged fluted barrel, adjustable bi-pod, and a highly efficient muzzle brake, which reduces recoil substantially to increase shooting comfort.

The top mounted Picatinny rail (Mil. Std. 1913 rail) allows quick and easy installation of various optics, or night vision devices. The STEYR HS .50 is designed to field strip easily for transportation or maintenance purposes.

According to the Telegraph report,

The National Iranian Police Organisation bought the rifles allegedly to use them against drug smugglers in an £8 million order placed with Steyr in 2005.

According to reports, 800 of the rifles were bought. So a couple of questions come to mind. First, why does the Iranian police need 800 sniper rifles with a nearly 1 mile range to conduct drug operations? Second, if what the Iranians have been saying about not supplying weapons to Iraqi insurgents is true, how does 15% of £8 million (about $15 million) order get "misplaced?" Not a particularly good inventory control system. Third, are the Iranians stupid or what? This is a unique weapon, with a unique purpose. There are only so many of these rifles in the world and you can bet that the ever efficient Austrians have pretty good records on their sale, particularly one that so many nations objected to. These firearms can be tracked and it is not hard to find out where they went to.

Of course, there will be a great deal of hand wringing among the defeatists who will claim that the Bush Administration is simply seeking to expand the conflict in Iraq or deflect attention from Iraq to Iran. But as this evidence indicates, you cannot separate the two nations so neatly. But one needs to look a little further into this scenario.

While the HS .50 is a single shot weapon, its range makes it an effective terrorist weapon. Pick any spot on earth and draw a circle with a radius of one mile and you get a lot space that a sniper can hit (for the geometrically challenged, the area of a circle with a radius of one mile is 3.1 square miles, give or take). So a sniper equipped with one of these rifles can kill a person nearly a mile away and be gone from their shooting position before the echo of the gunshot fades. If you think the Washington, DC sniper killings were scary, they were using a rifle with a range of about 200 yards. Now think about the problem. The problem with these rifles is that they don't have to be used only in Iraq, but can be used right here, right now for their one purpose, killing people without putting the shooter at risk.

So yes, this is not simply a war issue, this is a domestic problem given how porous our borders really are.

Hat Tip: Captain Ed