Somebody dropped the ball on this one. 20,000 missiles were stolen from the Lybian army, and experts are saying it’s a good chance they can end up in the hand of terrorist. Hit the jump to read the rest of the story.
@WiL
Thousands of surface-to-air missiles were reportedly looted from Libyan Army warehouses as the Khadafy regime folded – and there are fears some could land in the clutches of Al Qaeda.
As many as 20,000 of the deadly Russian-made weapons disappeared from the unguarded depots, raising fears of terror attacks in the skies, ABC News reported Tuesday.
“I think the probability of Al Qaeda being able to smuggle some of stinger-like missiles out of Libya is pretty high,” said former White House counterterrorism advisor Richard Clarke, now an ABC News consultant.
The missiles are about four- to six-feet in length, and can weigh as little as 55 pounds with a shoulder launcher. Accurate at a range of two miles, they lock onto the heat of a plane’s engines.
Peter Bouckaert, emergencies director for Human Rights Watch, recalled watching pickup trucks loaded with missiles driving away from warehouses six months ago.
“I myself could have removed several hundred if I wanted to, and people can literally drive up with pickup trucks or even 18-wheelers and take away whatever they want,” Bouckaert said.
A National Security Council spokesman says the U.S. has dispatched five specialists to Libya as part of the effort to recover and destroy the missing missiles.
