April 25, 2013 Posted by: Off Grid Survival
Top DHS training officer Humberto Medina, denied accusations that DHS was involved in manipulating the ammunition market when he told congress, “categorically that was not a factor at all” in the purchases.
Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif, told the DHS official that “The idea that you have to have excess rounds, year after year, flies in the face of common sense.” He went on to say that he suspects DHS has either “disposed of,” or passed the unused ammo on to non-federal agencies.
In another heated exchange, Chairman Jason Chaffetz demanded answers on where all the purchased ammo was going.
Ammo Purchases Far Beyond What Department Could Ever Use
In fiscal year 2012, DHS physically acquired somewhere around 103 million rounds of ammunition, which according to DHS was to be used by somewhere around 70,000 DHS officers for both operations and training purposes.
So why now do they need over 10 times that amount? To bring the numbers into perspective, at the height of the Iraq War the Army was using less than 6 million rounds a month, giving DHS a stockpile of ammunition to sustain a hot war for 20+ years.
Congress skeptical about DHS claims, asks why agency is using 1,000 more rounds per person than Army Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, told DHS official that their “math” wasn’t adding up. He argued that it didn’t make sense for DHS to use an average 1300 -1600 rounds per DHS officer , while the average U.S. Army soldier goes through only 350 rounds per year.
What makes even less sense is why DHS would place purchase orders for an additional 1.6 billion rounds, especially since by even their own accounts they had already stockpiled more than 260 million rounds of ammunition as of November 2012. When police departments have to start trading and begging for ammo because of a lack of supply, you really have to wonder why DHS is stockpiling such large amounts of ammunition.
Congress Asks DHS if they are Manipulating Ammo Market with Giant Purchases of Ammo
