Arms Traffic

Sylvia Longmire weighs in on the origin of the guns used by Mexican gangs:

According to the ATF, Mexican authorities submitted over 7,500 firearms for tracing in fiscal year 2008. That means that the ATF uses serial numbers stamped on the weapons to determine where they were sold and to whom they were sold. Of those 7,500+ firearms that were actually traced by the ATF, approximately 90 percent of them were sold to individuals in Texas, Arizona, and California.

This seems pretty cut and dried, but in reality, it’s not so simple. According to the Mexican government, over 20,000 guns were seized by Mexican authorities in drug-related crimes during the same time period. One has to ask why so many guns were not submitted to the ATF for tracing, and more importantly, where did those guns come from.

This is where it gets easy to fudge statistics because there is no easy answer. My sources within the ATF have been kind enough to explain to me some of the many reasons why those thousands of guns were never submitted by Mexican authorities for tracing.

Many of those untraced guns have serial numbers that have been filed off. Until recently, only a small percentage of U.S.-origin guns in Mexico had the serial numbers filed off, and that number has increased significantly—from roughly five to 20 percent. This renders those guns untraceable. Other guns are stolen or “misplaced” by corrupt law enforcement officials, either for personal use or for passing on to Mexican drug trafficking organizations (DTOs). Some are never submitted because corrupt officials are attempting to protect the DTO-sponsored purchasers. And finally, some are simply destroyed without being traced.

Is it possible that less than 90 percent of those untraced guns came from U.S. sources? Yes. It’s also possible that more than 90 percent came from U.S. sources, but we will never know. This problem can be approached from a purely statistical standpoint, meaning the 7,500 guns submitted for tracing would represent a sample of the total gun “population.” If 90 percent of traced guns were sold in the U.S., then statistically speaking, there’s a good chance that somewhere in the neighborhood of 90 percent of untraced guns also came from the U.S. This is because 7,500 is a large sample from a “population” of 20,000.

This isn't something I've thought or read about too much, but the above seems logical to me. The idea that the 12,500 guns not submitted for testing are much less likely to have come from the US relies on many in the Mexican government working together to manipulate the sample, and in so doing shame American authorities. I suppose that's possible, but it doesn't seem too likely.