"Merchant of Death" to be extradited to US

[A-R]

Found this story in today's paper very interesting. Seems this guy, Viktor Bout, was the inspiration for the movie "Lord of War" staring Nicholas Cage (a very under-rated film about the post-Soviet international trade in military arms)

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/art ... wD9HNQUDG0" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Why is this article important to the RKBA debate? There is a loose tie in with this story to antis' ridiculous claim last year that 90% of Mexican drug gang guns come from the US (in reality they get their fully automatic military weapons from arms dealers like this guy). Also the Obama Administration's strong push to bring this guy to New York could be an attempt to get information from him that would support the UN's Arms Treaty effort? Just my own speculating and reading between the lines. Some of y'all here know more about both of these angles than I do.

[surprise_i'm_armed]

Viktor Bout (say "boot") is a rather cosmopolitan figure
who speaks 9 languages and has moved immense amounts of
armaments over the years, sometimes supplying both sides of
a conflict.

His business is claimed to be an air cargo biz, but the majority of
what he carries in his planes are vast amounts of weapons and ammo.

In a rather ironic example of "politics makes strange bedfellows",
Viktor Bout's aircraft were hired by the US Government (CIA? DOD?)
to fly cargo for the US. His planes were allowed to fuel up at US bases.

IIRC, the way he got his start was he saw a bunch of Russian cargo planes
sitting around, unused, after the USSR collapsed in 1991. He started filling
them up with cases of AK-47's, and he was off to the races as an arms dealer.

The Thailand govt has turned him over to the US, and the Russkies are
jonesin' to get him back into Russia. He's a Russian citizen.

SIA