Long War: The White House announced a strange new policy today. Italy's fleet of Reaper drones is to be weaponized with Hellfire missiles and upgraded in a host of other ways to make Italian drones identical in all respects to fully functioning CIA Reaper drones.
The official reasons given for this action are pretty thin. We are told that Italy's CIA compatible drones will be used to protect Italian troops in Afghanistan even though these troops never see combat. And then we are told that selling Italy Hellfire missiles for their drones will help America's balance of payments deficit by about .000001%.
Why does Italy even have non-weaponized Reaper drones in the first place? Again the official answers are unsatisfying. The current fleet of Italian Reapers are supposedly good for reconnaissance even though there are a bunch of other drones designed specifically for recon that are much better. Reaper drones are the most deadly drone platform in the world and having non-weaponized Reapers is like having an M1A1 main battle tank without a cannon and then saying this bizarre tank will sneak behind enemy lines and snoop about so it doesn't need a cannon. Pure nonsense.
And we also learned today that oil majors are getting contracts to begin exploring once again in Libya. Suddenly big oil companies are for one reason or another feeling very safe and secure in the former Italian colony of Libya. Italy has always maintained a very tight relationship with its former colony. At one point Italian oil companies did most of the exploration and development of the Libyan oil industry. Italy would certainly like to return to its old role of supervising and helping Libya advance economically.
Do you see a connection between these two news items? Do you see CIA fingerprints?
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