Word: stinger
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 2000-2009
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...antiquated Soviet-era SA-7 Strela that missed only because of equipment malfunction or operator error. Shoulder-launched SAMs are efficient and easy to fire and require little instruction; al-Qaeda trainees were taught how to use them in the Afghan camps. The U.S. supplied hundreds of shoulder-fired Stinger missiles to the mujahedin fighting the Soviets in Afghanistan; Washington was so concerned about their potential for trouble afterward that it offered as much as $100,000 per missile to try to buy them back. But shoulder-fired missiles made in Yugoslavia, Pakistan and China slosh around the weapons black...
...baggage screening became more rigorous, the chances of missile strikes would rise. The U.S. government's interest in the problem followed its decision to supply Afghan mujahedeen fighting the Soviets in Afghanistan - whose ranks included Osama bin Laden and many of his al-Qaeda lieutenants - with about 1,000 Stinger missiles in the 1980s. Pentagon officials credit the Stinger with downing about 250 Soviet aircraft...
...officials estimate that the roughly 400 Stingers unaccounted for in Afghanistan are nearing the end of their useful life, if they haven't already passed it. While defense officials suggest the missile system's battery is good for only about five years, many remain potent after 10 years. Both the basic Stinger supplied to the Afghan rebels and the Soviet-designed SA-7s are fairly crude weapons. But the CIA has launched several efforts since they were delivered in 1986-87 to get them back, offering up to $100,000 per missile, and sometimes paying more, U.S. officials...
...missile found in Saudi Arabia remained in its tube, burn marks suggested a bungled effort to fire it, U.S. officials said. A Sudanese with possible al Qaeda links was arrested in connection with the missile. "The FBI possesses no information indicating that al-Qaeda is planning to use 'Stinger' missiles or any type of MANPAD (MAN Portable Air Defense) weapons system against commercial aircraft in the United States," the FBI warning said. "However, given al-Qaeda's demonstrated objective to target the U.S. airline industry, its access to U.S. and Russian-made MANPAD systems, and recent apparent targeting...
...November 14 hearing before the House Armed Services Committee, the chairman of a panel established to study U.S. vulnerabilities to terrorism talked about the SAM threat. "Nobody knows whether or not the enemy has their hands on a Stinger missile and can get it delivered into this country," James Gilmore, a former governor of Virginia, told the committee. "But it's a lot easier to do that, and a lot more available than, for example, a smallpox attack, which would be more difficult to get, and to deliver, into this country...