Sioux City Journal from Sioux City, Iowa • 6

A 6 The Sioux City Journal, Sunday November 21 1 993 World 1 1 Stingers head shopping lists for world's warlords CIA tries to buy back weapons sent to Afghanistan which now are feeding multimillion-dollar black market spreading. As far back as 1988, U.S. officials reported the Arab state of Qatar had By The Associated Press The high roller from Russia caromed from casino to club to call-girl soiree, drinking in the high life of London. Then Ruslan Outsiev got down to business, on "special instructions" from home, and ended up rolled into a carpet and stuffed in a cardboard box, three bullets in his head. Outsiev was one of the latest to fail in his case, fatally in the quest for the Stinger.

For the White House, the minimissile is a rooftop defense against terrorist air attack. To a guerrilla, the Stinger is the equalizer that lets him stand up to an air force. To a weapons dealer, it's a top-of-the-line prize. In a time of dirty little wars fought by desperate little armies, this U.S.-made, hand-carried, shoulder-fired anti-aircraft missile heads the shopping lists of warlords worldwide. A deadly enough threat in a guerrilla conflict, it would become a nightmare weapon if drug cartels or terrorists succeed in buying Stingers and turn commercial air lanes into free-fire zones.

Over the past 13 years, more than 50,000 of the 4-foot-plus missiles have been produced for the U.S. armed forces and 16 other governments. They keep them under tight security, but hundreds of other Stingers, shipped by the CIA to anti-communist rebels in Afghanistan and Angola, are believed to be feeding a multimillion- more than $200,000 per Stinger in Pakistan's arms markets, says the Pakistani press. The CIA was offering $68,000 a missile at last report, although that buyback price is believed to be rising. The 22-pound missile and 12-pound shoulder launcher are loaded with expensive technology.

The current model, which has an effective range of 3 miles, combines heat-seeking guidance, zeroing in on aircraft engines, with ultraviolet detection that spots an object blocking the sky. Together, they tell the missile it is tracking an aircraft, not a diversionary flare or similar countermeasure. U.S. Army soldiers get more than 100 hours' training on the Stinger. But even without the full-dress orientation, Afghanistan's Islamic guerrillas managed to shoot down scores of Soviet helicopters and other aircraft in the 1980s.

The missile's impressive performance attracted a lineup of customers from big-time crime and small-time warmaking. In four U.S. investigations the past 3Vi years, federal agents short-circuited Stinger hunts mounted by agents of the Medellin drug cartel, Iran, the Irish Republican Army and Yugoslavia's Croatian secessionists. Authorities in Italy broke up another ring trying to get the missiles to Croatia. And last year, Spanish police said they blocked an Iranian arms procurer's efforts to round up Stingers.

Despite such successes, Stingers are dollar black market, The CIA is trying to buy back the Afghan missiles. Apparently it is being outbid: The weapons are believed already deployed in at least five of the world's small wars, and may have brought down aircraft in each. Stingers may lie in wait in Somalia, too. Combative militia leader Mohamed Farrah Aidid is believed to have gotten his hands on some of the missiles, U.N. military officials say.

The Stinger's appeal is clear. "Our missile is a hit-to-kill missile. We are extraordinarily accurate," explained Bob Merritt, a marketing executive with Hughes Missile Systems, the Stinger's manufacturer. But for Ruslan Outsiev, the Stinger's appeal lay in politics the intricate alliances of the former Soviet Union. Outsiev, 38, was a leader in the movement to make southern Russia's Chechnya oil region an independent state.

He went to London a year ago to arrange for banknotes, stamps and other trappings of nationhood, Scotland Yard investigators said. He relished his duty as the well-financed envoy of an oil fiefdom. He paid $1.1 million cash, for example, for a Baker Street penthouse, spread huge tips around posh restaurants, frequented London's gambling rooms and often hosted, with his 20-year-old brother, several prostitutes in a night at his richly furnished flat. Outsiev's fatal mistake was in his choice of translator, an Armenian named Gagic Ter-Ogannisyan. Later, after his murder, the Chechen leadership would say only that Outsiev had been acting on "special instructions." But the translator learned what the special assignment was: to buy hundreds of black-market Stingers.

He tipped off fellow Armenians. Investigators said Armenia's secret service apparently determined the Stingers were bound for the Chechens' fellow Muslims in Azerbaijan, for use against Armenia's aircraft in the war between those two former Soviet republics. The translator and an Armenian gunman were ordered to block the deal by assassinating Outsiev, investigators said. The Outsiev brothers were shot last February, but the Armenians bungled the disposal of the bodies and were discovered. The gunman confessed, told detectives about the Stinger connection, then hanged himself in jail.

Ter-Ogannisyan was convicted of murder in October and sentenced to life in prison. Who was selling the Stingers? "We were told they were dealing with someone on the Stingers," said Detective Inspector Julian Headon. "But we don't know with whom." Such a deal would have cost a petrofor-tune. The Stinger sells legitimately for around $30,000. But Afghans have been getting bought the missiles on the blacK More recently: In the former Soviet republic of Tajikistan last May, Islamic rebels allied with-the Afghans shot down an Su-25 fighter-; bomber with a Stinger, the Russian media; reported.

In Georgia, another ex-Soviet Muslim Abkhazian separatists shot down! three Georgian airliners earlier this killing 126 people. The weapons used were; not identified, but Abkhazian leaders earlien indicated to reporters they had obtained; Stingers via the Russian military. In Bosnia-Herzegovina, a preliminary, investigation blamed a Stinger last! year's shootdown of an Italian U.N. supply; plane. Some dispute this, but a general in! Bosnia's Muslim-led army told a reporter! last year that Bosnia had obtained Stingers.

Potential sources are proliferating. Under U.S. license, Stingers are now also made in Germany and Switzerland. The Russian military, adept at copying U.S.! technology, is producing near-Stingers of its own. And authorized recipients might; "leak" weapons to others.

Two years ago, Saudi Arabia wasi reported to have pushed a plan Washington to supply Iraq's Kurdish rebels with Stingers. The Bush administration was; said to have balked. But the Saudis have! their own U.S.-supplied Stingers. 3 (Vi Njf mKimzikm Puling I Santa's Surplus I loKt S3k qSt Lowel Level MayfalrMaM CLU A. LV Cranny ora niir enor 9 3 XUt 1 II 111 1 ff I Mon-Ftl Saunday 8.

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