Senators Seek to Deny U.S. Jet Parts to Iran

Although the United States and Iran have a testy relationship at best, weaknesses in security protocol currently allow buyers for Tehran to procure valuable aircraft parts from the U.S. military. At least two Democrats in the Senate want to cut off the supply, which would make the Iranian air force effectively irreparable.

AP via Yahoo!:

Sen. Ron Wyden’s bill came in response to an investigation by The Associated Press that found weaknesses in surplus-sale security that allowed buyers for countries including Iran and China to surreptitiously obtain sensitive U.S. military equipment including Tomcat parts.

The Oregon Democrat’s legislation would ban the Defense Department from selling surplus F-14 parts and prohibit buyers who have already acquired surplus Tomcat parts from exporting them. Wyden’s bill, the Stop Arming Iran Act, is co-sponsored by the Senate’s No. 2 lawmaker, Democratic Whip Richard Durbin of Illinois.

The surplus sales are one of the first national security issues to be addressed by the new Democratic-controlled Congress.

“It just defies common sense to be making this kind of equipment available to the Iranians with all that they have done that is against our interests,” Wyden said Monday in an interview, adding that constituents brought up the surplus-sale security problems at his town-hall meetings over the past few days. “I just want to legislate this and cut it off permanently, once and for all.”

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