Man Accused of Selling US Military Drones On EBay 182
garymortimer writes "47-year-old Henson Chua is in a bit of trouble for trying to sell a RQ-11B 'Raven' Unmanned Aerial Vehicle on eBay. From the article: 'A federal grand jury in Tampa returned an indictment charging Henson Chua, 47, of Manilla, Philippines, with violations of the Arms Export Control Act and smuggling, following an investigation by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement's Homeland Security Investigations. If convicted on all counts, Chua faces a maximum penalty of 20 years in federal prison.'" I'm kicking myself for missing this auction.
So you can't buy a plane? Buy a ship instead! (Score:4, Insightful)
One 19,000 tonne aircraft carrier for sale [edisposals.com], one careful owner, only used to drive to church on sundays and launch fearsome aircraft into the skies to intimidate the enemy and drink their blood [bbc.co.uk].
Re:Perhaps tangential, but a worry nevertheless... (Score:4, Insightful)
Actually, the absurdity is that these are fairly complex undertakings. These types of hobbies - or at least those that do it successfully - are generally for pretty smart folk, and there are precious few of those in these terrorist organizations (they do exist, but in very, very small numbers). There are far cheaper ways of working terror, and at the end of the day, everybody has a limited budget.
I happen to have played with both pyrotechnics (I was a PGI member for many years) and I now do high power rocketry. It's fun stuff, and it's far less usable to terrorists than a tank full of gasoline, but up until recently you could fill up a 300 gallon tank on the back of a pickup at any local gas station, but you couldn't store 64 grams of slow burning model rocket propellant in your garage without a BATFE inspected, plate steel, double hasp explosives magazine and a Low Explosives Users Permit. You're allowed to have 25lbs of black powder in your basement, but you still can't purchase a 0.5gram engine igniter without the aforementioned permit.
Re:Perhaps tangential, but a worry nevertheless... (Score:5, Insightful)
What is the absurdity of the fear that a model airplane that can fly thousands of miles by itself could be used to deliver something hazardous?
It is akin to worrying about general aviation (all those "uncontrolled" airplanes in the sky - in the hands of terrorists, etc.) while ignoring the proverbial elephant in the room - Ryder trucks. Only more so.
Further, as has been demonstrated repeatedly, a car bomb is a horrifyingly effective terrorist weapon (cheap, fast, inconspicuous, readily available, large payload). As an example, the use of just one such device ended up with US forces leaving Beirut.
Thus far, no model airplanes have been used in any terrorist attack (long distance or otherwise). If we are to worry about model airplane terrorist attacks, then we are no longer able to prioritize and are fearful to the point of collapse.