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Critical CriminologyThe official Journal of the ASC Divisionon Critical Criminology and the ACJSSection on Critical Criminology ISSN 1205-8629 Crit CrimDOI 10.1007/s10612-015-9281-8

Secrets Exposed?: Selective State Concernand the Prosecution of Notorious ArmsTrafficker Viktor Bout

Victoria Ellen Collins & Melissa Pujol

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Secrets Exposed?: Selective State Concernand the Prosecution of Notorious ArmsTrafficker Viktor Bout

Victoria Ellen Collins1 • Melissa Pujol1

� Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2015

Abstract Criminological scholarship has long recognized that small arms are trafficked

through large and complex international networks that involve a multitude of different

actors. These actors include different buyers, sellers, brokers, intermediaries, corporations,

and most importantly states. Despite this recognition, there has been little research on the

duality of the role of states that are both perpetrators and controllers of this crime. Here we

analyze the court transcripts and media accounts of the prosecution of notorious arms

trafficker Viktor Bout. In doing so, we show that arms trafficking prosecutions fit within

the realm of neo-liberal crime control policies where the focus is hyper-individualism and

the protection of state legitimacy, which allows for the maintenance of a flourishing arms

market.

Introduction

Estimates indicate that there are approximately 875 million small arms in circulation

worldwide (United Nations Office for Disarmament Affairs 2013), manufactured by one

thousand different companies, and located in nearly one hundred countries (Small Arms

Survey 2013). Small arms are defined as ‘‘civilian, private, and military weapons that fire a

projectile with the condition that the unit or system may be carried by an individual, a

small number of people, or transported by a pack animal or a light vehicle’’ (United

Nations General Assembly 1997). They are used by a wide array of actors involved in

various criminal enterprises including, but not limited to, insurgents, drug lords, street

gangs, pirates, as well as ‘‘traditional’’ street criminals (United Nations Office for

& Victoria Ellen CollinsVictoria.Collins@eku.edu

Melissa Pujolmelissa_pujol@mymail.eku.edu

1 School of Justice Studies, Eastern Kentucky University, 521 Lancaster Avenue, Richmond,KY 40475, USA

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Disarmament Affairs 2013). Small arms have also been responsible for approximately 90

percent of all war casualties since World War II (Bassiouni 2010; Bohlander 2009). Small

arms have been used in some of the bloodiest conflicts in recent history including Sierra

Leone’s 11 year civil war (Schroeder and Lamb 2006), the genocide in Rwanda (Human

Rights Watch Project 1994), and most recently the conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq (Small

Arms Survey 2013).

Although some of these arms reach their destination through legal transactions (termed

white market sales), a vast number of them are sold through illicit networks. This is due to

the covert nature of transactions that occur on the gray and black market (i.e. the concealed

and secretive transfer of arms for money), as well as the abstruse nature of gray market

sales that originate with legal state to state transfers but result in arms being transferred to

third parties in clear contravention of existing arms embargoes through the utilization of

rogue brokers or insurgency groups (Rothe and Collins 2011; Rothe and Ross 2011).

Despite this fact, there has been relatively little attention paid to the role of states as

complicit or implicit facilitators of arms trafficking (with the exception of Rothe and Ross

2011).

While arms trafficking prosecutions are relatively rare in relation to the totality of arms

trafficking, they do remain focused on a select number of individuals rather than the

broader system or the host of actors involved in making such illegal transactions possible.

This is a similar approach that is taken to deal with street crime or the ‘War on Drugs.’ We

suggest that through the analysis of the US prosecution of the international arms dealer

Viktor Bout, the process of transforming the agenda and framing of Bout as a ‘lone’ arms

trafficker further reveals this pattern regardless of the role of the United States and other

countries in his illegal arms trafficking. This fits within the realm of neo-liberal crime

control policies where the focus is hyper-individualism, selective enforceability, and the

protection of state legitimacy. After briefly reviewing the literature on the issue of selective

enforcement as it relates to state criminality, we lay out our method for this research before

providing a brief history of Viktor Bout including the events that led up to his apprehension

in Thailand in 2008.

Selectivity of Enforcement: A Brief Review of the Literature

As noted above there is relatively little literature that addresses the dual role of the state as

both perpetrator and prosecutor of arms trafficking (see Rothe and Ross 2011 for the

exception). There does exist however, an established literature so vast it is only possible to

address in brief, that calls attention to the selective enforcement of crime control policies

by law enforcement and the criminal justice system in general (Alexander 2010; Chambliss

1989; Currie 1998; Massoglia and Warner 2011; Pager 2008; Skolnick 2007; Spelman

2007; Sutherland 1940). Much of this literature draws attention to traditional street crime

as it relates to the disparate enforcement of crime control policies that have adverse

impacts on certain populations (i.e. racial minorities) (Alpert et al. 2007; Alexander 2010;

Brunson 2007; Harris 2007; Mauer and King 2007; Glaze 2010). Other literature illustrates

that some crimes, such as white collar, corporate and state crimes, due to the power and

status of the offenders escape prosecution or are purposefully omitted from the focus of the

criminal justice system (Chambliss 1989; Kramer and Michalowski 2006; Sutherland

1940). This is something that is especially pertinent to the perpetration of state violence

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due to the highly politicized law-making process (Barak, Leighton and Flavin 2010;

Chambliss 1989; Hagan 2010; Sutherland 1940; Rothe 2009).

Scholars of state crime have long recognized the difficulties of controlling state crime

when the state has authority over defining what constitutes criminal behavior (Iadicola and

Shupe 2013; Michalowski 1985; Rothe 2009; Rothe and Ross 2011). As argued by Rothe

and Ross (2011: 3) ‘‘defining state behaviors as criminal or illegal given the states position

to self-define acts as legal or illegal and the concept of harm based definitions’’ is prob-

lematic. This is especially true when the state is complicit in the criminal behavior of other

states or in corporate offending in the case of state-corporate crime (Cruciotti and Mat-

thews 2006; Kramer and Michalowski 2006; Rothe 2009). State crime scholars have

argued that states are often complicit in some of the worst crimes such as genocide

(Mullins 2009), torture (Smeulers and van Niekerk 2009), piracy (Chambliss 1989; Collins

2014), assassination (Bohlander 2009), drone warfare (Rothe and Collins 2014), as well as

behaviors that fall under the umbrella of transnational crime (Andreas and Nadelmann

2006; Burns and Lynch 2004; Friedrichs 2007; Pickering 2007). What has clearly been

established is that controlling state crime, whether implicit or complicit, is highly prob-

lematic when the state has power over whether its behavior is defined as criminal and the

agencies that are responsible for enforcing the law: i.e. the state provides the resources and

political justifications for prioritizing the enforcement of some crimes over others as

evidenced in the ‘War on Drugs’ and the ‘War on Terror’. It is from this perspective that

we approach the issue of arms trafficking and the prosecution of Viktor Bout.

Method

Here we utilized a qualitative case study approach to examine the framing and presentation

of arms trafficking charges against Bout for the 4 years following his apprehension on

March 7, 2008. Discourse analysis was used to examine the role of state/s in the prose-

cution of an international arms dealer paying particular attention to the power of the state

in shaping the course of the trial, creating discourse about the crime itself, and the network

of actors both involved in the sting and the charges being prosecuted. In this instance

primary data were collected from the US court records of the trial which were accessed

through the online electronic filing system (PACER) and through the court reporting

service that provided the transcription for the trial. In addition, data were collected from

political statements about the case, as well as from world news media. The data were

arranged chronologically, and analyzed for themes and patterns that emerged.

A Brief History of the Case of Viktor Bout

Viktor Bout, made famous by the 2005 Hollywood movie Lord of War, and nicknamed

‘‘The Merchant of Death,’’ is a Russian born private arms dealer who was apprehended in

Bangkok, Thailand in 2008, for offenses related to arms trafficking. Most often associated

with brokering arms deals in Sub-Saharan Africa, the arms merchant has been accused of

‘‘making a career of arming bloody conflicts and supporting rogue regimes across multiple

continents, [and] even using the US banking system to secretly finance a private fleet of

aircraft’’ (Bharara as cited in Gendar 2010). Bout and his network are said to have supplied

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arms to many countries including the Democratic Republic of Congo, Angola, Sierra

Leone, Liberia, Afghanistan, and Bosnia (Control Arms 2006).

Bout has an established history of providing services to many countries for their

national security operations (Austin 2012; Common Dreams 2012), including the US. For

example, between 1996 and 2001 the accused operated out of the United Arab Emirates

(UAE) transporting weapons to Afghanistan to clients that included both the Taliban and

Al-Qaeda (Farrah and Braun 2007). Although the US was actively interested in Bout and

he was subject to scrutiny and sanctions from the UN (Brunwasser 2002), when the CIA

became privy to this information they chose not to take any action. Instead, because of

their relationship with the UAE they urged for increased banking controls, but they did so

‘‘delicately, not wanting to offend an ally in an already complicated relationship’’

(Pasternak and Braun 2002). Contributing to the lack of action against the arms merchant

were US intelligence priorities, that of counter-narcotics and the possibility that Al-Qaeda

would acquire weapons of mass destruction (Farrah and Braun 2007). This eclipsed Bout’s

involvement, especially as during this time period he was primarily viewed in his ‘‘African

context’’ (Wolosky in Farrah and Braun 2007: 143).

Bout is most often associated with the conflict in Liberia and Sierra Leone, and for

providing weapons to UNITA rebels in Angola earning him millions of dollars in diamonds

(Farrah and Braun 2007). Despite there being reports from private investigators, govern-

ment officials, non-governmental organizations, and various intelligence agencies

including the British and Americans, the information gathered on Bout and his weapons

pipeline was largely neglected. In the Angolan conflict the US allied itself with Savimbi

and his UNITA rebels, the same rebels that Bout was arming (The International Consor-

tium of Investigative Journalists 2002). As indicated by analysts at the CIA, ‘‘there was no

direction from senior policymakers at State or elsewhere in the Clinton administration to

target African weapons flows’’ (Farrah and Braun 2007: 96). As indicated by Johan

Peleman, a researcher working for the International Peace Information Service (IPIS) and

investigator of the arms merchant’s network, ‘‘Africa is not high on the agenda. There are

no classrooms of analysts and secret agents looking into the situation in Sierra Leone and

Liberia. These countries are not important enough on the national agendas of those states,

I’m afraid’’ (Peleman in Farrah and Braun 2007). Bout’s actions in Africa were not in

contradiction with US foreign policy interests and as a result he did not warrant their

attention. US interest however, changed dramatically after 9/11 when Bout became directly

involved in assisting the US in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Immediately prior to 9/11, the US State Department in conjunction with the National

Security Council had created a team for the purposes of apprehending Bout, but the

election of Bush in early 2001 re-focused priorities and the investigation into the arms

merchant dwindled and eventually ended after the attacks on New York (Farrah and Braun

2007). Although the Bush administration had been briefed on his arms network, specifi-

cally Condoleezza Rice the then National Security Adviser, when Bout moved back to

Russia in 2002 she decided that it would not be in the US’ political interests to pressure

Russia about arms trafficking as the US had ‘‘bigger fish to fry’’ (Landesman 2003). It is

during this same time period that the US began to use Bout and his network to transport

weapons to the Northern Alliance to arm them against the Taliban. Although this has been

vehemently denied by the US, European officials have reported that ‘‘Bout had his aircraft

near Afghanistan and made them available to the US efforts almost immediately. They

needed him and he had the only airlift capacity in the region…The deal was, if he flew, the

US would leave him alone’’ (Farrah and Braun 2007: 198).

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Bout was also contracted by the US to fly weapons to Iraq in 2003. Reports indicated

that many of the supplies for US troops were transported to Iraq by aircraft that were

owned and operated by the arms trader (Huband, Parker and Turner 2004). Further reports

connect Bout to private military companies Halliburton (then Vice President Dick Che-

ney’s former company) and Kellogg, Brown and Root (KBR) through his companies

Aerocom/Air Mero (Madsen 2005) and Irbis Air (Spiegel Online International 2010). This

occurred despite there being a specific ban on dealings with the arms merchant issued by

the UN. US intelligence launched an investigation into Bout’s activities that confirmed that

he was flying supplies for the US Air Mobility Command—a major command for the US

Air Force (Farrah and Braun 2007).

In 2004, the Bush administration also exerted political pressure on other states to curb

their interest in Bout. For example, they pressured the UN to omit the arms trader from

sanctions despite there being considerable efforts from France to freeze his assets and an

Interpol warrant for his arrest. Furthermore, the Bush administration called on its ally the

UK, to remove Bout’s name from their list of individuals recommended for sanctions by

the UN (Fenzel 2007). There have also been reports that the US may have interfered with

Belgian efforts to apprehend the arms trader on a warrant they attempted to execute in

February 2002. Belgian authorities, somewhat clandestinely, had indicted Bout on charges

of illegal weapons trafficking and money laundering. As a result Interpol issued an arrest

warrant, and Belgian intelligence planned to execute the warrant after finding that Bout

was due to board a flight from Moldova to Greece. British intelligence services sent an

encrypted message to their superiors in London, informing them that the arms merchant

would be arrested when the plane landed in Athens. A short time after the message was

received in London, the plane changed course and disappeared off the radar. It was missing

for approximately 90 min before it reappeared and continued to Athens where it landed.

British and Greek special-forces, who had been waiting in Athens, boarded and searched

the plane. Bout was found not to be on board, but was later sighted by Belgian intelligence

in the Democratic Republic of Congo (Farrah and Braun 2007). In an interview with

Douglas Farrah and Stephen Braun, authors of the 2007 book Merchant of Death: Money,

guns, planes, and the man who makes war possible, European intelligence officials stated

‘‘There were only two intelligence services that could have decrypted the British trans-

mission in so short a time…The Russians and the Americans. And we know for sure it was

not the Russians.’’

Bout continued to fly supplies to Iraq for the US government until 2007. During this

time period there were sporadic news reports of his connections with the US, but CIA

intelligence did nothing to address the issue until 2004. In July 22, 2004, President Bush

issued an executive order labelling Bout a ‘‘specially designated person.’’ This explicitly

banned all US business with the arms trader and froze his assets. Yet this was largely

symbolic as the US continued to use Bout with estimates indicating that he was paid as

much as $60 million to fly US supplies into Iraq despite the ban (Farrah and Braun 2007).

There has been no official acknowledgement from the US of their connection to Bout,

instead they have maintained that any possible connection to him was made because of the

incompetence of US military contractors who hired the arms trader’s companies without

their knowledge. This explanation however, has been met with considerable skepticism,

especially as there were reports of direct contracts between Bout and the US military

(Braun in Silverstein 2007). As indicated by National Security Adviser Lee Wolosky who

had previously headed up the pre-9/11 taskforce to apprehend Bout, ‘‘It befuddles the mind

that the Pentagon would continue to work with an organization that both the Clinton and

Bush White Houses actively fought to dismantle’’ (Farrah and Braun 2007: 237).

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The US attitude toward the arms merchant changed when their intelligence agencies

found that he had been arming Hezbollah in their 2006 conflict with Lebanon. US intel-

ligence revealed that Bout had been spotted in a Hezbollah military camp and Israeli

intelligence indicated that he had been the one to supply them with Russian made armor-

piercing anti-tank missiles. Hezbollah has been designated a terrorist organization by both

the US and Israel, and has a long history of conflict with Israel—who is arguably the US’

strongest ally in the Middle East. Furthermore, in July 2006, it was also revealed that Bout

was supplying weapons to the Islamic Courts Union and Islamist militias in Somalia and

Eritrea, some of whom have been associated with Al-Qaeda (Farrah and Braun 2007).

Therefore, although Bout was assisting the US in Iraq, the US found that he was also

providing services for groups who they were actively or covertly fighting in the US-led war

on terror, and by continuing to use his services they were effectively undermining their

own global policies. Official statements from the White House differentiate between those

‘‘who are either with us or against us’’ (Bush in Farrah and Braun 2007: 11), and in the case

of Bout he was both. Shortly after these revelations, the US launched an operation to

apprehend the arms trafficker.

In March 2008, Bout was apprehended in a luxury Bangkok hotel by Thai police

following a 6 month long sting in cooperation with US intelligence who posed as members

of the Colombian Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (FARC) seeking to

broker an arms deal. The initial charges against Bout were arms trafficking in Thailand and

attempted mass murder (Falconer 2008), however shortly following his arrest both the US

and Russia began to exert political pressure on the Thai government to extradite him to

their respective countries for prosecution.

Almost 2 years later, Bout was extradited to the US in such an abrupt manner that

neither his wife nor his lawyer were made aware of the extradition until the morning after it

occurred. This elicited considerable criticism from Russia who accused the US of being

politically motivated and being blatantly unjust (The Moscow News 2010a). Despite these

accusations, Bout was prosecuted in a US court for the following four charges: (1) con-

spiracy to kill US nationals; (2) conspiracy to kill officers and employees of the US; (3)

conspiracy to acquire and use anti-aircraft missiles, and; (4) conspiracy to provide material

support to a foreign terrorist organization (the operatives posing as the FARC) (United

States v. Viktor Bout 2011). On April 5, 2012 Bout was sentenced to 25 years in prison by

a New York court (Katersky 2012). We now turn our attention to the sting as presented in

the data gleaned from the trial transcripts.

Operation Relentless

Operation Relentless was a complex sting involving many different individuals, police

authorities, states, spanning three continents. Beginning in late 2007, DEA informant Mike

Snow approached Andrew Smulian, a British born former associate of Viktor Bout, asking

him to contact the latter about weapons for his clients—the paid DEA operatives posing as

FARC. Smulian had not seen Bout for 10 years and was targeted by the DEA as he

was financially broke, strapped for cash, he was—he needed business. Snow offers

Smulian a once-in-a-lifetime deal, an all-cash arms delivery contract. Get paid,

deliver the arms, drop them in the middle of nowhere. Perfect opportunity for Viktor

Bout, who the DEA believed was a rogue arms dealer (United States v. Viktor Bout

2011: 300).

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Smulian reported that he had contacted Bout via email but the arms trader had turned down

the proposal reporting to Snow that Bout’s ‘‘situation [is] not so good’’ (United States v.

Viktor Bout 2011: 301). Bout had stated to Smulian that all his assets had been frozen by a

UN resolution that had been supported by the European Union, the US and Switzerland,

and he was no longer in the business of selling ‘‘gray items’’ (arms) and instead he was in

Russia selling real estate (United States v. Viktor Bout 2011: 301).

Two weeks following this exchange Smulian contacted Bout again, this time via email

through a more secure server in Iceland that was set up by Jon Gylfason, a friend/contact of

Smulian. There were several emails back and forth that finally resulted in Bout giving the

deal the ‘‘green light.’’ This prompted Smulian to meet with Snow, which they did on the

island of Curacao where he then learned the clients were the FARC (the DEA undercover

operatives). Having had a successful meeting in Curacao, Smulian then flew to Moscow to

meet with Bout and Mikhail Belozerosky where they discussed the deal further. Smulian

testified that it was during this meeting that Bout contacted Peter Michev, the owner of

KAS Engineering an arms manufacturer in Bulgaria and inquired about the availability of

weapons (United States v. Viktor Bout 2011: 1280). Smulian then left Moscow and flew to

Copenhagen where he again met with Mike Snow and Carlos Sagastume—one of the DEA

operatives pretending to be the FARC. It is during this meeting that Smulian provided

updates on his meeting with Bout and they began to talk about the possibility of meeting

face to face. The three of them decided that Romania would be a good location for the

meeting, so they flew there in anticipation of a face-to-face with Bout. They spent almost

3 weeks in Romania corresponding with the arms trader via email about a possible meeting

either in Romania or Montenegro. Bout did not show for the meeting, but instead arranged

to meet them in Thailand.

Smulian, Snow, and Sagastume then flew to Thailand where they were joined by

Ricardo Jardeno the second paid operative for the DEA posing as a high ranking official

within the FARC organization. Bout and his bodyguard met them in a hotel in Thailand

where, following a brief discussion, they were arrested. After securing the end user cer-

tificates (EUCs), the proposed deal would have resulted in the weapons being flown from

Bulgaria to Nicaragua in two planes sold by Bout to the FARC. From there they would

have been loaded onto a flight to Brazil and airdropped into Colombia. The payment of $5

million in cash was to be transported to Spain where Bout’s bodyguard Misha would

receive it (United States v. Viktor Bout 2011).

Here we are not debating Bout’s guilt, rather we are arguing that this case reaffirms the

focus of neo-liberal crime control policies as being highly individualistic notwithstanding

the large number of actors involved in the proposed arms trafficking deal and the sting

itself. Despite this, the prosecution argued that Bout had ‘‘mastery of all facets of an illegal

weapons deal’’ (United States v. Viktor Bout 2011: 281), and that it is he, and he alone that

was going to provide the weapons, EUCs (by flying to Nicaragua to obtain them), contracts

necessary to transport the weapons, the transportation (the cargo planes), and he was also

able to ensure their delivery. Like crime control efforts in general, such as the ‘War on

Drugs’ (Parenti 2008), the torture at Abu Ghraib (Smeulers and van Niekerk 2009), and the

pirates of Somalia (Collins 2014), the focus on a singular or few ‘‘bad apple/s’’ shifts focus

away from the broader political and economic context in which the crime occurs. This

leaves states free of further scrutiny to pursue their own economic and political interests,

which includes the US continued use of illegal arms brokers, and the maintenance of an

arms market that escapes oversight.

As indicated above there were many other actors involved in the proposed deal

including the arms manufacturer in Bulgaria, arms broker Peter Michev, Bout’s bodyguard

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Misha, Jon Gylfason in Iceland who set up the secure email server, Paul Popov, another

associate of Bout’s from Moldova where Bout was keeping an Antonov 12 cargo plane

who was mentioned in conjunction with transporting the weapons, Jean-Bernard Lasnaud

identified during the trial as another arms dealer in Paris who had access to airplanes, and

even Russian President Putin who was mentioned by Sagastume. In addressing the court,

Sagastume stated that Bout,

Has total protection of the boss….I understood could be referring to the president of

Russia.

Q. Putin, correct, that’s the name?

A. Yes (United States v. Viktor Bout 2011: 968).

It becomes clear that the sting was designed for the sole purpose of arresting and

prosecuting Bout, and not about the larger arms trafficking network. This hyper-

individualistic focus acts to publically appease those focused on controlling arms

trafficking, while distracting attention away from state complicity in the crime.

This is further supported by the treatment of the other actors swept up in the sting, such

as Bout’s bodyguard Gylfason, and Michev who were quickly discarded by the authorities.

For example, Bout’s bodyguard having attended the meeting at the Sofitel hotel in Thai-

land was arrested by the DEA and the Royal Thai police. He was detained and briefly

questioned, but shortly afterwards he was given approximately 20 US dollars in Thai Baht

and told to leave Thailand immediately (United States v. Viktor Bout 2011). Furthermore,

Michev the arms manufacturer did not testify at the trial and did not face any criminal

prosecution. This is surprising as technically he was the weapons manufacturer and sup-

plier, whereas Bout involvement centered on the logistics of transporting the arms. By

focusing on one individual, the state is able to maintain legitimacy and appease the larger

population by showing they are active in their efforts to control the crime.

Also, of particular interest are the operatives who posed as the FARC. Both had

extensive criminal histories including being engaged in the trafficking of cocaine. Prior to

being engaged in the drugs business one of the operatives was an officer in the Guatemalan

army, and the other was a former Colombian military officer. Both had extensive histories

of human rights violations associated with how they had pursued and treated guerillas in

Colombia. It was the operatives who approached the US offering their services in exchange

for immunity from prosecution and moving their families to the US. The US not only

agreed, but they had both been paid upwards of $8 million for their work for the DEA

(Austin 2012). Here, the US used ‘‘former cocaine traffickers in order to bring Viktor Bout

to justice’’ (Austin 2012). The US justified their use of the agents by asserting that the

operation was too dangerous for DEA field agents. This is especially ironic considering

peace researchers and human rights investigations have long been engaged in collecting

evidence of Bout’s illicit arms trade—dating back to the mid-1990s (Farrah and Braun

2007)—operating on small budgets and without the aid of cocaine traffickers (Austin

2012).

The only other person prosecuted by the US was Andrew Smulian. He was arrested on

the same four charges as Bout, but very early on agreed to help the US in their case against

Bout and secured a cooperation agreement. Smulian pled guilty to the charges against him

in July 2008 and was sentenced after the completion of the case against Bout. During

Smulian’s sentencing hearing the Judge took his cooperation into account and he was

sentenced to only 5 years (the minimum sentence for the four charges was 25 years). As

Smulian had been held in custody since his arrest in 2008, he had already served over

4 years, so essentially he received a sentence of time served. During the sentencing hearing

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the Judge (the same Judge that presided over Bout’s trial) said that Smulian ‘‘‘‘was simply

a financially vulnerable, out of work’’ air transporter who had known Mr. Bout…There was

no evidence…that had Mr. Smulian not been approached in the sting, he would ever ‘‘have

been involved with terrorism’’’’ (Schiendlin in Weiser and Moynihan 2012). Ironically, the

same could have been said of Bout, as at the beginning of the sting he repeatedly rejected

the proposed weapons deal and said he could not be involved, so much so, that at one point

Smulian suggested to Snow that he buy the weapons directly from KAS manufacturing

himself expressing to the agents that he was comfortable acting alone, ‘‘I feel OK myself

about it. I don’t have a problem. If you guys are OK with it, then we’ll go’’ (United States

v. Viktor Bout 2011: 1427). The DEA rejected Smulian’s offer as this would have cut

Viktor Bout out of the transaction completely.

As indicated in the court transcripts, from the very beginning Bout is characterized as

being solely responsible for ‘‘all facets of an illegal weapons deal’’ (United States v. Viktor

Bout 2011: 281), and how operating ‘‘on his own, Bout had worked out a coverup for the

deal’’ (United States v. Viktor Bout 2011: 290). Bout is effectively separated from the

other actors in the network, who because of the US’ blind focus on Bout are afforded

plausible deniability for their involvement in the crime. This gives the appearance that the

US is pursing justice by prosecuting the crime of international arms trafficking, appeasing

the call for greater crime control, but also allowing for state parties to protect their own

legitimacy and self-interests. In accordance with this individualistic approach was the US

use of terrorism charges.

The terrorism charges were used as a tool by the US to claim jurisdiction over Bout, and

simultaneously heightened security and control over access to not only Bout himself, but to

the information in the case. This was demonstrated when Bout was escorted from his Thai

prison to his plane,

Thai police commandos in full combat gear and balaclavas accompanied Bout from

prison to the asphalt at Don Muang airport in Bangkok. At least half a dozen

Americans, some wearing jackets identifying them as members of the US Drug

Enforcement Agency, ushered Bout aboard a chartered jet. Bout wore a bulletproof

vest, a helmet and a blue tracksuit (The Guardian 2008).

The dramatic ‘‘perp walk’’ that was disseminated by media globally, served to heightened

the focus on Bout as a very threatening and dangerous individual and support US action in

holding him accountable for his crimes.

Additionally, the justification used by the US for the charges of terrorism was built

around two factors. The first was the US designation of the FARC as a terrorist organi-

zation in 1997 (US Department of State 2014), and the second revolved around statements

made by Bout to the undercover operatives. Designating an individual a terrorist is a means

for states to exercise extra-jurisdictional power over an individual, state or region beyond

its own borders (Singh and Bedi 2012). This has been done in other notable instances, with

regards to non-legal detentions at Guantanamo Bay (Butler 2003), targeted killings by

drones (Rothe and Collins 2014), and even through the conflation of piracy with terrorism

as it relates to the international response to piracy in Somalia (Collins 2014). This is a

common tactic of states in a post-9/11 world, where terrorism legislation coupled with the

extension of executive power has provided the justification for the extension of state power

over issues that pose a threat to international peace and security. In this particular case

however, the FARC are not designated a terrorist organization by Russia (The Supreme

Court of the Russian Federation 2014), or by Thailand (Public Prosecutor v. Viktor Bout

2009), yet the US used this charge as leverage for extradition from Thailand to the US.

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Interestingly, for the Thai government to agree to extradition to the US, they first had to

establish that the evidence was sufficient to justify a detention order and that the offense

committed was extraditable. This was problematic for the US as the Thai court had to find

that the offense that Bout was accused of would result in a sentence punishable by 1 year

or more in both jurisdictions. Although the Thai court acknowledged that the charges

would be punishable under US law for a year or more, they also found there was no

evidence to support the assertion that the FARC would use the weapons that they bought

from Bout to attack US interests in Colombia. This meant that the Thai court found charges

against Bout to be political and as a result they did not meet the criteria for extradition.

Furthermore, they found that the US charges against Bout were not punishable under Thai

law as they were committed against an interest outside of Thailand (Public Prosecutor v.

Viktor Bout 2009). Accordingly, Bout should not have been extradited to the US.

The second factor influencing the terrorism charges against Bout was based on testi-

mony from the operatives posing as FARC, asserting that Bout not only knew the FARC

planned to kill US soldiers and personnel with the weapons he was supplying, but he allied

himself with their cause. The prosecution asserted that Bout,

was presented with an opportunity to put a multi-million dollar arsenal of weapons

and explosives into the hands of men who told him that they needed it to kill

American pilots. And he jumped at the opportunity. He had the experience to do it,

he had the means to do it, he had the will to do it. And he agreed to do it (United

States v. Viktor Bout 2011: 280).

In speaking to the press, US Attorney Preet Bharara said ‘‘No one should ever think he can

plot to kill Americans with impunity’’ (Bharara in The Nation 2010). However, when the

context of the exchange between the undercover operatives and Bout is revealed, it is paid

operative Ricardo Jardenero who initiates the conversations about killing Americans.

During the last meeting in Thailand Sagasume testifies to the exchange between Jardenero

and Bout,

Ricardo said we want to knock down those American sons of bitches, because we’re

tired—unintelligible—kill them and kick them out of my country. The problem now

is in Colombia –unintelligible—Colombia, they don’t care where they go anymore.

They go here, they go there, they go wherever they want. Why. And in response, Mr.

Bout said yes, yes, yes. They act as if—as if it was their home.

Q. Who did you understand him to be referring to there?

A. He was referring to the Americans.

Q. Going to page 80, line 6. Ricardo said: The FARC has—the FARC has been

fighting for 46 years. I wasn’t born with the war began. I was a baby when this

started. Now Raul Reyes was a great man, he was my teacher. But, man, the

important thing for us is, what did Ricardo do after saying that?

A. Ricardo was referring to the loss of Commander Reyes, and afterwards he was

doing something like—like he felt the loss of the Commander.

Q. Did he do anything at that time?

A. He was grabbing his chest.

Q. At the beginning of line 1, Ricardo said for the better, we make the decision, we

could die and it doesn’t matter because it is for—for our people. But we don’t want

anymore gringos in our mother country. Now we’re going to fight. He then con-

tinues. In response in line 2, Mr. Bout said: We are going to do it (United States v.

Viktor Bout 2011: 878–879).

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Bout agrees with Ricardo’s assessment of his own cause and situation, but Bout never

directly says he wants to kill Americans, and it is only after several outbursts from

Jardenero that Bout begins to convey agreement. Bout is reacting to a conversation

initiated by someone he views to be a potential client. Furthermore, the operative is acting

under the specific instructions from the DEA to speak to the killing of Americans with

Bout, as indicated by the Operation Specialist in charge of the investigation, Agent Brown,

Q. And in your pursuit of Viktor Bout, the DEA operatives and yourself devised a

plan to inject the element—inject the element of killing Americans into this arms

deal, correct?

A. That was part of the scenario, yes, very clear.

Q. And you did that so that the United States would gain jurisdiction over Viktor

Bout and extradite him to this country to stand prosecution, correct?

A. That we said to kill Americans. We made it perfectly clear throughout the

investigation what the intention of these individuals were.

Q. But my question is very simple, I believe, you did that so that United States would

get jurisdiction over Viktor Bout so he could be extradited and prosecuted in this

country?

A. We created an investigation—…A. It was a scenario, it was a sting operation, yes, it’s common.

Q. So that he could be extradited and prosecuted in the United States?

A. If there was evidence enough for a U.S. court do that, yes (United States v. Viktor

Bout 2011: 543–544).

It therefore appears that the DEA operatives were paid to express anti-American sentiment

and to speak to Bout about their intent to kill Americans as a strategy to not only to

facilitate his extradition to the US for prosecution, but as a strategy to emphasize the threat

that Bout poses to the US and the rest of the world.

The characterization of Bout as being threatening, not only to the US but to interna-

tional peace and security, was evident in the US media coverage of Bout’s arrest and

prosecution. Characterized as ‘‘one of the world’s most notorious arms dealers’’ and

‘‘Africa’s chief merchant of death’’ (Mydans and Bonner 2008: 1), he was described as the

‘‘FedEx of arms dealers’’ (Eggen 2008: A01), ‘‘munitions monster’’ (Zambito 2008: 6), as

being aligned with ‘‘Afghan warlords and then the Taliban and Al Qaeda’’ (The Moscow

News 2008: 6), and as heading a network described as ‘‘The McDonald’s of arms traf-

ficking’’ (Freeze 2008: A3). Repeatedly referred to as the ‘‘Lord of War’’ by numerous

media outlets, Western news coverage of the story focused on Bout being caught supplying

weapons to a terrorist organization (Johnston and Mydans 2008; Eggen 2008; Freeze 2008)

as well as his history of fueling deadly conflicts in Africa (Campbell and MacKinnon

2008). He was also repeatedly described as ‘‘former KGB,’’ (Yaniv and Siemaszko 2010:

20), ‘‘former Soviet Air Force officer’’ (Fuller 2010: 4) with connections to ‘‘leftist guerilla

groups’’ (Hutchinson 2010: 19), and ‘‘Marxist-inspired guerilla arm[ies]’’ (The Irish Times

2011: 11). Bout was clearly portrayed as the worst of all criminals, and was even likened in

several newspapers to some of the US’ most high profile criminal defendants, ‘‘Bernie

Madoff and the head of Gambino mafia clan John Gotti’’ (The Moscow News 2010a).

In contrast Russian coverage of the arrest and prosecution painted a very different picture.

Bout was described as being a ‘‘suspected’’ (The Moscow News 2010b), or an ‘‘alleged’’

(The Moscow News 2008) arms trafficker. He was portrayed as a ‘‘Russian army officer’’

(Kozin 2010), a ‘‘businessman’’ (ITAR-TASS 2010), an ‘‘ordinary citizen who found

himself in difficult conditions abroad’’ (Interfax 2010). Bout also garnered considerable

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support from the Russian government who were described as having ‘‘raced like bears to

honey’’ to defend him against the charges (Sidorov 2010). Russian officials described the

sting operation as ‘‘prejudice,’’ ‘‘suspicious,’’ akin to characterizing it as ‘‘sheer murkiness’’

(Editorial 2010a), and the extradition as ‘‘illegal’’ (The Moscow News 2010c). Furthermore,

non-Western media coverage providedmore quotations fromBout himself who protested his

innocence and likened his arrest to ‘‘a plot for a Hollywood action movie’’ (Bout in

Abdullaev 2008). Bout also repeatedly asserted that he is a victim of ‘‘a political chase that

has lasted many years’’ (Bout in Kozin 2010), and is subject to a justice system that is ‘‘akin

to medieval witch-hunt trials of inquisition’’ (ITAR-TASS 2012). As noted in an Editorial

(2010b) in The Moscow News ‘‘For the Western press, Bout is seen as a bogeyman echo of

Ronald Reagan’s ‘Evil Empire’, while in the Russian media Bout is widely seen as a victim

of a vindictive CIA.’’

In summary, there were seven witnesses that testified for the prosecution in the case

against Viktor Bout, including the DEA Agent in charge of the operation, two paid DEA

operatives, a computer forensic examiner also employed by the DEA, a co-conspirator

turned state witness, and two individuals who had previously been employed by Bout’s

companies in the late 1990s. The prosecution argued that Bout entered into a transaction

with the DEA informants whom he believed to be high ranking members of the FARC,

with the goal of providing them with 700–800 antiaircraft (or surface to air) missiles, 5000

AK47s, air transportation for the weaponry (two cargo planes), and the requisite EUCs

necessary for transportation.

There were no witnesses for the defense, something that surprised the presiding Judge

who said ‘‘I did not realize there would be no defense case’’ (United States v. Viktor Bout

2011: 841). Instead, the defense case focused on providing contradictory explanations to

the prosecution’s assertions to demonstrate reasonable doubt. For example, the defense

argued that Bout did not intend to sell weapons to the FARC, that he repeatedly evaded

meeting with them, and when he finally agreed to meet with them no contract for the sale

of weapons was made. Furthermore, the defense argued that Bout intended to sell the

operatives two air cargo planes instead of weapons, and that it was one of the operatives

posing as a FARC Commander who spoke about killing Americans on the instruction of

the DEA, not Viktor Bout.

What is Really Driving The Prosecution?

By examining the weapons deals that Bout had previously been involved with in con-

junction with the US prosecution, it becomes apparent that the US interest in Bout coin-

cides with their larger geopolitical and economic interests. The sting and subsequent

prosecution of Bout serves to appease the need for crime control, but also ensures the

generation and maintenance of the existing open arms market that serves the very states

engaged as controllers of the crime of arms trafficking. States are able to use covert

military planning, to access and execute arms trafficking deals that serve their own political

and economic interests, while simultaneously keeping it hidden from citizens and other

global leaders. By controlling the prosecution of Bout, the US can continue to perpetuate,

and even celebrate its role as being at the forefront of tackling international crime by

bringing a notorious international criminal to ‘‘justice.’’ In doing so, they can control the

flow of information made public, specifically as it relates to their own complicity in the

crime. By propagating understandings of Bout as being associated with terrorists and being

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solely responsible for numerous conflicts across the world, the US has effectively separated

their behavior from the crime. This again serves state interests as this characterization of

Bout legitimizes the heavy-handed approach from the US in exerting pressure on Thailand

to extradite him to the US, charge him with serious charges irrespective of the strength of

their evidence, and then sentence him to prison for 25 years.

It was not until Bout lost all utility to the US, and perhaps became a threat to their global

political and economic interests, that they chose to pursue a case against him. Although his

arrest was framed as the product of an elaborate sting investigation, its timing was not

accidental. Rather, and as indicated by Christopher Walker in an interview with Farrah and

Braun (2007) ‘‘If the government really wanted him bad they could have come up with a

pretext and seized his planes’’ at an earlier date. In framing the case against Bout as a

cooperative product of varying law enforcement agencies situated across the globe, the

gravity of the charges against Bout are constructed as credible, and little political and

media attention is paid to the logistics of the sting itself—such as the US use of paid

undercover operatives with extensive criminal histories for drug offenses and human rights

violations.

Furthermore, considering the vast array of Bout’s clients, it is unlikely he had particular

allegiances to one group, client, or customer. It is also somewhat of a stretch to suggest he

is aligned with a particular client’s causes or ideologies—the key motivating factor for an

act of terrorism. This argument gathers strength considering that just over a year prior to

Bout’s arrest he was providing transportation and arms for the US military, the very target

of the FARC as indicated to Bout during the sting. We suggest, that like the states that

utilize Bout’s services, it is economics that provide the motivation for Bout, as he has

reaped fortunes from his deals across the globe with his corporate earnings estimated to be

in the hundreds of millions (Farrah and Braun 2007).

Conclusion

Here we have highlighted some of the hypocrisies in the case against Viktor Bout. We are

not debating the serious harm that has been caused by arms deals that Bout has been

involved with, however, the US case against Bout serves as a reminder of the hyper-

individualistic nature of neo-liberal crime control policies. Playing up Bout’s notoriety, the

US focus was on the threat Bout posed to international security, his active involvement

with terrorism, and his supposed complicity in wanting to kill Americans. This distracts

both public and political attention away from Bout’s connection to the US, allowing them

to deny their involvement and maintain their agenda of fighting for international peace and

security in the ‘‘global war on terrorism’’ (Chossudovsky 2013). It also supports the

ongoing emphasis of ‘crime control’ and ‘crime prevention’ with the focus on a few select-

disposable-individuals rather than the broader structure that facilitates and encourages

criminality.

After all, relations with Bout soured when the US found that Bout was not only assisting

in US foreign policy interests, but was simultaneously arming their ‘‘enemies.’’ Bout, albeit

a cog in a larger machine, is assigned blame for the behavior of a network of actors, all of

whom collectively make arms trafficking possible and benefit from the maintenance of an

accessible illegal arms market—both economically and politically. Bout, very publically,

has become the ‘‘bad apple,’’ and his prosecution not only shifts focus away from the

reality of the crime, but also serves US state interests. These interests include their

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utilization and involvement with an international arms broker who was also working with

other groups whose political interests counter those of the US, the maintenance of state

legitimacy as a controller of crime, and the preservation of an illegal arms market that

allows for covert interactions in a global economic system that is characterized by free

market enterprise and the acquisition of capital. Ironically, US state involvement as both a

facilitator and controller of arms trafficking crime, has suppressed the real nature of the

offense which includes their own culpability. In 2013, the international political com-

munity renewed efforts to control and regulate the trade of weapons, including small arms,

by negotiating the multinational Arms Trade Treaty which entered into force on December

24, 2014. To date 130 member states have signed the treaty and 69 have ratified it. Despite

this effort however, the problem remains that until states acknowledge their involvement in

arms trafficking networks, targeting specific individuals for prosecution will not prevent

the illicit trafficking of arms.

Acknowledgments This work was supported by the School of Justice Studies Research Program atEastern Kentucky University. We would like to thank both Dr. Dawn Rothe and Dr. Gary Potter for theirvaluable feedback on earlier drafts of this paper.

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