Mitchell
Operation Fast and Furious is now more of a functional disaster than a slick and smart way to track firearms. Leadership of the departments in question learned what the United States already knew based on their dealings with the Taliban in Afghanistan; Guns don’t know who the bad guys are and bullets don’t expire. The US government armed the Taliban in the 80’s only to be at war with those same weapons and fighters 20 years later ( Dixon, 2021). Although a seemingly abstract history lesson, it does prove that this was a botched idea from the start, on multiple levels.

Perhaps the largest unintended consequence was that the instrument that officials let ‘walk’ was more than a carton of drugs or a small cache of marked bills, these were automatic weapons numbering in the hundreds that they unleashed to violent criminals. The number of deaths officials don’t know about that they played a role in could be stunning. The lessons here are clear, that items or systems that can bring deadly harm in and of itself should not be allowed to be a prop in a fishing expedition where the results are left to chance and authorities render themselves a passive audience to the repercussions.

What should be examined is the process of the decision itself. Was groupthink in play in the meeting room where this was authorized? Surely there must have been one student of history there to recognize the danger of this Operation or the danger of groupthink (Tsintsadze-Maass, & Maass, R. W ,2014). It must be reminded to those currently in service and those interviewing for leadership positions that the cost of speaking out is never higher than the cost of a state funeral.