There is a land where the people believe magic wands can detect bombs and firearms. The magic wands require no batteries, nor do they ever need to be plugged into a power source; they run off the static electricity generated by the soldier or policeman using them. If there are explosives present, a small antenna on the end of the wand points toward them.

Just like a divining rod pointing toward water.

Over eight hundred of these magic wands are in service, at a price tag of as much as $60,000 each. They cost only $250 each to actually build, which is a pretty good profit margin, but hey, what’s the price of security? The problem is, they are about as useful in finding explosives and weapons as those black plastic eight-balls with answers on the bottom. “Prospects are doubtful.”

Where could you find a land where people are willing to shell out millions of dollars for magic beans? Iraq, of course. After all, it’s the land where magic really works, the land of flying carpets and enchanted lamps. More recently, it’s the place where we sent pallets of cash – literally shrink-wrapped pallets stacked high with banded bricks of currency – worth hundreds of millions of dollars, and which then vanished. Poof! It’s a trick which would make David Copperfield even more famous.

And a felon.

The only good news in this fiasco is that the U.S. didn’t actually buy any of these worthless gizmos – only the Iraqis government has. U.S. soldiers have been skeptical of them from the start.

Oh, the other good news is that the British manufacturer of the devices has been arrested for fraud, so at lest this one gushing artery of cash has been staunched. Here’s the link.

Now if only we could figure out where those pallets of cash went.

About the Author: The major landmarks in Frank's historical interests range from ancient Persia through the Crimean War, World War II, and the modern U.S. Armed Forces, with a lot of stops in between. Frank is fascinated by the unusual, the overlooked, and the surprising. He is the New York Times number one best-selling author of the Desert Shield Fact Book (1991) and he is currently writing an historical novel on Alexander's conquest of Persia – from the Persian point of view.

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