Front page of Yahoo News feed today.  

Quick Google search turned up this link.  Sentencing scheduled for September:
https://www.justice.gov/usao-ndca/pr/bay-area-residents-plead-guilty-scheme-illegally-export-components-production-night

Hitek Night Vision company caught smuggling NV to Russia.

Sorry if it's been posted before.

Under Obama’s watch...

Collusion.

Meanwhile, Hildebeast is paid to see that the chicoms get classified emails in real time, and so far walks free while her deep state friends in the "justice" dept run cover...

PS- They all need to be in jail, but it is irritating that some seem to be above the law.

A big LOL to all the people that claim ATN is a good company.

What does the article have to do with ATN?

My bad as I did not read the first Yahoo link just the second.

ATN sux.

In 1993, Naum and Irina Morgovsky rode that wave of growing consumer demand, combined with their Soviet-era connections, and established a company, Hitek, at their Bay Area home. Irina Morgovsky’s son, then known as Marc Morgovsky, worked for a few years as president of the company, but in 1995, he struck out on his own, founding American Technologies Network (ATN), a night-vision manufacturer and distributor still based in South San Francisco.

Where’s Satchel Baig?

Ok, my bad as I only read the second linked article which had no mention of ATN just the sons name, and unless you knew who he was you would not make the connection to ATN. Yahoo/AOL is commie spewing crap 99% of the time so I skipped the first link it but now that I went back and read it and I see my error.

So does this mean the secret is out, and I can take my NVGs with me if I go outside the country?  For personal use only, of course.

I've always been of the belief that unless the government/military maintains 100% physical control of it, any foreign state can get sensitive/controlled info/things if they really want it.  How much know-how was given up by these two before they were caught?  How much by all the others that haven't been caught?  I keep seeing notices that manuals are supposed to be ITAR controlled as well as the devices (as well as some ludicrous other 'related' accessories like the 'milspec' neck lanyard that appears to be nothing more than a shoelace), yet I was able to easily download one after being given the document number on this very site.

Satchel Baig and Chip Fong of ATN were the best marketing directors in the NV business, engineering was totally lacking, but PR marketing was A+,

SatchelATN and his paid shills were always good for a laugh here on the NV forums.

No wonder Scott Hardin abandoned the ATN ship and started IRD when the sheet started hitting the fan.

I am thinking many more shady NV dealers will get to feel the heat from the Fed prosecutors with the info they gleamed from their plea bargain....

I for one do not like companies nor people who condone such activities. It makes things a little bit more complicated every time we go back out and every time we do it seems like the sh*t heads have more stuff to play against us with. No accountability (especially some of the ANA guys) and others in it for a quick cash grab. We get it some of them are well funded well out beyond the sandbox but when you start seeing our NSNs and other NATO equipment such as this you wonder how the hell does this stuff still end up in their hands when people "supposedly" do everything correctly.

I have no problem with them getting that ATN x-sight.

I find this a bit strange, since Katod NV produces top knotch night vision ?

Lol hey now, those are actually better than that old Soviet crap that just make the lights green at night with super sized meal of pitch blackness with it.

Here's a question... What's the difference between US Special Forces and North Korean Special Forces?
Answer: Only what's inside the uniform.

North Korean SF use and wear US uniforms, carry US weapons and use US night vision. They don't seem to be having any trouble getting it, so generally, ITAR doesn't prevent people who are really determined. What it does do is to stop opportunistic US businesses from selling US technology in competition with the rest of the world's technologies, to people who will use it to kill US Citizens. It doesn't need to be 100% successful to be effective.

So Hitek exported thousands of NV devices to Russia... If not for ITAR, that probably would have been HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS of NV devices.

Anyway, the article is a good read. Russia still does not have EBAPS technology that I am aware of, but they are far more advanced in terms of pulsed laser systems, and I don't imagine EBAPS would be too difficult for them to figure out themselves. China is also manufacturing both high-end Gen2 and Gen3 tubes, and really does put Russia to shame when it comes to copying stuff. Most of what they do make though is closer to Omni levels of performance, and isn't anywhere close to Photonis or L3.

State based actors are a threat on a different level, but any technology at retail level will never be hidden from state based actors... Heck, look at how much secret stuff ends up in China lately? I'm wondering if someone left the plans for an aircraft carrier lying around or something?

David.

Where's Dino? He should be here, right on top of the pile-on...

I agree. Something is missing from the story, but even then the US didn't have much of a comprehensive night vision capability during the first gulf war. If you follow the NV sales from ITT and L3, even with the fall of ITT, there was some crazy level of spending going on there, after the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq occured, and now it's all collapsed, taking what was ITT with it, because there's no war anymore... Russia wouldn't reasonably be expected to have any more capabilities than the US did at that time, at best. Unless something kicked off the massive uptake of night vision in Russia as it did in the US around 2002. That's probably more what led to US dominance of night fighting.

Photonis, on the other hand, doesn't have the same market drivers, but there's no doubt ITAR created that market for them and they have a lot of countries using their technology. They achieved parity with the US in 2002 and have maintained the edge for the subsequent 16 years.

Things like language barriers and even internal rules have prevented both Russia and Chinese manufacturers from producing a huge surplus of technology as happened in the US. India might have been a contender too if not for the rampant corruption in their bid to develop night vision.

So even if Katod produce some top-notch technology, Russia probably can't afford to make it available to everyone.

David.

I'm not advocating for complete repeal of ITAR.  I agree it absolutely makes sense not to allow commercial exporting.  We certainly shouldn't be supplying our adversaries.  But how is my taking a set of NVGs on a trip outside of the country for personal use a threat to national security?  The only argument I can see is if it gets in the hands of adversaries they could use it to reverse-engineer the tech, but that ship has long sailed.  For that to be a valid argument, we'd have to maintain positive control of every single tube ever produced and every design document ever created.  Hell, the way I understand it, it would be illegal for me to even take NV on a boat that leaves US waters.

these are the rules that were made whenever - might be out of date now , but -  rules are like government burocrats , once they are there its allmost impossible to get rid of them