What's An F-16 Worth? About 80,000 Tons of Chicken

In connection with a special report, Reuters has scrubbed WikiLeaks, looking for State Department cables related to diplomatic efforts to help facilitate sales of American weapons systems abroad. The Atlantic Wire highlights a couple of the deals today, including one attention-grabber involving a 2005 effort by the government of Thailand to purchase fighter jets.

The Thais considered Russia's Sukhoi model, Sweden's Saab and Lockheed Martin's F-16. But there was a catch: They didn't want to pay cash, but were willing to give up 80,000 tons of frozen chicken. After some hemming and hawing, according to the leaked cables, Lockheed actually agreed to consider the deal. But it was too late. After a military coup, the Thais ended up going with the Swedish jets.

I wonder if the Thais could have facilitated the Lockheed deal earlier if they would've agreed to throw in some peanut sauce.