US enhanced its arms sales, even equipped nations with repressive regimes: Report

London

Notwithstanding Joe Biden’s election pledge of not “checking (America’s) values at the door” when it comes to arms sales, the United States has increased the sales of it weapons across the world, including to nations having repressive regimes, reveals a new report.

The report by a Washington-based think-tank, the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, released on Thursday, states that most of the weapon sales involved just four companies — Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Raytheon and General Dynamics. The contribution of these four firms was 58 per cent of all the major offers made since Biden assumed office, reported The Guardian.

US arms offers did drop sharply in the first year of the Biden administration, from $110.9bn in the previous year under Donald Trump to just $36bn. The report suggests that the dip could be partly due to a “less aggressive approach” to sales promotion but more likely due to market saturation, since a large volume of deals had concluded during the Barack Obama and Trump presidencies.

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It further said, “The concentrated lobbying power of these companies – including a ‘revolving door’ from the Pentagon’s arms sales agency and the leveraging of weapons export-related jobs into political influence – has been brought to bear in efforts to expand US weapons exports to as many foreign clients as possible, often by helping to exaggerate threats.” 

The arms offers increased to $65bn as of October, partly due to increased sales to Europe and Asia – “tied to the Pentagon’s focus on ‘great power competition’ with Russia and China”.

“The current US arms policy and practice too often fuel war rather than deterring it. Roughly two-thirds of current conflicts – 34 out of 46 – involve one or more parties armed by the United States,” the report said.

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“Of the US-supplied nations at war, 16 received $50m or more worth of US arms between 2017 and 2021. This contradicts the longstanding argument that US arms routinely promote stability and deter conflict,” it added.

Indonesia ranks first in the top recipient of US arms deals as of September, with $13.9bn in offers, while Greece and Germany are next at $10.2bn and $10.1bn. Between Saudi Arabia, Jordan and the United Arab Emirates - the bottom three recipients – total offers between $3.4bn and $4.7bn have been made from January 2021 to September this year, said The Guardian quoting the report.

Lockheed Martin had the largest share in major deals and its weapons accounted for $25.8bn since February 2021 in the deals. Boeing was next with arms deals worth $22.65bn, followed by General Dynamics at $7.7bn since February 2021, including a $6bn offer of M-1 tanks to Poland and $1.7bn worth of heavy armoured vehicles to Australia. Raytheon ranked fourth with deals worth $4.7bn.

“Sales of combat aircraft constituted the biggest payoffs for major contractors, followed by missile defence systems,” the think-tank said.

The report also urged Congress to amend the Arms Export Control Act so that an affirmative congressional vote is required on major deals, instead of the current system that simply necessitates a veto-proof majority to block any arms deal.

It also called on the Biden administration to provide greater transparency on the delivery and use of US arms.

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In 2021, the arms industry employed 766 lobbyists — far more than one for every member of Congress, the report mentioned.

“Arms exporters and the US government routinely cite job creation as a reason to sell weapons to foreign clients. But the number of jobs associated with arms sales is greatly exaggerated … Spending on weapons produces 40 per cent fewer jobs than spending on infrastructure or green energy, and 100 per cent fewer jobs than spending on education,” it said.

The thinktank recommended a number of policy measures including restricting the revolving door between government and industry in attempts to weaken the control that weapons manufacturers have over arms-transfer decision-making.

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