| WASHINGTON
- July 13 - The following was released today by the Federation of American Scientists:
A recent report to Congress
from the Defense and State Departments details more than $40 billion worth of
U.S. arms shipments and export licenses to 165 countries. The U.S. has exported
similarly large amounts of weapons throughout the 1990s, dominating the post-Cold
War global arms market.
The Pentagon's portion of
the fiscal year 1998 "Section 655" report lists $13.9 billion worth of arms and
training delivered through the government-negotiated Foreign Military Sales (FMS)
program. The following top ten recipients represent nearly 80 percent of that
total:
(Dollars in thousands)
1. Saudi Arabia-4,307,585
2. Israel-1,617,819
3. Taiwan-1,489,671
4. Korea-955,848
5. Egypt-611,796
6. Turkey-541,204
7. Japan-419,892
8. Greece-414,397
9. Netherlands-346,729
10. Australia-343,623
A separate section of the
FY 98 Section 655 report lists $26.4 billion worth of State Department approved
manufacturing agreements and weapons export licenses negotiated directly between
U.S. defense firms and foreign entities-both governments and private companies.
Export licenses for Direct Commercial Sales (DCS) are valid for four years, and
not all licenses will be acted upon. Because it is difficult to obtain delivery
data on DCS, this category of sales is often left out of reports on U.S. arms
exports, skewing the picture of global arms sales and the U.S. portion of the
trade.
Under U.S. arms export policy
guidelines, U.S. military equipment may not be sold to countries where they might
exacerbate regional arms races or contribute to human rights abuses. Yet the list
of top ten recipients of FMS sales tells a different story. The already highly
militarized Middle East region absorbed the most U.S. arms in 1998, accounting
for just over half of all FMS deliveries. Long-time rivals Greece and Turkey are
also involved in a costly arms race, with the U.S. government acting as a willing
partner.
The U.S. government also
exported or authorized licenses for arms sales to several states involved in internal
conflicts and with poor human rights records: $176 million of arms exports were
sent or authorized for export to Colombia in FY 98, $185 million for Mexico, and
over $2.1 billion for Turkey, where the U.S. State Dept. has documented the military's
use of U.S.-origin arms against civilian populations in its war against the Kurdish
rebels. Hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of military equipment and training
were also delivered to Ethiopia and Eritrea while a bloody war continues between
them, and small amounts of military equipment were also provided to Guinea-Bissau
and Sierra Leone, involved in violent internal conflicts.
"These arms sales lend both
logistical and political support to the pursuit of military, rather than negotiated,
solutions to conflicts," noted Tamar Gabelnick, Director of the Federation of
American Scientists' Arms Sales Monitoring Project. "Foreign militaries interpret
the U.S. government's decisions to export arms as a signal of tacit approval for
their military policies."
The commercial sales portion
of the Section 655 also highlights the U.S. contribution to the proliferation
of "small arms"-the weapons credited with most of the casualties in today's internal
conflicts. In FY 98, the State Department authorized the export of approximately
$478 million worth of small arms, light weapons, ammunition, and their components
(spare parts or manufacturing equipment), up slightly from fiscal year 1997. Included
in this figure are over 440,000 pistols, rifles, shotguns, submachine guns, and
machine guns, as well as over 650 million ammunition cartridges.
Among the top recipients
of small arms licenses were Taiwan and Venezuela, which received $46.5 million
and $39 million worth of small arms licenses, respectively. Major small arms recipients
also included countries with internal conflicts, such as Israel and Indonesia.
Brazil and South Africa-two states plagued with high gun-related murder rates-also
topped the list of small arms license recipients.
###
|
Share This Article With A Friend