Arms Manufacturer Small Weapon

Arms Manufacturer Small Weapon

It is, in essence, the poor at home and abroad who pay the price for escalating arms exports.
Arguing that the removal of the ban "could undermine regional military balances or stimulate an arms race," Sens. Arguing that recoupment fees made U. The Defense Department writes off another $1 billion each year for bad or forgiven weapons-purchase loans to foreign countries. This marks a 56 percent increase in political action committee (PAC) and soft money contributions over the previous peak of $6.
weaponry is sold to the Middle East and other strife-torn regions, helping bilingual education in texas to fan the flames of war instead of promoting stability. The 1996 welfare reform law will cut federal support for poor families by about $7 billion annually over the next five years, an amount almost equal to the yearly subsidies given to U. dominance of the global arms market has been accomplished as much through subsidies as sales: In 1995, more than half of the $15 billion in U. 3 million to last year's campaign-was Lockheed Martin, the world's largest arms manufacturer. ban on sales of advanced fighter aircraft to Latin America. market in indirect payment for weapons purchases. Among the major conflicts in windsor ontario job bank 1993 and 1994 90 percent involved one or more parties that had received U. free unlimited automatic responder weapons in foreign arsenals to justify increased spending mature woman fucking younger man on new leading-edge weapons back home so that the United States can maintain its military superiority. AID Economic Support Fund grants each year. The Pentagon and defense contractors then turn around and use the presence of advanced U. In a joint statement issued recently in New York, eight Nobel Peace Prize recipients-including Oscar Arias, Elie Wiesel, Jose Ramos Horta of East Timor and the Dalai Lama-who support an international Arms Transfer Code of Conduct declared, "Millions of civilians have been killed in conflict this century, and many more have lost their loved ones, their homes, their spirit.

The result is a net transfer of dollars from the U. Our children urgently need schools and health care centers, not machine guns and fighter planes.
9 million during the 1991-92 election cycle. allies in Europe, Asia and the Middle East is being used to justify the development of the F-22, the "next generation" fighter that has already cost taxpayers $16 billion.

"We could have air superiority with what we have in the Boneyard," Rossiter of Demilitarization for Democracy told the New York Times. 2 billion in grants in 1995 to foreign countries-chiefly Israel and Egypt-to buy American military equipment. Unlike in any other industry, U. It is very hard for us to tell other people the Russians, the Chinese, the French not to sell arms, when we are out there peddling and fighting to control the market.

Rather than embark on a serious program of defense cuts and economic conversion-the illusory "peace dividend" promised with the end of the Cold War- the Clinton administration is phasing out its conversion programs, opting instead to help boost the profits of military manufacturers through overseas sales. The Office of Management and Budget estimates that for every 100 jobs created by weapons exports, 41 are lost in non-military U. The $15 billion Defense Export Loan Guarantee Fund covers military contractor losses when foreign customers cannot afford to honor weapons sales agreements.
According to a 1995 Pentagon forecast, the United States accounts for 63 percent of worldwide arms deals already signed for the The Clinton administration has accelerated arms exports despite the global downturn in military production and defense budgets since the end of the Cold War. During last year's election campaign, the top 25 weapons exporters contributed $10.

"It has become a money game: an absurd spiral in which we export arms only to have to develop more sophisticated ones to counter those spread out all over the world. The "leader of the PACs"-contributing more land use map africa than $2. " It's no coincidence that the globe-trotting president of the U.
Clinton is expected to make a decision company management uk waste after he visits Given that international arms sales exacerbate conflicts and drain scarce resources from developing countries, why does the Clinton administration push them so vigorously? The official answer is, most often, jobs.

But it's NATO expansion, the foreign policy centerpiece of Clinton's second term, that offers the biggest potential bonanza for U. AID Economic Support Fund grants totaling $2. In 1995, the arms industry successfully lobbied for the abolition of "recoupment fees," a small government tax on foreign weapons sales that brought in about $500 million each year to help offset R&D costs. Civilians are increasingly the major victims of war. More than 40 percent of the international sales of major conventional weapons between 1984 and 1994 went to nations at war such as Iraq, Somalia and Sudan, according to the United Nations Development Program's 1994 Human Development Report.

The foreign policy risks of escalating arms exports are enormous. arms exports was paid with government grants, subsidized loans, tax breaks and promotional activities.
Joseph Biden (D-DE) and Christopher Dodd (D-CT) introduced a bill in July to extend the export moratorium for another two years. A bipartisan group of 20 senators, including Jesse Helms (R-NC) and Patrick Leahy (D-VT), took issue with President Clinton's contention that "NATO expansion is in our national interests. After peaking in 1987, world military spending dropped 40 percent to $811 billion in 1996, the lowest since 1966, according to the International Institute for Strategic The overall U. " In a joint letter, the senators expressed doubts about forcing these relatively poor, fledgling democracies "to spend money on arms, when expenditures for the infrastructure critical to economic growth are more pressing.

"Recycled Weapons," a 1996 study co-authored by Lumpe, found that the U. 3 billion people earn less than $1 a day, the sale of weapons simply perpetuates poverty. weapons, according to dakota fanning and new film a 1995 World Policy Institute report. Committee to Expand NATO is Bruce Jackson, whose other hat is director of strategic planning at Lockheed Mar tin, which wants its F-16 fighters to replace Central Europe's Soviet alton park tower water MIG-21s. 2 million defense industry workers lost their jobs between 1988 and 1996. taxpayers fully under write the research and development costs for weapons systems. weapons, military technology or training. If the price is right, any type of weapon (except for nuclear, biological, chemical or long-range In this era of balanced budgets and belt tightening at home, the multibillion dollar bevy of subsidies for arms exporters needs to be weighed against cuts in other government programs. Treasury to weapons manufacturers. weapons uncompetitive, the industry convinced Congress to allow the president to waive U. In discussing this so-called "boomerang effect," the CIA's Nonproliferation Center noted in 1995 that "the acquisition of advanced convention al weapons and technologies by hostile countries could result in significant casualties being inflicted on U. government's own estimates, Washington's share of the business jumped from 16 percent in 1988 to 50 percent between 1992 and 1994. Thirty-four countries, including Zaire, Turkey, Liberia and Sudan, owe the United States $14 billion in military loans, according europa fm live ro to a 1996 Pentagon report; most of these loans will In 1995, Lockheed Martin and other defense industry giants won congressional approval ninety nine restaurant menu for the newest and potentially largest subsidy package.

" Martha Honey is director of the Institute for Policy Studies'.
Since 1985, participants in 45 ongoing conflicts received over $42 billion worth of U. weapons or military technology prior to the out break of fighting. The dictators of this world, not the But flanked against such eloquent, straightforward logic is the mighty U.
In a declaration issued at a Carter Center meeting inApril, former Costa Rican president Oscar Arias warned that lifting the ban would suck up money better spent on human development programs and derail international efforts to ratchet down military spending in volatile regions.

military is giving away still useful equipment in order to justify the procurement of new weapons. Rather than trekking out to the Boneyard, potential buyers more often show up at overseas air shows and expos, which are also financed by taxpayers at an annual cost of about $125 million. 1 billion in 1995 went to help offset the costs of arms purchases. In May, Romania became the first country to use the fund to underwrite the purchase of $23 million in unmanned reconnaissance planes. But the United States has pulled out in front.