The US has recently carried out the following arms deals:
- 16 Chinook helicopters sold to the UK for $3.5 billion on October 19
- 3 King Air 350ER aircraft to Canada for $300 million on October 4
- 5 Bell 407GX helicopters to Iraq for $82.5 million on October 4
- One guided and one tactical missile system to Bahrain for $300 million on September 28
- A blanket order check of $330 million in arms for Taiwan on September 24
- 50 MK 15 Phalanx weapon systems to the UK for $75 million on September 20
Golly…$5 billion in arms sales over the past month!?!
Didn’t hear about any of those sales on the nightly news, did you?
I wonder why that is.
I think it’s probably because the corporations that control our news don’t want us to know about these sales.
Last year the US sold 24% more arms than it did in 2016, or $42 billion worth.
Just five countries account for 75% of all global arms deals: The US, Russia, Germany, France and the UK.
In 2011, US arms sales totaled over $21 billion. The second-leading country was Russia, with nearly $8 billion in arms sales.
Countries that buy the most arms are India, South Korea, Pakistan, China and Singapore.
In 2011 the US and Saudi Arabia did a $60 billion arms deal.
This year we’re set to do a $110 billion arms deal, and Trump wants to go through with that even though the Saudi government ordered the killing and dismemberment of a journalist in a foreign country and then tried to cover it up.
This deal was actually set up last year, and since then we know that $14.5 billion in arms sales have already gone through.
And we know what those weapons are used for.
For instance, in August the Saudis used one of the laser-guided Mark 82 bombs we sold them to bomb a school bus in Yemen. This killed 51 people, including 40 boys aged 6 to 11.
Few spoke out about this deal before the journalist was killed this month. For instance, only Rand Paul – he called the bill a “travesty” – and Tulsi Gabbard – called Saudi Arabi a country “with a devastating record of human rights violations at home and abroad” – spoke against it.
Everyone else in Congress knows that the arms dealers like Lockheed Martin are the folks that put them in office via campaign contributions.
Lockheed is the largest arms dealer in the US. So far this year the company has spent $4 million on political candidate campaigns and another $7 million on lobbying. Last year they spent over $14 million on lobbying.
Boeing and Raytheon are the next biggest companies, and they have similar political contribution amounts.
No wonder that no one in Congress is making hay about these arms deals. They know the hand that feeds them.
Neither Daines or Rosendale have taken money from this arms dealer.
Back in 2012, Jon Tester took $10,450 from Lockheed and this year he’s taken $11,550.
Lockheed is a company that makes bombs used to kill children. Jon Tester happily takes money from them.
Don’t ask him to return a penny of it, either. You know he won’t.
Notes
“2017 United States-Saudi Arabia arms deal.” Wikipedia. Retrieved 23 October 2018. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_United_States%E2%80%93Saudi_Arabia_arms_deal
Borger, Julian. “US supplied bomb that killed 40 children on Yemen school bus.” The Guardian. 19 August 2018. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/aug/19/us-supplied-bomb-that-killed-40-children-school-bus-yemen
Elbagir, Nima; Abdelaziz, Salma; Browne, Ryan; Arvanitidis, Barbara; Smith-Spark, Laura. “Bomb that killed 40 children was supplied by the US.” CNN. 17 August 2018. https://www.cnn.com/2018/08/17/middleeast/us-saudi-yemen-bus-strike-intl/index.html
“Global trade in weapons – Overview and current dynamics.” Bonn International Center for Conversion. Retrieved 23 October 2018. http://www.warpp.info/en/m5/articles/global-trade-in-weapons-overview-and-current
“Lockheed Martin.” Open Secrets. Retrieved 23 October 2018. https://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/summary.php?id=d000000104
“Lockheed Martin, 2018 Cycle.” Open Secrets. Retrieved 23 October 2018. https://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/recips.php?id=D000000104&type=P&state=&sort=A&cycle=2018
“Major arms sales.” Defense Security Cooperation Agency. Retrieved 23 October 2018. http://www.dsca.mil/major-arms-sales