The U.S. government should be making it more difficult to sell weapons—at home as well as abroad.
Guys with Guns
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Arms Exports
World Cuts Back Military Spending, But Not Asia
Driven by a rising China and arms exports from the United States, military spending in Asia is on the increase.
An Agreement on Arms — With No Teeth
Fearing the disruption of gun exports, the National Rifle Association vociferously opposed the Arms Trade Treaty that was approved on April 2 by the UN General Assembly. The joke, though, is not just on the NRA. While the treaty doesn’t do anything to affect American gun-owners, it’s so weak that it doesn’t seem to affect anybody at all.
Asia Is Up in Arms
The geopolitical centre of gravity, as measured in arms spending and transfers, has shifted to Asia.
The top five arms importers over the last five years, according to new data from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), are from Asia. And, led by deep-pocketed China, Asia is poised to overtake Europe for the first time in modern history in overall military spending. The Cold War ended in Europe in the early 1990s. But Asia continues to buy and sell weapons as if the Cold War never went out of style.
Weapons: Our #1 Export?
The phrase "Obama has a lot on his plate" is the understatement of the year. The president has a to-do list a mile long, and every day a new crisis (like the coup in Honduras) gets added to the list. Can we really fault him if he sneaks the occasional smoke?
Indonesia’s Arms Appetite
Jakarta wants weapons. Lots of them.
Arming the Middle East
President George W Bush announced during his recent Middle East trip that he is formally serving notice to Congress of his administration’s decision to approve the sale of bomb-guidance kits to Saudi Arabia. This announcement follows notification on five other arms deals to Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait that are part of a $20 billion package of additional armaments over the next decade to the family dictatorships of Saudi Arabia and other Persian Gulf emirates announced by President George W. Bush last summer.