A report published on http://www.globalresearch.ca/ shows that current US president has authorized the sale of more arms to foreign governments than any other US president after World War II.
While Obama has been praised in the media for his passionate appeal on reducing the number of guns on the streets of America, his administration has seen the access to more arms in countries whose policies or intended use of those guns is questionable.
According to the US Department of State’s “World Military Expenditures and Arms Transfers 2014: Introduction and Overview” report,
“during the period of 2001-2011, more than 77% of the world arms trade, by value appears to have been supplied by the United States, about 11% by the European Union, about 5% by Russia, less than 2% by China. The US share of the world arms market appears to have grown, while the EU share appears to have diminished.”
The violence being occasioned in the Middle East and North Africa has created a huge market hole that this administration seems committed to filling.
Arms are purchased by an array of “politically stable” governments such as Turkey and Taiwan. They are also purchased by corrupt, weakened and “unstable” governments such as those of Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, where there is little to no accountability in terms of who is utilizing or selling the weapons. During President Obama’s first five years in office, new agreements under the Pentagon’s Foreign Military Sales program — the largest channel for US arms exports — totaled over $169 billion. According to William Hartung, director of the Arms and Security Project at the Center for International Policy, in an interview with Democracy Now!, the volume of deals authorized by President Obama has exceeded the amount approved by President George W. Bush throughout his tenure by nearly $30 billion.
In 2015, President Obama authorized the sale of armed drones. A study published by the Teal Group, a defense industry research and analysis firm, indicated that the sale of armed drones is expected to grow substantially: “Teal Group’s 2014 market study estimates that Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) spending will nearly double over the next decade from current worldwide UAV expenditures of $6.4 billion annually to $11.5 billion, totaling almost $91 billion in the next ten years.” Read full report here
