Making a Killing: The State Department Boasts About 56% Increase in Foreign Arms Sales

As the world burns, the US proudly emphasizes that its $80.9 billion in FY23 Foreign Military Sales was the “highest annual total” ever recorded

An American weapons shipment arrives in Ukraine in February 2022. Photo credit: Efrem Lukatsky / AP file

The US government is in the business of war and business is booming.  

According to a fact sheet published in late January by the State Department’s Bureau of Political-Military Affairs, “in FY2023 the total value of transferred defense articles and services and security cooperation activities conducted under the Foreign Military Sales system was $80.9 billion.  This represents a 55.9% increase, up from $51.9 billion in FY2022.  This is the highest annual total of sales and assistance provided to our allies and partners.”

It's a peculiar flex given the horrors our armaments have caused throughout most of the 20^th and 21^st centuries. It’s even stranger when one considers the current state of the world and the role America’s weaponry is playing in perpetuating the violence and instability plaguing so many parts of the planet. While it may be an odd accomplishment to flaunt, it’s certainly par for the course for the US government and the callous gaslighting that sustains its foreign policy.  

In the document relaying the spike in sales, the State Department writes that “the United States follows a holistic approach when reviewing arms transfer decisions, in accordance with the U.S. Conventional Arms Transfer Policy, and weighs political, social, human rights, civilian protection, economic, military, nonproliferation, technology security, and end use factors to determine the appropriate provision of military equipment and the licensing of direct commercial sales of defense articles to U.S. allies and partners.”

Last year, the White House published a memorandum that was intended to provide further guidance on how the US government decides which nations to arm to the teeth. Reading the contents of this document is an insult to anyone with even a cursory understanding of recent history.

“The United States will promote norms and controls for the responsible international transfer of conventional arms and exercise restraint in transfers of weapons systems that may be destabilizing or dangerous to international peace and security,” the memorandum states.

“United States foreign policy and national security objectives are best advanced by facilitating arms transfers to trusted actors who will use them responsibly and who share United States interests.  This policy recognizes that, when not employed responsibly, defense materiel can be used to violate human rights and international humanitarian law, increase the risk of civilian harm, and otherwise damage United States interests,” the document further states.

This is the type of boilerplate gibberish that perpetuates the West’s destructive global arms trade, and the narrative managers who help spread it aren’t bothered by the fact that it’s rooted in lies. No matter how many fairy tales it tries to feed its citizens, America’s arms trade has always been about sparking and then fueling conflicts conducive to its geopolitical goals. It’s always been about making money for the weapons manufacturers that line the pockets of its lawmakers come election time. Western propaganda insists that flooding the world’s war zones with weapons makes them safer, but our eyes and objective reality tell us otherwise.

These obvious contradictions and lies about national security and global prosperity underscore the simple fact that the American arms industry is too important and too lucrative to curtail. No matter how many casualties they cause, the institutional forces driving sales of US-made weapons will always work to keep the funds flowing.

Several of the parameters set forth in the February 2023 memorandum illustrate this fact rather clearly. According to this document, the US government reviews arms transfers on a “case-by-case basis.” Of the more than a dozen considerations comprising the government’s decision-making process are two points that are especially worth mentioning.

The first is “the degree to which the transfer reduces an ally’s or partner’s dependence on United States competitors and/or helps displace long-term reliance on those competitors.”

It’s not every day that the government so readily volunteers admissions like this, but competing with foreign arms manufacturers has long been a primary concern for American lawmakers and the defense industry titans they bend over backwards to accommodate.

Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), the Swedish think tank which describes itself as an organization “dedicated to research into conflict, armaments, arms control and disarmament,” has spent years tracking this highly competitive space.

According to SIPRI, US-headquartered defense corporations accounted for 37% of all arms sold around the world for the five-year timeframe ending in 2020. Selling weapons to an astonishing 96 countries, this total was a 15% increase over the previous five-year interval, from 2011 to 2015.

Russia held 20% of the market, making it the world’s second largest exporter at the time. Total sales from its defense sector experienced a 22% decrease during the same prior five-year time period. During this time, China, the US government’s primary competitor, exported just 5.2% of the world’s weaponry, while its sales dropped by 7.8% between 2011–2015 and 2016–2020.

Two years later, data furnished by SIPRI revealed that America’s control of the weapons trade had grown even larger. According to the institute, America’s chunk of the market had swelled to 40% between 2018 and 2022, while Russia’s declined to 16%. In the wake of its February 2022 invasion of Ukraine, the rapid decline has stemmed from Moscow’s need to reserve weapons for its own military, as well as from Western sanctions that have criminalized trade with the Kremlin. This has created plenty of advantages for American industry.

One such opportunity presented itself later in 2022 following the Philippine government’s cancellation of an order for 16 Mi-17 Russian transport helicopters. As noted by a senior defense official during a Philippine Senate hearing, this decision came largely as a result of the Western sanctions being inflicted on Russia. Shortly thereafter, it was announced that the Philippines would purchase 32 Black Hawk helicopters from Lockheed Martin.

These are financial prospects the Beltway isn’t leaving to chance. As our elected officials have repeatedly emphasized, how large of a slice of the world’s weapons market America’s corporations get their hands on has always been, and remains, a primary focus for Capitol Hill. Over the past few years, the political landscape has been littered with outrage and panic from Washington’s top lawmakers over ceding market share to America’s global competitors.

As the memorandum notes, the US government’s Conventional Arms Transfer (CAT) policy dictates that shipping weapons overseas is encouraged in the event that doing so will “strengthen the United States manufacturing and defense industrial base.” 

With the nation’s lawmakers becoming more and more comfortable when it comes to admitting that a substantial part of America’s foreign policy is fueled by the need to feed the military-industrial complex, this has become a rather popular phrase on Capitol Hill.

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Earlier this week, the Senate voted 70 to 29 to pass a $95.3 billion foreign aid bill, which included $60 billion for Ukraine and $14.1 billion for Israel. House Speaker Mike Johnson has indicated that he has no plans to put the bill on the floor, but if history is any indication, the setback for this weapons package isn’t likely to be permanent.  

As always, the primary winners are the defense firms comprising the infamous Big Five.

Following a massive wave of consolidation starting in the 1990s, the defense industry dwindled to just five dominant corporations that gobbled up 36% of all federal defense contracts in 2020. Raytheon, which reported more than $57 billion in adjusted net sales that year, was one of them. On its website, the company boasts that approximately “50% of the world’s population is protected by our defense products.” This is a simultaneously comical and terrifying description of Raytheon’s contribution to humanity, given the violence [and constant threat of violence] the world has experienced as a result of America’s global military posture.  

For generations, America’s continuous stream of weapons has caused a level of death and destruction we may never be able to properly measure. In a world of ceaseless war and such immense human suffering, setting records for weapons sales is nothing to brag about.