arms trade

We’re on the eve of the first-ever Global Day of Action on Military Spending, and the turnout has already exceeded all of our expectations. There will be more than 100 actions in at least 35 countries. We have multiple events in Australia, New Zealand, and India. There will be actions in Okinawa, Hawaii, Puerto Rico and many parts of Europe. There will be flash mobs and demonstrations and speak outs and petitions and films and marches and much, much more.

The events in the Middle East and north Africa have highlighted that the governments who have ignored human rights issues to support and sell arms to authoritarian regimes are not only hypocritical and immoral, but also short-sighted in terms of /realpolitik/. Politicians squirm yet remained shameless when pressed on shameful dealings in the not-so-distant past.

In 2009 the Defence & Security Equipment International (DSEI) exhibition was due to hold its bi-annual arms selling jamboree in East London, opening with a conference at the Queen Elizabeth Conference centre in central London.

‘Neged Neshek’means ‘Against Arms’ in Hebrew. This website endeavours to be a valuable resource for news, data and analysis focusing on Israel’s arms industry with a secondary focus on militarism in Israeli culture, society and politics.

United Nations, Mar 10, 2011 (IPS) - World governments have spent an estimated $1.6 trillion dollars in 2010 on military operations, weapons, research and military aid, according the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI). What would you do with this amount of money? By asking this thought-provoking question NGOs seek to strengthen the discussion about alternative ways for shifting and reallocating military spending in the run-up to the Global Day of Action on Military Spending (GDAMS) on April 12.

In the UK, the arms trade is in the spotlight. As revolutions in North Africa and the Middle East challenge authoritarian regimes, they also challenge the UK government's approach to arms sales.

On 11 March 2011, the Platform against the BBVA bank of Bilbao held a gathering and a protest outside the BBVA shareholders’ meeting held in the Palacio Euskalduna in Bilbao. Both were very successful. Participation in the protest was high and the action was carried out at the entrance of the thieves’ cave (as it has been labelled by many during the protests) without any incidents.

Frank Slijper

After the bloody suppression of protests in Beijing's Tiananmen Square in 1989, the European Union (and the US) ordered an arms embargo that applies until today. From a human rights perspective this is fully justified: the situation remains appalling and attempts at democratic reforms are nipped in the bud. At the same time the embargo is also clearly politically motivated, to keep China as small as possible in military terms. While the economic relationship with China has grown, military co-operation rightly remains a thorny issue. Despite cracks in the embargo it won't be off the table any time soon. Yet it is a question how long the blockade will be maintained with China strengthening its power base.

Jordi Calvo

The uprisings in the Arab world have led to extreme violence in the country which has suffered the longest-standing and most repressive dictatorship of the Arab world. Due to the lack of information from the press, we suppose that the protests took place against repression on a smaller scale, perhaps at the hands of Libyan security forces who, when faced with the success of these uprisings, did not want to face their people. Therefore it is presumed that those who are using military strategies are mercenaries. It is very difficult to know where these soldiers are coming from and whether they form part of private military organisations, which are playing an increasingly important role in current armed conflicts. It is also difficult to know what arms we are talking about when we hear the news that fighter planes and helicopters are shooting at the civilian population. However, it is not impossible to find out this information.

In 2009, global military spending surged to an all-time high of US $1.53 trillion. Given the numerous crises facing the planet -- economic, environmental, health, diplomatic – it is vital to create a global movement to shift this money to human needs. Thousands of organizations, and millions of individuals, support this point of view. Moreover, because of the global economic crisis, some governments are even beginning to cut military spending.

Pere Ortega

It was between 9/11 and the ensuing war against international terrorism (in Afghanistan and Iraq) initiated by the USA, with the help of the majority of European countries, that the already sizeable military spending of the USA’s allied countries began to increase significantly. In this regard, the USA has spent $1100 billion. In Europe spending has not gone so far. However, these defence budgets have increased above their national GDPs, with an annual average 5% increase.

Wendela de Vries

Of the global top 20 arms producers, 4 European companies are ranked in high positions. Leading is British BAE Systems (former British Aerospace). The Swedish peace research institute SIPRI even ranked BAE Systems as the biggest global arms producer in 2008, but US weekly Defence News, using another ranking system, is listing BAE Systems third after the American companies Boeing and Lockheed Martin. Besides BAE the three other European giants are Italy’s Finmeccanica and formally Dutch-based EADS, both  mainly aeronautical companies, and French electronics company Thales. The output of these giants is bigger than the output of many a developing nation. They arose from the mid-1990’s in a process of mergers and acquisitions, when international (notably American) competition forced European defence companies to overcome national limits in order to survive. At that time a lot of state-owned defence companies were privatised, facilitating the accumulation process. Still national governments often kept a say in their defence industries: Finmeccanica is 30% state-owned, Thales is 27% French state-owned and EADS is partly French state and a Spanish state holding company-owned. Note that, in contrast, BAE Systems is private, although the company can count on strong government support, including export promotion, sales financing and even covering up of high-level corruption.