U.S. Arms Recipients, 2006/07: Near East

Despite sharp increases in U.S. security assistance and arms transfers to Asia as part of the global campaign against terrorism, the Middle East remains the largest market for U.S. weaponry, with the bulk of it going to Washington’s two closest allies in the region, Iraq and Israel.

Iraq

As the U.S. intervention in Iraq approaches its six-year anniversary, exports of U.S. weaponry to that country have increased sharply, as Washington works to train and equip the Iraqi military to fight the multi-sided insurgency with fewer U.S. “boots on the ground.” In 2007 and 2008, over $20 billion in arms sales offers have been made to the Baghdad government, covering everything from tanks and attack helicopters to military construction services to small arms and ammunition.[35] It is as yet unclear how much of this flood of weapons systems is being paid for out of Iraqi oil revenues rather than with U.S. government assistance.

Although an examination of emergency war supplementals from 2003 to the present reveals that $25 billion has been authorized to provide support for the Iraqi Security Forces, detailed breakdowns of how this funding has been allocated (for equipment, training, infrastructure, or other purposes) are hard to come by. According to one breakdown covering funds authorized in FY2007, over $2.2 billion of the $5.5 billion provided for Iraqi Security Forces went for “equipment and transportation.”[36] What information we possess about U.S. security assistance funding levels for Iraq is reflected in table 14.

Table 14
Major U.S. Security Assistance Programs to Iraq
FY 2002 through FY 2009 (dollars in thousands)

Sources: U.S. Department of State, Congressional Budget Justification for Foreign Operations, FY 2004 through FY 2009 editions; and U.S. Department of Defense, "Global War on Terror" supplemental appropriations, FY 2003 through FY 2009 editions.
^aFY 2008 figures are estimates.
^bFY 2009 figures are as proposed in the administration's budget.
^cApproximately $5 billion in funding for equipping and training Iraqi Security Forces was taken from the $18.4 billion appropriation for the Iraq Relief and Reconstruction Fund (IRRF).
^dFigures for the CERP program include funding for both Iraq and Afghanistan; because of the uncertainty as to how the funds are split between the two countries, the CERP figures have not been added into the security assistance totals in this table.

One interesting finding that emerges from the data in table 14 is that funding for the Iraqi Security Forces now exceeds the original projected budget for Iraq reconstruction, a subject that has received far more attention due to the high-profile contract abuses by companies such as the Halliburton subsidiary Kellogg, Brown and Root (the company is no longer part of Halliburton). This suggests the need for closer monitoring of military training and weapons transfers as the bulk of U.S. assistance to Iraq moves in that direction.

While the logic of increasing U.S. arms transfers to Iraq in conjunction with a reduction in the U.S. military presence there seems unimpeachable, there are several nagging questions that need to be addressed. The first involves accountability for U.S. weapons that are designed to reach Iraqi government forces. As of mid-2008, according to Amnesty International, more than 360,000 of the over one million pistols and automatic weapons provided by the United States to Iraq had not been adequately accounted for, the assumption being that many of them may have been diverted to antigovernment insurgents or illegally transferred to other nations in exchange for cash. The New York Times reported in November 2007 that the U.S. contractor Lee Dynamics had partnered with an Iraqi businessman who was alleged by co-workers to have “turned the armory into his own private arms bazaar with the seeming approval of some American officials and executives, selling AK-47 assault rifles, Glock pistols and heavy machine guns to anyone with cash in hand—Iraqi militias, South African security guards, and even American contractors.” Until better mechanisms are established for tracking and securing U.S. weapons supplies to Iraq, it may make sense to moderate the flow of new transfers, particularly of highly portable small arms and light weapons.

The increase in U.S. arms supplies to Iraq also gives rise to the question of how the weapons may be used once the United States either leaves Iraq or dramatically reduces its military presence there. While the much discussed “Sunni Awakening” has clearly been a major factor in the reduction of violence in Iraq during 2007/08, the Sunni militias, which have been trained and armed by the United States, could end up undermining recent progress in Iraq if they were to turn their arms on Shiite forces inside and outside the Iraqi government. One of the many conundrums of the arms trade is the fact that it is often difficult to control how weapons are utilized once they have been transferred to an ally of the moment. The possibility of future internal strife in Iraq should serve as a cautionary note in determining both the volume and the types of U.S. weaponry supplied to factions within the country.

Israel

Israel has been the largest recipient of U.S. security assistance since the early 1970s, when the Nixon administration dramatically increased military aid to America’s closest Mideast ally. This pattern has continued throughout the Bush administration, during which time Israel has received over $21 billion in security assistance funding, an average of more than $2.7 billion a year (see table 15. Beginning with the FY2010 budget, to be introduced in February 2009, Israel is slated to receive an increase in security assistance of up to $3 billion a year over a ten-year period. According to the State Department, “Increased assistance will allow for a more robust Israeli defense budget during a critical time for the peace process and in the midst of regional instability. It will also help safeguard Israel’s Qualitative Military Edge.”[37] Thus, military and security aid will remain the primary forms of U.S. assistance to Israel for years to come.

Table 15
Major U.S. Security Assistance Programs to Israel
FY 2002 through FY 2009 (dollars in thousands)

Source: U.S. Department of State, Congressional Budget Justification for Foreign Operations, FY 2004 through FY 2009 editions.
^aFY 2008 figures are estimates.
^bFY 2009 figures are as proposed in the administration's budget.

Until late in its second term, the Bush administration did little to reinforce Israel’s security by nonmilitary means, with the November 2007 Annapolis talks on a framework for peace between Israel and the Palestinians coming far too late to have a positive impact on the increasingly chaotic situation on the ground.

Over the past several years, Israel has faced conflicts on three fronts: in the Gaza Strip, on the West Bank, and in Lebanon in its battles with Hezbollah. Each of these conflicts has been accompanied by attacks on Israeli territory. Estimated casualties in the fighting between Israelis and Palestinians during 2007 included the deaths of 373 Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza. The Israeli human rights group B’tselem estimates that about a third of those killed were civilians. At the same time, 13 Israeli soldiers and 7 Israeli civilians were killed by Palestinian forces. But the biggest source of violence against Palestinians during 2007 came from other Palestinians: 400 Palestinians died in the Gaza Strip in factional fighting involving Hamas and Fatah. [38]

Perhaps the most controversial use of U.S.-supplied armaments in recent years came during Israel’s 34-day war in Lebanon in the summer of 2006. A conflict that was sparked by the capture by Hezbollah of three Israeli soldiers evolved into a bloody ground war between the Israeli Defense Force and irregular Hezbollah forces. Hundreds of Lebanese civilians were caught in the crossfire. The Israeli bombing raids accompanying the intervention resulted in widespread destruction of Lebanon’s basic infrastructure.[39] Of particular concern was the use of cluster bombs by Israeli forces, a practice that intensified in the waning days of the conflict.

Cluster bombs are a weapon system of particular concern because of their potential to harm civilians. On initial use, the bombs scatter thousands of separate bomblets over an area that can be as large as several football fields, with a high likelihood of killing or maiming anyone in that area. After the bombs have been dropped, unexploded bomblets are inevitably left behind, and are often set off inadvertently by civilians long after the conflict has ended. Because of this probability of wounding or killing noncombatants, cluster munitions have been branded indiscriminate weapons and are now the subject of a global ban that has been endorsed by over a hundred nations (but not, thus far, by either the United States or Israel).[40]

As noted by Human Rights Watch and other observers, many of the cluster bombs used by Israel were of U.S. origin, supplied under U.S. security assistance programs. For example, the M77 submunition, delivered by the U.S.-supplied Multiple Launch Rocket System (MLRS), was used widely during the war. As of February 2008, over 40 percent of the submunitions cleared by de-miners working in Lebanon were of the M77 type. Postwar assessments suggest that there may have been as many as a million unexploded “bomblets” left on Lebanese soil after the Israeli intervention, posing an ongoing threat to civilians and acting as an impediment to certain normal economic activities such as agriculture. It is estimated that there have been at least 200 casualties since the end of the Lebanon conflict caused by leftover cluster munitions.[41]

The bulk of Israel’s arsenal consists of U.S.-supplied weaponry, from F-16 and F-15 combat aircraft, to M-1 tanks, to attack helicopters, to bombs and ammunition. So when Israeli forces engage in combat in Gaza or the West Bank, they are more often than not using U.S.-designed systems that were either made in the United States or produced under license in Israel. However, as Human Rights Watch notes in its 2008 World Report, “Despite its leverage, the US has not made the funding conditional on Israel improving its human rights record.”[42]