The worst thing about knowing something you don’t really want to is having it confirmed over and over again. At a time where some of the wealthier nations are seeing the end of a financial crisis (France and Germany for instance) – the developing ones are scrambling to get desperately needed cash to fill their national budgets.
Between 2000 and 2007 developing nations were the primary focus of foreign arms sales by weapons supplies. One would think that given the dramatic fall of the global economy and the struggling economies of developing countries that this would no longer be the case. Why spend all this money for weapons when so many other pressing social and economic issues are at stake?
Many analysts thought the developing world would somehow escape from the crisis because their banks had very few “toxic assets” that sparked the madness in the first place. But these analysts (IMF for example) did not consider remittances. Remittances sent to Africa, for instance, total three times the amount of all aid. Not anymore.
Last year, the global arms sales amounted to $55.2 billion. The US share of those sales was $37.8 billion which is the equivalent of 68.4% of all global business in that shady enterprise. Of that $37.8 billion, $29.6 billion came from developing countries. In other words, the US had over 70% of the weapons trade cornered in the developing world in 2008.
Italy ranks a distant second at $3.7 billion.
Quick update – France is also in the business of weapons dealing. According to the Liberation (a French left leaning daily ), President Sarkozy is about to sign an arms deal with Brazil worth several billion Euros.
