The global arms industry likes to grease the corridors of power:
The US arms industry is backing Hillary Clinton for President and has all but abandoned its traditional allies in the Republican party. Mrs Clinton has also emerged as Wall Street’s favourite. Investment bankers have opened their wallets in unprecedented numbers for the New York senator over the past three months and, in the process, dumped their earlier favourite, Barack Obama.
Mrs Clinton’s wooing of the defence industry is all the more remarkable given the frosty relations between Bill Clinton and the military during his presidency. An analysis of campaign contributions shows senior defence industry employees are pouring money into her war chest in the belief that their generosity will be repaid many times over with future defence contracts.
Employees of the top five US arms manufacturers – Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Northrop-Grumman, General Dynamics and Raytheon – gave Democratic presidential candidates $103,900, with only $86,800 going to the Republicans. “The contributions clearly suggest the arms industry has reached the conclusion that Democratic prospects for 2008 are very good indeed,” said Thomas Edsall, an academic at Columbia University in New York.
The situation in America is clearly intolerable but the Jewish state is keen to compete for the crown:
Yitzhak Rabin’s government decided, more than 10 years ago, that Israeli companies may not sell arms to Burma (Myanmar). Despite that, two large transactions were carried out: In one case, the Israel Military Industries sold Burma several million dollars’ worth of rifles, automatic rifles and ammunition, and Soltam sold 18 155-millimeter cannons, worth about $20 million. The middleman in these deals, and several others, was Koor Trade, which then had an office in neighboring Thailand.
Since that government decision, Israeli dealers, middlemen and weapons companies have requested several times to the Defense Ministry’s Foreign Defense Assistance and Defense Export Organization that they be allowed to sell more weapons, but the answer has been unequivocal: absolutely not.
The effect of small arms, as just one area, is already devastating.