by David Swanson Posted on
Spain, Thailand, Germany, Japan, Netherlands – The word has gone out that every government can buy a lot more weapons with either no debate at all or with all debate shut down by a single word: Russia. Do a web search for “weapons buying” and you’ll find story after story about U.S. residents solving their personal problems the way their government does. But search for the secret code words “defense spending” and the headlines look like a united global community of nations each doing its important bit to enrich the merchants of death.
Weapons companies don’t mind. Their stocks are soaring. US weapons exports exceed those of the next five leading weapons-dealing countries. The top seven countries account for 84% of weapons exports. Second place in international weapons dealing, held by Russia for the previous seven years, was taken over in 2021 by France. The only overlap between significant weapons dealing and where wars are present is in Ukraine and Russia – two countries impacted by a war widely recognized as outside the norm and meriting serious media coverage of the victims. In most years no nations with wars present are weapons dealers. Some nations get wars, others profit from wars.
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