Probe: US Arms Sales to Persian Gulf Lack Oversight

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Probe: US Arms Sales to Persian Gulf Lack Oversight

Joseph Schuman

(Sept. 29) -- The U.S. State and Defense departments have authorized billions of dollars in arms sales to countries in the Persian Gulf without documenting how transferring Patriot missile defense systems, F-16 fighter jets and the like advances the national interest, a government investigation found.

The Government Accountability Office, the nonpartisan investigative arm of Congress, said a State Department licensing program for commercial arms sales and a Defense agency handling government-to-government sales failed to comply with controls aimed at verifying how such weapons deals further U.S. interests in the region.

"State and DOD did not consistently document how arms transfers to gulf countries advanced U.S. foreign policy and national security goals for cases we selected," the GAO said.

In The Huffington Post, Jonathan Tasini, a Democratic candidate for Congress in New York, wrote that under both the Bush and Obama administrations, the U.S. "is dispensing weapons like candy without even making sure that the sales of the weapons advances anything but the bottom lines of the weapons industry."

The national-interest criteria for weapons sales to Saudi Arabia, Oman, Qatar, Kuwait, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates -- the six allied countries examined -- are key because, as the GAO noted, "the Persian Gulf remains a volatile region for the United States as it continues to withdraw U.S. forces from Iraq and confronts Iran's attempts to develop nuclear weapons."

Such concerns have also been widely cited as grounds for a spate of recent nuclear power assistance deals with Arab countries.

The GAO investigation also found that the State Department database responsible for tracking weapons-sales authorizations has difficulty keeping track of all deals in the region and their monetary totals because it doesn't distinguish weapons sales to foreign countries with transfers of weapons systems to U.S. forces in the region.

In contrast, the DOD's Foreign Military Sales agency was able to provide investigators with financial details on the $22 billion in arms transfers it authorized to the six gulf countries.

The deals examined by the GAO took place between 2005 and 2009, were worth around $40 billion in total and dealt with systems that ranged in scale from the Patriot missile defense to Javelin and Hellfire anti-tank missiles and C-17 transport aircraft. The biggest recipients of U.S. arms in the region by far were Saudi Arabia and the UAE.

Among the lapses, the State Department's Direct Commercial Sales agency documented its regional security review for only two out of 15 arms deals it condoned for the region and that were analyzed by the GAO. Another example: The DOD could not document its review of the effects of sharing highly secret military technology in the region for seven of the 13 authorizations examined.

Still, "while documentation was incomplete, U.S. officials stated that arms transfers to gulf countries are an effective tool to advance U.S. foreign policy and national security goals," the GAO said. "For example, U.S. officials noted that gulf countries support the United States by providing basing rights for the U.S. military in the region and supporting operations in Afghanistan."

The agencies also justified the arms deals with economic reasons.

Sponsored Links The GAO notes the arms deals "support the U.S. defense industrial base," and that with the exception of Bahrain and Oman, the countries in question have large oil or gas reserves.

The GAO recommended that the State and Defense departments provide more details on arms transfer authorizations to Congress, adding clarity on both the financial values of the approved deals and their national security ramifications, "especially for sales of significant military equipment."

It also called on State to improve its database, improving the capability to identify and separate licenses for arms headed to U.S. government entities and those going to foreign governments.

While the DOD largely concurred with the GAO findings and said it will work to meet them, the State Department said it needed additional resources to makes the fixes.

The Financial Times has tallied up "recent and pending" U.S. arms sales to gulf countries at more than $120 billion.

GAO Investigation: US Arms Sales to Persian Gulf Lack Oversight