Global Policy Forum

By Thalif Deen

When the 15-member United Nations Security Council legitimized the US-imposed interim government in Baghdad in June, the five-page unanimous resolution carried a provision little publicized in the media: the lifting of a 14-year arms embargo on Iraq. The Security Council's decision to end military sanctions on Iraq has triggered a rush by the world's weapons dealers to make a grab for a potentially multimillion-dollar new arms market in the already over-armed Middle East.

The former US-run Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA), which handed over power to the new Iraqi government on June 28, finalized plans for the purchase of six C-130 Hercules military transport aircraft, 16 Iroquois helicopters and a squadron of 16 low-flying, light reconnaissance aircraft - all for delivery by next April. The proposed purchases were part of an attempt to rebuild and revitalize Iraq's sanctions-hit, weapons-starved military.

But some experts question the strategy. "The flow of weapons to Iraq will not improve the security situation in Iraq, nor will it make the country safe from outside threats or an external invasion," said Naseer H Aruri, chancellor professor (emeritus) at the University of Massachusetts. "With 140,000 US military personnel, 20,000 from the so-called coalition of the willing and another 20,000 contracted civilians, Iraq remains occupied and denied effective sovereignty," said Aruri, author of Dishonest Broker: The US Role in Israel and Palestine.

"Purchasing weapons at this time, therefore, is more relevant to the needs of the occupier relating to the suppression of armed opposition, and consolidation of US hegemony. Moreover, it is not appropriate for the interim government, a subcontracting agency for the United States, to go shopping for arms as numerous arms exporting countries compete feverishly for contracts," he told Inter Press Service (IPS).

The United States, the United Kingdom and Jordan are providing assistance and training for the creation of a 40,000-person Iraqi army. With blessings from the US Congress, the former CPA also earmarked about $2.1 billion for national security, including $2 billion for the new army and $76 million for a civil defense corps. Since late last year, Iraq has purchased 50,000 handguns from Austria, 421 UAZ Hunter jeeps from Russia and millions of dollars' worth of armored cars from Brazil and Ukraine, along with AK-47 assault rifles, 9mm pistols, military vehicles, fire-control equipment and night-vision devices.

The biggest single deal was a $327 million contract with a US firm to outfit Iraqi troops with body armor, radios and other communications equipment. The contract has been challenged by two non-US firms that lost out on the bidding process. The decision by the CPA to purchase the handguns from the Austrian gun maker Glock late last year evoked a strong protest to the Pentagon. "There are a number of US companies that could easily provide these weapons," Representative Jeb Bradley, a member of President George W Bush's Republican Party, said in a letter to US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, "Why were other firearms companies, namely American companies, passed over?" he asked.

The US Army Corps of Engineers awarded two contracts, totaling $2.7 million, to US firms in March for transmission, distribution, communications and controls for the Iraqi infrastructure. A third contract valued at $7.8 million - for a modern, digital cellular, command and control system to link the various sites of the Iraqi armed forces and the Coalition Military Assistance Training Team - was also awarded to a US-based company.

The US has also awarded a $150 million contract for the renovation of four military bases at Umm Qasr, al-Kasik, Tadji and Numaniyah in various parts of Iraq. And the Pentagon has plans to expand existing military bases near Mosul, Baghdad and Kut, specifically for the US Army. This contract is estimated at about $600 million. "It does not seem wise to introduce new weaponry and military capability into Iraq's volatile mix of ongoing war and occupation, civil strife and political transition," said Frida Berrigan, senior research associate with the Arms Trade Resource Center, a project of the World Policy Institute.

On average, more than two US soldiers are killed each day, she said, and inter-Iraqi violence is taking a deadly toll on civilians and government officials. "Before Iraq is outfitted with high-tech weaponry, it seems that the low-tech needs of clean water and reliable electricity should be met," Berrigan told IPS.

In addition, if experience with the Iraqi police force is any indication of what is to come from a US-armed and -trained security force, she said, this is not the right time for the interim leadership to embark on an arms spending spree. "Instead of aiding the United States in putting down the uprisings, thousands from Iraq's newly trained police force deserted, and many reportedly turned over their US-issued weapons to street fighters. How many of the 135 Americans killed during that month faced American guns and ammunition?" Berrigan asked.

"It's a well-known fact that Iraq is saturated with weapons and ammunition, particularly firearms and light machine-guns, but also others," said Mouin Rabbani, a Middle East analyst based in Jordan and a contributing editor to the Washington-based Middle East Report.

That is one reason the US has experienced so much difficulty in its efforts to eradicate the insurgency, he said: the insurgents do not appear to be dependent on a flow of weapons from outside their borders. At the same time, the Iraqi security forces, particularly the Iraqi national army once it is properly reconstituted, does not have - or has only very few - weapons systems normally associated with national self-defense, such as combat aircraft, artillery and air defenses, Rabbani said. "One can argue about whether or not investing in such systems constitutes a particularly wise move by the Iraqi national authorities given the numerous and severe challenges facing Iraqi society," he told IPS.

But it is a fact that a sovereign Iraqi state has a legitimate right to acquire sophisticated weapons systems and, given the way political and military leaders invariably behave, will seek to acquire them, he added. Rabbani said Iraq has a long military tradition, some would even say a long tradition of militarism, and the dissolution of the Iraqi armed forces, combined with the destruction of much of the heavy weaponry that was left at the end of a previous war, means the government will have to invest considerably more in developing an effective military than would otherwise have been the case.

But, he added, "It would be particularly reprehensible if American and other arms exporters exploit their control of Iraq and its government to foist upon it the purchase and acquisition of weapons systems that are either prohibitively expensive, including systems marked up in price to make a fast buck, or unnecessary."

If they do so, Rabbani said, they will be repeating a pattern of weapons sales seen during the past several decades to, for example, Saudi Arabia and other Persian Gulf states (part of the system known as petrodollar recycling). Overall military spending in the Middle East is estimated to reach about $55 billion annually by 2007, rising from about $52 billion in 2003, according to Forecast International, a US-based defense market research organization. The big spenders include Saudi Arabia, which will average more than $18 billion in defense spending annually through 2007, followed by Israel (more than $9 billion), Iran ($4.5 billion), the United Arab Emirates (about $3.7 billion) and Egypt (more than $3 billion).

A large proportion of the funds is earmarked for weapons purchases, mostly from the US, the UK, France and Russia. Iraq's first decisions concerning military acquisitions will be critical, Rabbani said, because they will virtually determine subsequent purchases (in terms of compatibility, for example). "It therefore seems to me crucial that such decisions be made by a genuinely independent Iraqi government, upon the recommendation of a professional assessment by a genuinely independent Iraqi military high command, on the basis of both the current and future needs of the country and its existing traditions," he said.

Even "grants" of sophisticated weapons by the US or other states with military export industries will interfere with this process, said Rabbani. "The pattern in Iraq so far is that it is being seen as a financial bonanza - and where civilian contractors like Halliburton and Bechtel have gone, military contractors such as Lockheed and Raytheon can be expected to follow."