U.S. Shares Weaponry With World, Report Says

In a sale likened by critics to a giant flea market for weapons, the Pentagon has transferred $8.8 billion worth of surplus tanks, ships, aircraft, missiles and guns to dozens of nations over the past five years, in some cases exacerbating regional arms races.

The transfers are intended to reduce the massive surplus of weapons left from the Cold War, as well as to raise spare cash for the Defense Department.

Most of the weapons are either sold at low cost or given away outright if their value is small.

The arms have gone all over the world--four Hercules transport planes to Romania, two landing craft to Chile, 15 rifles to Belize, 12 bombers to Bangladesh, seven flying tankers to France and 922 battle tanks to Turkey, according to a report issued Tuesday by the Federation of American Scientists.

Estonia received laptop computers, Botswana trousers and Bolivia mapping equipment. Among the other items were trucks for Djibouti and ammunition for Ecuador.

While Congress puts tight legislative controls on the flow of new weapons, the Pentagon has far greater freedom to equip armies with surplus weapons, said Lora Lumpe, an expert on arms transfers who coauthored the report.

The Federation of American Scientists is a public policy research group frequently critical of the federal government.

Since 1990, the Pentagon has given away 3,900 heavy tanks and 500 ground-attack jets, primarily to developing countries. The transfers in some cases are “fanning regional arms races,” particularly between Greece and Turkey, Lumpe said.

Under a 1990 treaty on reducing conventional arms in Europe, the United States, its allies and a number of former Warsaw Pact nations destroyed 37,000 conventional weapons by 1994. But the treaty allowed large weapons giveaways.

“The fundamental principle of the United States is that every country has the right to be armed to the hilt,” Lumpe said.

A Defense Department spokeswoman said officials had not seen the study and would decline to comment. In general, Pentagon policies are meant to enhance regional military stability by crafting careful balances in forces.

The transfers of used weapons are controlled by an obscure management panel known as the Excess Defense Articles Coordinating Committee, which includes members from the Defense, State and Commerce departments.

The committee has enormous power to affect worldwide military power. Since 1990, the committee has approved the transfer, for example, of 86 naval vessels, including destroyers, frigates and landing ships. Among the most controversial transfers were the 922 battle tanks to Turkey and a parallel transfer of 672 tanks to Greece.

“In some cases, we have chosen to transfer tanks just to avoid the higher cost of transporting or destroying them,” said Natalie J. Goldring, an analyst at the British American Security Information Council, who said she concurred with many of the conclusions in the report. “We have vastly increased the ability of Greece and Turkey to fight each other.”

But Marcy Agmon, a political scientist at Santa Monica’s Rand Corp., said the transfer of surplus military equipment ranks among the less-threatening issues that the United States is confronting in international security assistance.

More troubling is that purchasers are increasingly pressuring the United States and other major military powers to supply highly sophisticated “smart” weapons along with bread-and-butter equipment such as military aircraft, Agmon said.

“We have had a prudent policy, but I am concerned about the future,” Agmon said. “There seems to be less restraint on the part of everyone.”

Lumpe said the risks are growing because of the increasing willingness of Congress and the Pentagon to finance potent new weapons for the U.S. military by selling secondhand systems.

The Navy, for example, is seeking to unload about 300 F-18A/B jet fighters to help finance production of newer F-18C/D and F-18E/F models, the report said.

“It is kind of cheesy on the one hand, but ingenious on the other hand,” Lumpe said.