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Middle East War Adds to Surge in International Arms Sales [1]
['Eric Lipton', 'More About Eric Lipton']
Date: 2023-10-17
Just days after the assault by Hamas ignited a new war in the Middle East, shipments of American weapons began arriving in Israel: smart bombs, ammunition and interceptors for the Iron Dome missile-defense system. In President Biden’s planned meeting in Israel on Wednesday with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, more military aid is a likely topic.
The conflict between Israel and Hamas is just the latest impetus behind a boom in international arms sales that is bolstering profits and weapons-making capacity among American suppliers.
The surge in sales is providing the Biden administration with new opportunities to tie the militaries of other countries more closely to the United States, the world’s biggest arms exporter, while also raising concerns that a more heavily armed world will be prone to careen into further wars.
Even before Israel responded to the deadly Hamas attack, the combination of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the perception of a rising threat from China was spurring a global rush to purchase fighter planes, missiles, tanks, artillery, munitions and other lethal equipment. The surge in sales is also being driven by the rapid pace of technological change in warfighting, pressuring even well-armed nations to buy new generations of equipment to stay competitive.
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[1] Url:
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/17/us/politics/israel-gaza-global-arms-sales.html
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