WASHINGTON, Nov 7 — US government-to-government arms sales rose 4.7 per cent to a record US$38.1 billion (RM133 billion) last year and are projected to total almost as much in 2010, a Pentagon agency said yesterday.
The bumper 2009 sales reflected 465 per cent growth from an arms sales "low point" in fiscal 1998, according to Vice-Admiral Jeffrey Wieringa, head of the Pentagon's Defence Security Cooperation Agency.
Many, if not most, of the pacts signed in fiscal 2009 that ended Sept 30, are part of a boom in US conventional weapons sales that started under former President George W. Bush.
The 2009 sales were up from US$36.4 billion in sales agreements in 2008 and US$23.3 billion in 2007, said the agency, which administers the Pentagon's Foreign Military Sales programme, a key part of US alliance-building and maintenance.
US sales are expected to top US$37.9 billion in fiscal 2010, which began on Oct 1, Vanessa Murray, an agency spokeswoman, said in a written reply to Reuters.
Top US arms makers such as Lockheed Martin Corp, Boeing Co, Northrop Grumman Corp, General Dynamics Corp and Raytheon Co are looking to boost overseas sales to help hedge against Pentagon belt-tightening at home on big-ticket arms programmes.
The top purchasing countries in 2009 were United Arab Emirates (US$7.9 billion), Afghanistan (US$5.4 billion) and Saudi Arabia (US$3.3 billion), followed by Taiwan (US$3.2 billion), Egypt (US$2.1 billion), Iraq (US$1.6 billion), Nato (US$924.5 million), Australia (US$818.7 million) and South Korea (US$716.6 million), Murray said. — Reuters
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