{"id":13992,"date":"2018-10-19T01:50:19","date_gmt":"2018-10-19T01:50:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/?p=13992"},"modified":"2018-10-20T01:53:10","modified_gmt":"2018-10-20T01:53:10","slug":"arms-sales-to-saudi-arabia-give-trump-all-the-leverage-he-needs-in-khashoggi-affair","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/arms-sales-to-saudi-arabia-give-trump-all-the-leverage-he-needs-in-khashoggi-affair\/","title":{"rendered":"Arms sales to Saudi Arabia give Trump all the leverage he needs in Khashoggi affair"},"content":{"rendered":"

Terrence Guay<\/a>, Pennsylvania State University<\/a><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

Among Donald Trump\u2019s many unusual characteristics as president is his frankness. <\/p>\n

Last week, after the disappearance and apparent torture and murder of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi, Trump argued that \u201cwe would be punishing ourselves\u201d<\/a> by canceling arms sales to Saudi Arabia over a human rights concern. Few world leaders, or former U.S. presidents, would have been so bold as to publicly admit that a Saudi journalist\u2019s life is not worth the loss of arms sales.<\/p>\n

And it\u2019s true that the armaments relationship between these two countries is long-established and lucrative for U.S. companies, as my own research<\/a> on the global defense industry shows. <\/p>\n

However, the president has it wrong when he argues the U.S. would be \u201cfoolish\u201d to use these sales as leverage with the Saudis, claiming they could just get their tanks and fighter jets from other countries. In fact it\u2019s one of the best bargaining chips he has with the kingdom. <\/p>\n

An arms-buying behemoth<\/h2>\n

Saudi Arabia is indeed a major weapons buyer. <\/p>\n

Saudi Arabia spent<\/a> US$69.4 billion on military expenditures in 2017, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute<\/a>, the world\u2019s leading research organization on conflict, armaments, arms control and disarmament. Only the U.S. and China spent more. <\/p>\n

But since it doesn\u2019t have an arms industry \u2013 like the U.S. and China \u2013 Saudi Arabia must import most of that from other countries. That\u2019s why, over the past decade, Saudi Arabia has imported<\/a> more armaments than every country but India. <\/p>\n

And U.S. companies such as Boeing, Lockheed Martin and Raytheon have benefited most from all that spending, making up the 55 percent<\/a> of its weapons imports from 2008 to 2017. <\/p>\n