The world is in a frenzy of wars, border conflicts, armed civil wars, gang wars, terrorism, and so on. There is hardly a miniscule of war of liberation, or for freedom or independence or end of exploitation. A report from Geneva Academy of International Humanitarian Law says that it is monitoring more than 110 armed conflicts around the world at present. There are around 45 armed conflicts currently taking place in Middle East, in Africa more than 35, in Asia 21, in Europe 7, and in Latin America 6 armed conflicts are ongoing. The participants in them are state players, non-state players, and foreign intervention.
Who benefits from these conflicts? Do the people of these countries benefit from these wars? Why no serious initiative is made to end war and bring peace? The military industry is growing and countries are spending a substantial amount of budget in defence. The tax payer’s money is diverted to the arms race and development of the countries suffer; the living condition of common man deteriorates.
Humanitarian Crisis –
The wars in Gaza, Ukraine, Yemen, Sudan, and Myanmar have witnessed death, injury and displacement of thousands of civilians and children. Hospitals, ambulances, doctors, healthcare workers, schools, journalists, aid workers, food distribution centres, and places of religious worship have not been spared. In total more than 50000 children have been killed or injured in Gaza. An appeal from the UNICEF Regional Director for Middle East says, “These children – lives that should never be reduced to numbers – are now part of a long, harrowing list of unimaginable horrors: the grave violations against children, the blockade of aid, the starvation, the constant food displacement, and the destruction of hospitals, water systems, schools, and homes, the destruction of life itself in the Gaza strip.” “The children of Gaza need protection. They need food, water, and medicine. But more than anything they need immediate, collective action to stop this once for all.” The rights of children are violated in all these wars affected areas. UNICEF estimates 770000 children in Sudan will develop malnutrition and in Gaza 60000 children have acute malnutrition. A genocide in twenty-first century, with the world as a silent spectator. Terrorists killing or taking hostage, killing or causing injury to the innocent civilians, women, and children are as heinous as the crime of state actors.
The recent attack by Ukraine on a nuclear power plant of Russia, and the threat of using nuclear weapons in India-Pakistan war and Israel- Iran war have created the apocalyptic danger to human civilization.
Over 11 million people have been internally displaced in Sudan and 3.2 million have escaped to neighbouring countries. The scenario is same in all other conflicts. The sane voice from all parts of the world echoes in chorus for protecting the innocent civilians and children.
Who stands to profit from these wars?
Wars need huge amounts of arms and ammunitions. Arms manufacturers, the merchants of death, get benefitted by these wars. A New York Times headline said, “Middle East war adds to Surge in International Arms Sales”. The same is true for Russia-Ukraine war, or India-Pakistan war, or Thailand- Cambodia border conflict, or Conflict in Sudan. Share price of the arms manufacturing companies’ skyrockets, a heyday for the arms dealers, their profits soar at the cost of innocent human lives.
On 7th October’ 23, Hammas took hostage and abducted 251 people from Israel, and the war on Gaza started. A report from Global Times, a week after the incident, on 11th October’23 says – “The performance of US defence stocks gives some indication. Shares of Lockheed Martin rose by 9% on Monday. This is the highest increase in any non-earning day of a defence contractor since March 2020. Northrop Grumman, another major defence contractor share had the highest daily increase since 2020. Whenever there is a military conflict in the world, the military-industrial complex gets benefitted and the largest military industrial complex exists in USA.”
“Wall Street has pumped money into the defence sector following the largest military escalation in years out of Israel, with the Shares U.S. Aerospace & Defence ETF up 6% since Friday, headlined by Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman’s strongest stock gains in more than three years.” – Forbes, 11 October 2023. Another report says – “US defence stocks surge nearly 30 billion after Hamas attack”
“According to media reports, the big five military-industrial complex giants – Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Raytheon, General Dynamics, and Northrop Grumman – gained the most from those conflicts. They routinely split more than $150 billion in Pentagon contracts annually”, said an article published by The Nation in May 24.
In the Russia-Ukraine military conflict, the big five giants not only sold large amounts of military equipment to Ukraine, but also used the opportunity to market their products to other European countries. They also obtained more contracts and funds from the US government.” “As a result, Ukraine became the world’s third-largest arms importer in 2022, ranking the fifth among the main US arms export destinations, according to data from Statista. Also, the US State Department said in January that direct military sales by US companies rose 48.6 percent to $153.7 billion in fiscal 2022 from $103 billion in fiscal 2021, thanks in large part to arms sales to Ukraine amid the continued escalation of the conflict, according to media reports.” On the other hand there is unprecedented increase in Russia’s military expenditure, and also of China.
World’s largest arms manufacturing companies –
The SIPRI report of top 10 arms producing and military services companies in the world in 2023 were –
- Lockheed Martin Group – USA
- RTX – USA
- Northrop Grumman Crop – USA
- Boeing – USA
- General Dynamics Crop – USA
- BAE – UK
- Rostek – Russia – increase in 49.3% in one year
- AVIC – China
- NORINCO – China
- CETC – China
Fifty out of the hundred top arms producing companies are USA based. These companies do not have any nationality and some are multi-national companies. The key trends in 2024 are – the share of global arms export of USA reached 43% from 2020 to 2024, Russia’s arms export decreased by 64% during 2020-24 period, but arms production increased by 46% because of Ukraine war. China’s defence sector witnessed substantial growth, becomes the second largest arms manufacturer in the world. They all are players in this race.
World’s largest arms importers are India, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Ukraine, Pakistan, Japan, Egypt, Australia, Republic of Korea, and China. India, Ukraine, Pakistan, and Egypt have multitude of internal economic problems, still they import huge amounts of arms with the plea of security, defence, patriotism, and by creating war hysteria, putting their economies in crisis.
Israel or Ukraine or Sudan, are laboratories to experiment newer arms, ammunitions, missiles, fighter planes etc. for the giant manufacturers. USA is the largest arms supplier to Israel, followed by Germany, Italy, and UK. Israel has its own military industry and is exporting arms to other countries. A “Times of Israel” report dated 14th June 2023 says – Israeli arms sales doubled in a decade, hit new record of $12.5 billion in 2022.
Nuclear arms race has again gained momentum, which was subdued previously.
Military Industry Complex or Militarization of Economy –
The unprecedented increase in military expenditure of different countries in recent years is of concern. Imperialism, the highest stage of capitalism, is crisis ridden because of its mode of production, that is for maximum profit and exploitation of the working class.
Economy of most of these countries are becoming militarized. Capital is diverted from education, health, agriculture, infrastructure, power, and other essential sectors to military industry. The state is the main consumer of their products. The state buys them from the revenue collected from common people. Wars give breathing space to the moribund, imperialist economy, at the cost of the common man. Military industry complex dominates the economy, the deep state that rules. Wars give breathing space to the choked imperialist economy at the cost of innocent lives.
There was a time when such arms sales were termed as “merchants of death” or “war profiteers”. The days are gone when intellectuals, scientists, Nobel Laureates, writers, journalists, doctors, and students had marched on streets against wars. We are deaf to the cry of innocent children and civilians from different parts of the world. The time has come to rise to the occasion, say no to wars, understand the games the merchants of death play.
