Foreign aid dished out for the purpose of buying weapons

A friend sent me a link to a site that discusses where US Foreign Aid goes to. And it was quite an eye-opener. But before I go there, I just want to share something I read a few years ago with respect to that little war in the Middle East called ‘Desert Storm‘.

This little war was a skirmish between the USA, assisted by a couple of Allied troops — again, and Iraq — again. Iraq had decided to invade Kuwait and the UN authorised the task of removing Iraq out of Kuwait. Pesky folk, those Iraqis.

It wasn’t the war so much that caught my attention. It was some reports in the media, can’t remember which as this was in 1991, which speculated that in fact the war had been instigated primarily by the US as the US needed to replace its aging army, navy and air force equipment.

With the heavy penalties paid by the coalition forces from 34 nations this would be easy. In other words, the US would send its armed forces in with its aging weapons, which would certainly be good enough against the flimsy armies of Iraq, and the allies would pay for them to do the dirty work.

It’s a kind of new take on mercenaries. And that’s how it played out. The US got rid of its ailing and ancient weaponry and its allies funded the refurbishment. And guess what and just as an aside, who was president of the US at the time? None other than daddy Bush.

So back to my original thought. Where does US aid go to and for what purpose? So let’s have a look at number one on the list. Israel gets $2.4-billion of which virtually all is used to buy weapons and of which 75% are sourced from the US. Interesting.

Second on the list is Egypt, which was quite surprising really. Who is Egypt in the grand scheme of things, except of course for its rather strategic geographical position to the Middle East? They get $1.7-billion of which $1.3-billion is to buy weapons. Huh? Egypt needs that kind of weaponry? Maybe it’s to protect the Suez Canal from all those Somali pirates?

Third on the list is Pakistan. Again, could it be because of its geographical position to Afghanistan? They get a cool $798-million of which about half is for security efforts, including military-equipment upgrades and border security. Isn’t this the country that has all that internal conflict? One wonders where the weapons for both sides come from …

Then fourth is Jordan with a handout of $688-million of which $326-million is for fighting terrorism. Have you checked recently where Jordan is vis a vis Iraq and Iran, Israel and all the other countries in which the US is fiddling around, whether politically or with it’s all powerful war apparatus.

And here I thought it was all about oil. It isn’t, is it? It’s all about keeping the US arms industry going. Whether it’s hidden under the banner of “the war on terror” or foreign aid, the US government, this time led by Bush Jnr, seems to focus on keeping its arms industry well fed.

What’s even worse is that it doesn’t look like Obama is the person to stop the war machine. After appointing Rahm Emanuel, Jewish and mooted to be hawkish, to the position of Chief of Staff in the new administration, one can’t see a let-off of the fighting around Israel. Obama has been particularly tight lipped about the events happening in Gaza at the moment.

Of course speculating as to what Obama will or won’t do is entertaining at the most. What seems to be more real is that the US plans to give a further $30-billion to Israel over the next 10 years; 75% to go to buying weapons from the US. Can’t see a peaceful Middle East any time soon.

Pity the civilians that routinely get mangled in the cross-fire. Is this what it means to live in a modern society? Killing fields? There’s no regard for ordinary people who just want to live with their families and friends and bring up their kids. What’s WITH THIS WORLD?