Connor Paul | YPFP Member | October 1, 2024 | Photo Credit: Flickr
For the first time during its presidency, the Biden administration is sending Egypt its full allocation of $1.3 billion in military aid. Many politicians and advocacy groups have denounced the decision to override human rights conditions based on moral grounds. However, very little attention is paid to the imbalance of military to economic aid the country receives. Since the 1978 Camp David Accords, Egypt has received over $50 billion in military and $30 billion in economic aid from the United States, with the impacts of this assistance clearly visible in the country today. While Egypt has grown into a global military powerhouse, its economy has sputtered along on life support from international lending institutions. As the Egyptian government increased subsidized bread prices this year for the first time in 36 years, the bulk of the population endured the burden of austerity cuts.
This dynamic highlights the broader U.S. foreign policy of the past seventy-five years, in which, time and again, exporting weaponry has been more important than delivering economic assistance abroad. For the United States to secure a more secure and safe world, it should revise the ratio of its security assistance to economic assistance.
***
While the United States is the largest provider of foreign assistance in the post-World War II era, having spent over $4 trillion on global aid since 1946, it is also the largest arms exporter. In the past decade, it has only grown in this role, with its total global market share, averaged over five-year periods due to annual fluctuations, increasing from 34% between 2014 and 2018 to 42% between 2019 and 2023. As Director of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute Arms Transfers Programme Matthew George notes, “The USA has increased its global roles as an arms supplier – an important aspect of its foreign policy – exporting more arms to more countries than it has ever done in the past.”
Whether lent or sold, the United States continues to pump more weapons and military equipment into the world at the cost of increasing economic assistance. Through the Foreign Military Sales system (FMS), the United States oversees the transfer of defense articles, services, and training to international partners. With the total value of activities under the FMS system surpassing $80.9 billion, including $62.25 billion in direct arms sales, the United States registered its highest annual total ever in the 2023 fiscal year, a 55% increase from the year before. And such numbers skyrocket even higher when accounting for Direct Commercial Sales (DCS), with over $157.5 billion in sales last fiscal year, a new record surpassing the $153.6 billion in sales from the fiscal year prior. These DCS transfers, completed by private companies rather than the government, still require the same congressional approvals as FMS, and the companies’ export licenses require approval by the U.S. State Department.
Even though the United States far outpaces all other countries in terms of its total economic aid output, as a percentage of its gross national income, it ranked tied for 22nd among 31 Organization for Economic Co-operation & Development (OECD) countries last fiscal year, well below the mean.
***
Yet for all the stability the United States seeks to secure through its exportation of massive tranches of military arms, those same weapons can do just as much damage to its national interests. Once the final recipients receive their weaponry, the United States loses significant control over the equipment’s usage, impact, and even ownership. Arms transfers can increase the likelihood of conflict erupting, prolong existing conflicts, and escalate instability. And while the United States intends for the weapons it exports to benefit recipients, they can end up in the hands of terrorist organizations or enemy regimes. Whether commandeered by ISIS fighters or paraded through the streets of Kabul by the Taliban, billions of dollars worth of U.S. arms are now in the possession of those who would love to use them against it and its allies.
***
If the United States seeks to create a more stable and peaceful world through its international assistance, it should look back to the Economic Cooperation Act of 1948 (also known as The Marshall Plan) to see the enduring positive impact of an aid program dominated by economic assistance rather than military exports. As part of the Marshall Plan, the United States saw the need to prioritize the long-term sustainability of allies around the world and moved quickly with its economic assistance package. The Marshall Plan provided over $13 billion (the equivalent of $130 billion today) in economic aid and helped participating countries return to pre-war production levels within two years. It wasn’t until a year later that the United States sought to move forward with a military aid package through the Mutual Assistance Act of 1949. That package was a far cry from the Marshall Plan’s scale, with only $2.5 billion allocated for the fiscal years of 1949 and 1950.
Through the passage of the Mutual Security Act of 1951, however, Congress created an integrated program to administer economic and military assistance under the same umbrella and set the path for the imbalanced ratio between the two exports. In the initial $7.5 billion allocated to allies under the new law, more than $6 billion went to military assistance, with less than $1.5 billion reserved for economic support. And with the start of the Korean War the year before and the Cold War mentality setting in, the race to arm up allies at the cost of development commenced.
Such a trend continues through the present, nowhere more evident than in U.S. support for the Afghan Republic. Even the $83 billion in security assistance, plus the whopping $837 billion spent on US warfighting, could not prevent the Taliban from returning to power. All the while, the United States supplied less than $50 billion in development assistance for the country to rebuild – a factor in the increased rates of food insecurity, malnutrition, and poverty in the country today.
***
With so many different conflicts occurring concurrently all over the globe, the United States should revisit its approach to its role as the principal stabilizer and securer of peace. Rather than exporting massive quantities of weaponry that will further destabilize the world, the United States should be more proactive in providing economic development. More militancy only begets the need for greater economic assistance in the future, and the financial costs reflect this assessment. Whether through replenishing air defense system missiles or funding future reconstruction needs, these price tags will only continue to balloon as more military exports prolong the duration of the conflicts.
As the outgoing head of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, Martin Griffiths advises in a reflective essay on his time in the role, “set aside narrow interests, division, and conflict. Put humanity, cooperation, and people’s hope for a better, more equal world back at the center of international relations.” The United States would be wise to take the lead on such advice.
Connor Paul graduated from Wake Forest University with a B.A. in History and a minor in Political Science in 2017. He is a Volunteer and Intern Manager at Ayuda and his past work experiences include volunteer management roles with the United Mission for Relief & Development and Nonviolence International.
Charged Affairs 