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| US: Obama's Budget Calls for Billions in New Spending for Drones
by Jason Leopold, Truthout
February 2nd, 2010
Shares of major US defense contractors including Boeing, General Dynamics, and Northrop Grumman rose upon the unveiling of President Barack Obama's fiscal year 2011 spending plan for the Pentagon, part of the president's overall $3.8 trillion budget proposal. More than $2 billion will be used to purchase unmanned aerial vehicles, or drones, blamed for a significant rise in civilian casualties in the "war on terror." |
| US: F.B.I. Charges Arms Sellers With Foreign Bribes
by Diana B. Henriques, New York Times
January 20th, 2010
On Tuesday, 22 top-level arms industry executives, including a senior sales executive at Smith & Wesson, were arrested in what Justice Department officials called the first undercover sting ever aimed at violations of the federal ban on corporate bribes paid to get foreign business. The individuals are being prosecuted under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. |
| US: Despite Slump, U.S. Role as Top Arms Supplier Grows
by Thom Shanker, New York Times
September 6th, 2009
Despite a recession that knocked down global arms sales last year, the United States expanded its role as the world’s leading weapons supplier, increasing its share to more than two-thirds of all foreign armaments deals, according to a new Congressional study. |
| US: Contracting Boom Could Fizzle Out
by Dana Hedgpeth, Washington Post
April 7th, 2009
The surge in the U.S. military contracting workforce would ebb under Defense Secretary Gates's budget proposal as the Pentagon moves to replace private workers with full-time civil servants. The move could affect companies such as CACI and SAIC. "We are right-sizing the defense acquisition workforce so we can improve our contract oversight and get a better deal for the taxpayers," said the Pentagon's director of defense procurement and acquisition policy. |
| US: Gates Proposes Major Changes to Military Programs, Weapons Buys
by August Cole, Wall Street Journal
April 6th, 2009
Defense Secretary Robert Gates unveiled a sweeping overhaul of the Pentagon's top weapons priorities. The shake-up, a combination of defense contract cutbacks and policy changes, will stoke a smoldering debate in Congress, with cuts proposed for Lockheed Martin Corp.'s F-22 Raptor and replacement of the president's fleet of Marine One helicopters. |
| US: Pentagon Weighs Cuts and Revisions of Weapons
by Christopher Drew, New York Times
April 3rd, 2009
U.S. defense executives and consultants are worried about the sweeping changes in military programs that Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates is expected to announce on Monday. Weapons systems like missile defense are likely to endure deep cuts. |
| MEXICO: U.S. Is Arms Bazaar for Mexican Cartels
by James C. McKinley, Jr., New York Times
February 25th, 2009
Phoenix-based gun dealer George Iknadosian of X-Calibur Guns will go on trial on charges he sold hundreds of weapons, mostly AK-47 rifles, to smugglers, knowing they would go to a drug cartel in the western state of Sinaloa. The guns helped fuel the gang warfare in which more than 6,000 Mexicans died last year. |
| US: The Looming Crisis at the Pentagon
by Chalmers Johnson, TomDispatch.com
February 2nd, 2009
Like much of the rest of the world, Americans know that the U.S. automotive industry is in the grips of what may be a fatal decline. A similar crisis exists when it comes to the military-industrial complex. That crisis has its roots in the corrupt and deceitful practices that have long characterized the high command of the Armed Forces, civilian executives of the armaments industries, and Congressional opportunists and pay-to-play criminals. |
| US: Deputy SecDef could earn $500K lobbying Pentagon
by Lara Jakes, Washington Post
January 27th, 2009
William J. Lynn, the man nominated to be the Pentagon's second-in-command could make a half-million dollars next month with vested stock he earned as a lobbyist for military contractor Raytheon. This is despite an Obama administration order against "revolving door" lobbyists who become public officials. |
| ISRAEL: U.S. approves $330 million in arms deals for Israel
by Andrea Shalal-Esa, Reuters
September 9th, 2008
The U.S. government on Tuesday said it had approved up to $330 million in three separate arms deals for Israel, and sources tracking a much bigger deal for 25 Lockheed Martin Corp F-35 fighter jets said that agreement could be approved later this month. |
| UK-Zimbabwe: BAE linked to Zimbabwean arms dealer
by Christopher Thompson and Michael Peel , Financial Times/UK
July 31st, 2008
According to documents seen by the Financial Times, BAE Systems has been linked to Zimbabwean arms trader John Bredenkamp. BAE reportedly paid at least £20m to Bredenkamp via offshore entities in the British Virgin Islands between 2003 and 2005. The payments raise fresh questions about bribery in BAE's dealings. |
| US: Arms Dealer Had Troubled History
by ERIC SCHMITT, The New York Times
June 25th, 2008
When the Army last year awarded a contract worth up to nearly $300 million to a tiny Miami Beach munitions dealer to supply ammunition to Afghanistan’s army and police forces, it was in spite of a very checkered past. |
| US: Cover-Up Is Cited on Illegal Arms
by ERIC SCHMITT, The New York Times
June 24th, 2008
A military attaché has told Congressional investigators that the American ambassador to Albania endorsed a plan by that country’s defense minister to remove evidence of illegal Chinese origins on ammunition being shipped from Albania to Afghanistan by a Miami Beach arms-dealing company. |
| AFGHANISTAN: Supplier Under Scrutiny on Aging Arms for Afghans
by C. J. CHIVERS, The New York Times
March 27th, 2008
With the award last January of a federal contract worth as much as nearly $300 million, the company, AEY Inc., which operates out of an unmarked office in Miami Beach, became the main supplier of munitions to Afghanistan’s army and police forces. Since then, the company has provided ammunition that is more than 40 years old and in decomposing packaging, according to an examination of the munitions by The New York Times and interviews with American and Afghan officials.
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| INDIA: Building a Modern Arsenal in India
by Heather Timmons and Somini Sengupta, The New York Times
August 31st, 2007
India is developing a military appetite to match its growing economic power. With a ballooning arms budget, India will soon become one of the largest military markets in the world, making it an important new target for American arms manufacturers. |
| US: As Iraq Costs Soar, Contractors Earn Record Profits
by Eli Clifton, Inter Press Service News Agency
August 2nd, 2007
In a report to lawmakers earlier this week, the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office found that the war in Iraq could cost U.S. taxpayers over a trillion dollars when the long-term costs of caring for soldiers wounded in action, military and economic aid for the Iraqi government, and ongoing costs associated with the 190,000 troops stationed in Iraq are totaled up. |
| WORLD: US probes Saudi-linked UK arms firm
by David Robertson and Tom Baldwin, The Times (London)
June 28th, 2007
The British and US governments are on a diplomatic collision course after the US Department of Justice launched a formal investigation into allegations of corruption at defence company BAE Systems. The US investigation will scrutinise BAE's dealings with Saudi Arabia to expose an account allegedly held by the Bank of England that is used to facilitate Saudi payments for arms.
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| UK: Rowntree dumps its Reed shares
by Katherine Griffiths, Telegraph
February 13th, 2007
Two investors in Reed Elsevier have sold their shares as a protest that the publishing giant runs arms fairs which have included the sale of torture equipment. |
| US: Lockheed Stock and Two Smoking Barrels
by Richard Cummings, Playboy.com
January 16th, 2007
If you think the Iraq war hasn't worked out very well for anyone, think again. Defense contractors such as Lockheed are thriving. And no wonder: Here's the story how Lockheed's interests- as opposed to those of the American citizenry- set the course of U.S. policy after 9/11. |
| EU: EU firms getting round China arms embargo
by Andrew Rettman, EU Observer
October 3rd, 2006
European firms such as AugustaWestland and Eurocopter are supplying components for Chinese combat helicopters via networks of global subsidiaries and re-exporters despite the EU's 17-year old China arms embargo, NGOs have warned. |
| US: Army May End Lockheed Spy Plane Contract
Associated Press
January 12th, 2006
The Army is expected to cancel a Lockheed Martin Corp. contract to build a new spy plane, according to industry and Pentagon officials, despite efforts by the defense contractor to solve problems that include lightening the plane's weight.
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| Iraq: Army Contract Again Disputed
by T. Christian Miller, Los Angeles Times
May 26th, 2004
The U.S. Army has, for the second time, awarded a contract to supply the Iraqi security forces to a consortium of companies with little arms experience and whose participants include a friend of controversial Iraqi official Ahmad Chalabi.
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| US: Boeing reports $623 million profit, surge in defense revenue
by Dave Carpenter, Associated Press
April 28th, 2004
Boeing Co. rode an 18 percent surge in revenue from its defense contracting unit to a far-better-than-expected $623 million profit in the first quarter and raised its earnings estimates for 2004 and 2005. |
| US: Jets, IT Drive Lockheed Gains
by Renae Merle, Washington Post
April 28th, 2004
Lockheed Martin Corp. reported a 16 percent jump in first-quarter profit yesterday as demand for fighter aircraft and information technology continued to boost sales. |
| US: Probe of Boeing, Documents Expanded
by Renae Merle, Washington Post
April 28th, 2004
A criminal investigation into whether Boeing Co. used stolen Lockheed Martin Corp. documents to win an Air Force contract has grown to include an examination of NASA contract competitions, sources close to the inquiry said yesterday. |
| US: Boeing Turns to New CEO and the Pentagon
by Julie Creswell, Fortune
April 19th, 2004
The aerospace giant saw its blue-chip reputation and cherished status as an innovator flipped upside down last year. Two of its top executives became entangled in an ethics investigation by the Pentagon, while other employees faced criminal charges involving industrial espionage. The government penalized Boeing by canceling rocket launches valued at about $ 1 billion and is holding up a $ 17 billion aerial tanker contract.
Furthermore, Boeing infuriated investors with a billion-dollar surprise charge last summer. And underlying this sorry litany was a simpler, larger problem: In 2003, for the first time, Boeing sold fewer planes than the other global aviation superpower, Europe's Airbus Industrie.
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| UK: BAE Chairman 'Close' to Accused Executive
by David Leigh and Rob Evans, Guardian (London)
April 7th, 2004
Sir Dick Evans, the chairman of BAE Systems, had close personal links with the arms firm executive accused of providing free holidays and gifts for a Ministry of Defence official, it was alleged last night. Tony Winship, a former BAE employee, is the executive at the centre of allegations revealed in yesterday's Guardian that a BAE slush fund paid for a series of unauthorised luxury hotel stays for a civil servant in the MoD's arms sales unit.
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| US: Diminished Oversight Leads to Overpricing
by David Phinney, Federal Times
April 5th, 2004
Ken Pedeleose’s eyes popped in awe as he plowed through a bill for airplane parts in 1999: $2,522 for a 4½-inch metal sleeve, $744 for a washer, $714 for a rivet, and $5,217 for a 1-inch metal bracket. |
| Japan: Arms Export Ban To Be Revisited
by Mariko Sanchanta, Financial Times
April 1st, 2004
Japan's decision to dispatch troops from its self-defence force to southern Iraq has marked a watershed inthe country's postwar history and jarred the pacifist roots of its constitution.
But while Japan may now be shipping its soldiers to Samawah, it still struggles to export Japanese-made weapons. A four-decade ban on the sale of weapons abroad has left the country's defence industry largely impotent on the world stage. |
| Iraq: Trade Fair Postponed Over Security Fears
by Joshua Chaffin and Salamander Davoudi, Financial Times
April 1st, 2004
The deteriorating security situation in Iraq has prompted the postponement of a US-led trade fair aimed at accelerating reconstruction in the country amid heightening concerns about the safety of foreign civilians working there. Organisers of Destination Baghdad Expo, that was due to begin on Monday, postponed the event following the gruesome killings on Wednesday of four western contract workers in the city of Falluja. |
| Contractors are Cashing in on the War on Terror
World Policy Institute
February 24th, 2004
"With the Pentagon budget at $400 billion per year and counting, plus a new Department of Homeland Security with a $40 billion per year budget, plus wars in Afghanistan and Iraq that have cost $180 billion to date, these are lucrative times to be a military contractor." |
| US: Making Money On Terrorism
by William D. Hartung, The Nation
February 5th, 2004
We all know that Halliburton is raking in billions from the Bush Administration's occupation and rebuilding of Iraq. But in the long run, the biggest beneficiaries of the Administration's "war on terror" may be the "destroyers," not the rebuilders. The nation's "Big Three" weapons makers--Lockheed Martin, Boeing and Northrop Grumman--are cashing in on the Bush policies of regime change abroad and surveillance at home. |
| Iraq: Marketplace Deaths Caused by Raytheon Missile
by Cahal Milmo, Independent (London)
April 2nd, 2003
An American missile, identified from the remains of its serial number, was pinpointed yesterday as the cause of the explosion at a Baghdad market on Friday night that killed at least 62 Iraqis. The codes on the foot-long shrapnel shard, seen by the Independent correspondent Robert Fisk at the scene of the bombing in the Shu'ale district, came from a weapon manufactured in Texas by Raytheon, the world's biggest producer of "smart" armaments. |
| US: Unjust Rewards
by Ken Silverstein, Mother Jones
May 1st, 2002
The government continues to award federal business worth billions to companies that repeatedly break the law. A Mother Jones investigation reveals which major contractors are the worst offenders. |
| Palestine: Death in Bethlehem, Made in America
by Robert Fisk, The Independent (U.K.)
April 15th, 2001
Lockheed Martin of Florida and the Federal Laboratories of Pennsylvania have made quite a contribution to life in the municipality of Bethlehem. Or, in the case of Lockheed, death. Pieces of the US manufacturer's Hellfire air-to-ground missile lie in the local civil defence headquarters in Bethlehem less than two months after it exploded in 18-year-old Osama Khorabi's living room, killing him instantly. |
| US: A Blank Check from Washington for Colombia's Dirty War
by Mark Weisbrot, AlterNet
April 1st, 2000
One of the problems with deleting our government's worst crimes from America's historical hard drive is that they tend to recur. How many people even know the hideous story of how we supported and financed the slaughter of tens of thousands – innocent civilians, teachers, health care and church workers – in Central America in the 1980s? |
| Brazil: Amazon Contractor Raytheon has CIA Ties
by Pratap Chatterjee, Inter Press Service
December 3rd, 1995
A contract to monitor the Amazon rainforest in Brazil will include a shadowy company once described as ''virtually indistinguishable'' from the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). The 1.4-billion-dollar contract for satellite monitoring of drug trafficking and deforestation in the 3.2-million-square-kilometre forests in the Brazilian Amazon was awarded last summer to Raytheon, a 12-billion-dollar, Massachusetts-based company, Raytheon, that makes Patriot and Sidewinder missiles. |
| Brazil: Police Wiretap Jeopardizes Raytheon Radar Project
by Katherine Ellison , The Miami Herald
November 25th, 1995
It was meant to be a shining model of the new era of inter-American trade: a $1.4 billion U.S. contract -- the largest ever awarded in Brazil -- in which the Massachusetts- based Raytheon Corp. would build a vast radar project in the Amazon jungle.
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