The Impact Of Arms Production In the Third World

Abstract

In the last 20 years or so, the production of conventional armaments in countries of the Third World has increased markedly. The main considerations are political; economically, there is only limited support for such investments. Over time, though, economic interests tend to become entrenched and to sustain domestic production. The predominant question of independence from foreign suppliers of weaponry has two aspects: first, short-run independence in ammunitions, in which Third World arms production has been rather successful; and, second, long-run independence from inflows of technology and know-how, in which only a few producers have made advances. While domestic arms production reduces a barrier for arms control in the Third World, so far the impact on international security has not been positive.

Taxation of the Global Arms Trade? An Overview of the Issues

“…Most of the expensive arms are high-technology goods with large development costs. Manufacturing of weapon systems, particularly outside of the main producer countries, that is the United States, Russia, France, the United Kingdom, China and Germany, consists largely of the integration of externally supplied high-tech components (Brzoska 1989, Bitzinger 2003. The stimulating effects of a tax on domestic arms production in recipient countries would be small if the tax covered components for weapon systems in addition to complete weapon systems.…”

Military Power and Food Security: A Cross-National Analysis of Less-Developed Countries, 1970-1990

“…would be better but is unavailable for enough LDCs to be usefully analyzed. A second measure is arms exporting, treated as a dummy variable~1 ϭ yes; 0 ϭ no, derived from Brzoska, 1989;Kidron and Smith, 1983!. Most LDC arms producers are also involved in arms exporting, especially those capable of producing more sophisticated weapons.…”

Arms production in the third tier: An analysis of opportunity and willingness

“…There is consensus in the literature on this point Indeed, for Katz (1984, pp. 4-5), "[t]he most important factor driving LDCs to produce arms can be summarized quite easily: autonomy" (see also Brzoska, 1989;Ross, 1988). 4 Downloaded by [The UC Irvine Libraries] at 00:09 02 November 2014 258 D. KINSELLA So although regional conflict drives arms acquisition, it is regional conflict combined with the uncertainty of arms imports feat drives military industrialization.…”

“…Some researchers have gone further in attempting to identify more precisely fee industrial production capacities required for military industrialization. For example, Wulf s (1983Wulf s ( , 1985 "relevant industries" consist of manufacturing capacity in fee following sectors: iron and steel, non-ferrous metals, metal products, non-electrical machinery, electrical machinery, and transportation equipment These and similar criteria have been used to generate lists of countries wife fee highest potential for military industrialization (see also Kennedy, 1974, chapter 15;Brzoska, 1989;Brauer, 1991).…”