Credit: Vron Ware. All rights reserved.Throughout the week of September 15-18, London is hosting “the world’s leading defence and security event” organised by DSEI at the Excel Centre in Docklands. The occasion will allow “the entire defence and security industry to source the latest equipment and systems, develop international relationships, and generate new business opportunities”. For seven days preceding the opening, members and supporters of the Campaign Against the Arms Trade held numerous events and actions to educate, blockade and protest.
These valiant efforts will continue to shine a spotlight on the obscenity, hypocrisy and venality of governments and corporations involved in the global arms industry, long after the fair has left town. It may not be possible to obstruct the event itself, but their actions make it hard to ignore the extent to which the UK government is a leading player in this market for state-of-the-art surveillance, coercion and killing machines.
Taking part in an academic-style conference held on the grass outside the gates of the exhibition centre, I decided to talk about who is going to use these weapons and to ask questions abut how they are recruited. How are young people, whether male or female, enticed, compelled or persuaded to use weapons that kill, maim, torture and traumatise other human beings?
