Six months ago, Poland’s air force included large numbers of obsolete Soviet-era planes. But it is now furiously re-arming and has just signed a major arms deal with South Korea.
The US$14.5bn deal with Poland includes 1,000 K2 main battle tanks, nearly 700 self-propelled howitzers and 48 FA-50 combat aircraft. It’s just one example of the rapid expansion of re-arming now under way across Europe. As Sean Howard put it recently, making a killing is a lot easier than making peace. It is certainly far more profitable, at least in the short term, even if almost everyone will lose in the long term.
