Otto Dix, The trenches near Rheims II, 1916. Estate of Otto Dix, private collection.President Eisenhower famously used his farewell address to warn future US governments to ‘guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military–industrial complex’.
What he foresaw was a ‘potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power’ through the development of the arms industry and its dependency on arms sales abroad to sustain itself. The UK’s Department for International Trade, proudly announces on its website, that on a rolling 10 year basis, the UK remains the world’s second largest exporter of arms, with a 9% share of the global defence export market in 2016. Government pride is based upon jobs, balance of payments, and maintaining an independent defence-manufacturing base. The defence sector makes up 10% of the British manufacturing base and those defence exports sustain 55,000 jobs.
Liam Fox, the UK’s Secretary of State for International Trade, mounted an unashamed defence of Britain’s arms sales at the opening of the world’s biggest weapons trade exhibition in London this autumn. Fox said, “Britain is a global leader in defence and that should be celebrated, ….we must work to defend and promote the established defence industry.” These words reflect little thought as to the use of these weapons and their consequences. Military equipment worth at least £3.6 billion has been agreed for sale by the UK to Saudi Arabia since the devastating conflict in Yemen began in 2015. This has included Typhoon fighter jets, and precision-guided bombs. Claims have been made that UK-made arms are being used in indiscriminate bombing raids on civilian targets by the Saudi-led coalition fighting Shia rebels in neighbouring Yemen. These sales contribute to thousands of engineering jobs in the UK, and have provided billions of pounds of revenue for the British arms trade.
