The Middle East and the Great Arms Bazaar

Just as with oil sales, arms sales play a dominant role in the political orientations of the Middle East’s major powers. These sales greatly influence their respective positions in this region of the world and help explain some of the current realignments.

From 1965 to 1989, arms purchases were made within the context of the Cold War, with the United States wanting to protect oil-producing countries and the USSR seeking to surround and destabilize those countries. The primary buyers were Iraq ($93 billion), Saudi Arabia ($62 billion), Iran ($51 billion), and Syria ($46 billion.) During the Gulf War, American strikes proved to be of such surgical efficiency that buyers became momentarily disinterested in acquiring Soviet-made weapons. Now, the scale of the arms sales market is astounding: Nonindustrialized countries spend three times more on weapons than industrialized countries do, even though maintenance of technological infrastructure is often defective. Thus, Libya’s considerable arms purchases during the past decades were not able to be used during the revolt that ended the Gadhafi regime. Today, these weapons are found in the hands of radical militants and are sold on the black market.

The Iranian Market

Following the dismantling of the Soviet Union, the alignment of Eastern European countries regarding the European Union and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization greatly frustrated Russia. Additionally, in the eyes of the Russians, NATO’s intervention in Libya caused them to lose a lucrative market worth several billion. This is the reason why Russia clung to arms sales in Iran, which also financed arms purchases in Syria. Since 1995, 70 percent of Iranian weaponry originates from Russia. The maintenance of the status quo in Syria guaranteed that Russia would monopolize the Syrian and Iranian markets.

As far as China is concerned, they continue to benefit from international economic sanctions imposed on Iran. China is penetrating further and further into the Iranian market and does not desire instability in the Gulf region, which readily responds to its growing energy needs. This could explain the reason for Russia’s and China’s veto at the U.N. Security Council, thereby preventing the sanctions imposed on Syria for the massacres perpetrated by the Syrian regime.

American Withdrawal

The United States is disappointed in Turkey’s behavior, particularly concerning the war against Islamic State, as Turkey will not allow the use of American bases in its territory. The track record of American intervention in Iraq and Afghanistan, a costly one, is in many respects disastrous.

Moreover, oil-producing countries are financing radical anti-American Islamic movements. For the United States, the Middle East is no longer quite as vital to its interests as it was in the past, as methods of hydraulic fracturing make the United States more and more autonomous in their need for hydrocarbons. Yet, by withdrawing from Afghanistan and Iraq, the United States is giving a free hand to Iran, which is capable of blocking oil tankers in the Gulf. The construction of land-based pipelines leading directly to Oman at the mouth of the Gulf are a way of protecting themselves against an Iranian attack and of minimizing America’s involvement.

A Growing Market

Saudi Arabia alone has bought 500 billion weapons in the past 20 years, three-quarters of which were from the United States. Worldwide arms sales for 2014 are figured to be 64.4 billion, with an increase of 15 percent compared to the previous year. The United States leads weapons exportation with 23.7 billion, followed by Russia with 15 billion. Saudi Arabia leads in weapons imports — 6.5 billion — followed by India at 5.8 billion, China and the United Arab Emirates. Arms sales during 2014 highlight the substantial increase in arms purchases in oil-producing countries, which can be attributed to the relative disinterest of the United States in this region of the world, as well as Iranian expansion. New contracts in French arms sales financed by oil-producing countries — Qatar (7 billion), Lebanon (3 billion), Egypt (1 billion) and Saudi Arabia (4 billion) — only emphasized the Gulf countries’ dissatisfaction with the United States. They are heading toward making France the second world exporter of weaponry and are surely not strangers to the hardening of France’s position regarding the agreement between the P5+1 and Iran, pertaining to the development of nuclear technology in Iran.

The Middle East’s resources are of little use to the populations who find themselves subjected to the quasi-feudal regime of oil-producing countries, to dictators or to the growing ambitions of the Iranian semi-theocracy. For the moment, the status quo in Syria is convenient for Russia and China. There is a large risk that the relative withdrawal of the United States might swing the region into the hands of Iran once the international sanctions against that country are lifted. In which case, the Gulf countries would then be encouraged to obtain a nuclear umbrella.