- Bill Clinton spoke at Hunter College in New York on
Tuesday,
challenging President Bush to send American troops as part of an
international
peacekeeping force to the Middle East. What many Americans don't know is
that U.S. forces might as well be there already.
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- From 1990 to 2000 U.S. military aid to Israel totaled
over $18 billion. No other nation in the world has such a close
relationship
with the U.S. military and arms industry.
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- The UN, Amnesty International and other groups have
raised
questions about the extent the to which U.S. military aid is abetting human
rights abuses by Israeli forces operating in the West Bank. These debates
will no doubt continue for some time. In the mean time, however, there
is another aspect of the American-Israeli relationship that may have an
even greater impact on U.S. and Israeli security in the long run: the
ongoing
transfer of American arms technology from Israel to potential U.S. (and
Israeli) adversaries around the globe.
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- From the most sophisticated warplanes to tank engines,
artillery systems and armored vehicles, the United States is Israel's
one-stop
shopping center. Last year alone the U.S. sold one hundred top-of-the-line
F-16s to Israel for a total of over $3 billion. That same year Israel
purchased
9 of the newest Apache helicopter version equipped with the Longbow Radar
system. The helicopter-buying spree didn't end with the Apaches. Israel
bought fifteen Cobra attack helicopters last year along with twenty-four
Black Hawk transport helicopters.
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- Besides selling aircraft, the United States is also
Israel's
preferred vendor for missiles. Although Israel has designed its own version
of the U.S. air-to-air AIM9 sidewinder missile, the Python 3, it still
relies on the U.S. for its ground attack technology. Two years ago Lockheed
Martin sold Israel approximately 80 AGM-142D Popeye air-to-surface
missiles.
Israel also buys the AGM65 Maverick air-to-surface missile produced by
Hughes and Raytheon.
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- In addition, the U.S. sells Israel the engines for its
"indigenous" Merkava main battle tank. In 1999 Israel purchased
400 power packs for their Merkava fleet. The Merkava was developed by
Israel
so that it wouldn't have to rely on "fickle" countries like
Britain,
France or Russia when it was in the midst of a conflict.
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- Transactions between the U.S. and Israel are not
necessarily
worrisome by themselves; after all, as Israel has proved, there are a host
of countries willing to sell the weapons it needs. Currently, Germany is
Israel's source for submarines, and if Israel really needed fighters,
Russia
is always looking to make a buck and always seems to have a surfeit of
aircraft and other excess defense articles.
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- The real danger comes in Israel's habit of reverse
engineering
U.S. technology and selling to nations hostile to U.S. interests. Israel's
client list includes Cambodia, Eritrea, Ethiopia, the South Lebanon Army,
India, China, Burma and Zambia. The U.S. has most recently warmed up to
India and is now in fact competing with Israel for arms sales there, but
the other Israeli customers remain dubious at best.
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- Perhaps the most troubling of all is the Israeli/Chinese
arms relationship. Israel is China's second largest supplier of arms.
Coincidentally,
the newest addition to the Chinese air force, the F-10 multi-role fighter,
is an almost identical version of the Lavi (Lion). The Lavi was a joint
Israeli-American design based upon the F-16 for manufacture in Israel,
but financed mostly with American aid. Plagued by cost overruns, it was
canceled in 1987, but not before the U.S. spent $1.5 billion on the
project.
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- Last April, when the Navy EP-3E surveillance plane was
forced to land in China after a Chinese F-8 fighter flew into its
propeller,
photos show Israeli built Python 3 missiles under the fighter's
wings.
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- If Israeli weapons sales to China induce misgivings,
including the most recent U.S. blocked sale of Israel's Phalcon airborne
radar, the beneficiaries of Chinese arms transfers of Israeli-American
technology are even more disturbing. In 1996, as disclosed in the UN
Register
of Conventional Arms, China sold over 100 missiles and launchers to Iran,
along with a handful of combat aircraft and warships. Even worse, in 1997
the New York Daily News reported that Iraq had deployed Israeli-developed,
Chinese PL-8 missiles in the no-fly zones, endangering American
pilots.
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- Americans deserve to know where their money is being
spent, and how money allocated for friends and technology shared with
friends
can all too easily end up in the wrong hands, threatening all parties
involved.
At a minimum, discussions on a new security framework for the Middle East
should include plans to monitor and restrict Israeli transfers of
U.S.-origin
military equipment to potential adversaries. Otherwise, this deadly
technology
could come back to haunt U.S. and Israeli forces in future
conflicts.
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- Jonathan Reingold is a research associate for the Arms
Trade Resource Center at the World Policy Institute and a military analyst
for Foreign Policy in Focus.
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