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Let's Close Down the Mideast Arms Bazaar
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19691 |
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Section : |
CURRENT ISSUES
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| Issue
Date : |
9 / 1991 |
2,578 Words |
| Author
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W. Seth Carus
W. Seth Carus is a fellow at the Washington Institute for Near
East Policy. He has written extensively on weapons
proliferation in the Middle East. |
The Persian Gulf War brought home to official Washington the dangers posed by the militarization of the Middle East. Moreover, it clearly demonstrated that the large conventional and unconventional weapons inventories maintained in the region were a direct threat to U.S. interests.
As recent developments have demonstrated, the growth of lethal arsenals in the Middle East has reached epidemic proportions. The countries of the Middle East are among the most heavily armed in the world. Between 1984 and 1988, they imported about 40 percent of all arms exports, and 5 Middle Eastern countries were among the 12 Third World countries to import more than $1 billion worth of arms in 1988. These weapons purchases made possible the creation of large military machines. More than 3 million men are under arms in the region, equal to the total regular military manpower available to all NATO countries. One country, Iraq, was able to build the world's fourth-largest army.
The interest of Middle Eastern countries in conventional arms has been matched by their desire to acquire unconventional weaponry. Although Israel is the only country in the region believed to possess nuclear weapons, Iran and Iraq have development programs. Six countries are thought to possess chemical munitions: Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Libya, and Syria. These countries also are believed to have biological weapons programs, although only Iraq and Syria may have reached the stage of actually producing deliverable biological munitions. At least nine Middle Eastern countries have short- or medium-range ballistic missiles, and several of them have production capabilities.
The problems appear to be getting worse, as additional countries may acquire unconventional weapons. For example, U.S. intelligence officials now suspect that Saudi Arabia is working to acquire chemical weapons. At the same time, the size and sophistication of existing unconventional weapons programs are growing.
Concerns over the proliferation of such weapons are not new, but the new heightened sense of priority in halting their spread is. During the 1970s and 1980s the United States joined other countries to create supplier groups intended to prevent the spread of technology and supplies needed to produce chemical and nuclear weapons and surface-to-surface missiles. Despite many successes, the Persian Gulf War forced Bush administration officials to accept that even more needed to be done. Efforts to strengthen export controls resulted in the Enhanced Proliferation Control Initiative, which toughens
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