Ethics, Scientists, Engineers and the Military - Ethical Engineering for International Development and Environmental Sustainability - page 338

Libya in 2011, and the UK sold arms to 12 of the 16 countries identifi ed by the
Stockholm Institute of International Peace Research as locations of major confl ict
in 2009 (SIPRI 2009 ).
Many US arms companies have large cash reserves and are interested in some-
times large-scale acquisitions in related commercial sectors, such as aerospace
manufacturing. The fi nancial context has led to discussion of greater cooperation in
weapons production in the European Union and particularly Western Europe with
the aims of reducing costs and infrastructure duplication and having cheaper mili-
tary services. However, national arms industries are prestigious. There are also
bilateral arms industry cooperation agreements, including between the UK and
France, and Germany and Italy (Jackson 2012a ).
Military services can be divided into research and analysis, technical services
such as information technology and maintenance, operational support such as
logistics and training, and armed forces. Outsourcing of military services is likely to
continue due to assumptions that private fi rms are cheaper and more effi cient than
government agencies, but the rate of growth is likely to decrease due to saturation
as a result of previous rapid increases and decreasing US military activities in
Iraq and Afghanistan (Jackson 2012b ). The privatisation and outsourcing of armed
force illustrates the fact that economic rather than humanitarian concerns often
determine the use of force and may raise concerns with regard to human rights
issues. There has been signifi cant growth in private military services over the last
two decades, and there were 20 largely military services companies in the SIPRI top
100 in 2011 (Jackson 2012c ).

5.1 The Arms Trade and Corruption

The arms trade is associated with high levels of corruption, estimated at 40% of the
total corruption in world trade (Roeber 2005 ). Corruption has been defi ned as 'the
abuse of entrusted power for private gain' (Transparency International undated ) to
which has been added the act of corrupting or offering an 'inducement' to obtain an
'unfair advantage' (Feinstein et al. 2011 ). The methods used to acquire undue infl u-
ence in the arms trade include bribery, failure to declare confl icts of interest, prom-
ises of subsequent employment (the 'revolving door') and offers of preferential
business access. Bribery occurs in all types of weapons transactions and frequently
involves a network of international banks and third parties to hide payments and
relationships. Failure to declare confl icts of interest is common to arms deals involv-
ing governments and includes public offi cials making contracts with a supplier in
anticipation of a personal fi nancial reward. The 'revolving door' involves an arms
company employing a public offi cial when they leave offi ce, with the offer of employ-
ment often made while the offi cial is making decisions to award contracts to a future
employer (Feinstein et al. 2011 ). For instance, 80% of US three- and four-star gener-
als retiring between 2004 and 2008 became employees or consultants in the arms
industry (Bender 2010 ). Many of them were offered employment before retirement