GLOBAL DAY of ACTION on MILITARY SPENDING

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http://demilitarize.org/

No. 7 ! January 2012

Global Day of Action on Military Spending

17 April, 2012
On April 17, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) will announce the military spending figures for 2011. Our GDAMS actions in capital cities and other locations around the world will offer the mass media photo opportunities and local stories about military spending. Local organisers can schedule their action on or near the Global Day. This is the second Global Day. Last years event, held on April 12, 2011, was a big success, with nearly 100 actions in 37 countries. In 2012, activists will organize many types of events, from protests at military bases to teach-ins. Each location will devise its own approach. But all the events will highlight the latest figure for global military spending, which will likely approach $1.7 trillion. Our campaign could be built around slogans such as: What would you do with $1.7 trillion? Make Jobs not War! etc. ! To succeed in shifting military spending to human needs, we need to lift this issue up much higher in the political debates of the coming year. We need to draw in not thousands, but millions of people who refuse to accept the status quo. And we need to encourage influential voices to speak out. As we reach out to wider constituencies from labor to youth, we will multiply our impact. This Newsletter will go over the global and regional trends in military spending and give some initial steps towards planning your event! Here in Washington, D.C. were planning a Walk of Shame, visiting the military-industrial corporations that profit off of our taxes without paying taxes themselves. No More War-Profiteering Tax Dodgers!

Organizers:
The International Peace Bureau (IPB) is dedicated to the vision of World Without War. We are a Nobel Peace Laureate (1910); over the years, 13 of our officers have been recipients of the Nobel Peace Prize. Our 320 member organizations in 70 countries, together with individual members from a global network, bring together expertise and campaigning experience in a common cause. Our current main program centers on Sustainable Disarmament for Sustainable Development. Institute for Policy Studies (IPS) is a community of public scholars and organizers linking peace, justice, and the environment in the U.S. and globally. We work with social movements to promote true democracy and challenge concentrated wealth, corporate influence, and military power. As Washingtons first progressive multi-issue think tank, IPS has served as a policy and research resource for visionary social justice movements for 50 years.

Global Military Spending 2010

In the year 2010, the global trend in military spending took a turn from the pattern of the past decade. World expenditure was $1,630 billion, a 1.3% increase from last years figure and the slowest rate of increase since 2001. Over the past decade, the average annual rate of increase was 5.1%.

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MeetUp!
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The United States is once again the leader in military spending accounting for $19.6 billion of the $20.6 billion global increase. Much of the deceleration and cutbacks in spending worldwide have been caused by the global financial crisis. The largest cuts came from crisis-hit Southern, Central and Eastern European countries such as Greece. China, ranking number two, has continued to increase military spending. Between 2001 and 2009, Chinese military spending has increased 189%, and another 12.7% in 2010. Conversely, the UK, France, Russia, Germany, and India posted annual decreases in 2010 of 0.8%, 8.4%, 1.4%, 1.3%, and 2.8% respectively. Future U.S. military spending is expected to decrease due to the withdrawal of troops from Iraq and perhaps Afghanistan, but looming talk of war with Iran may dash those expectations. In crisis-wracked Europe, however, cuts are almost certain to follow 2010s overall continental decrease of 2.8%. South America and Africa, meanwhile, accelerated increasing military spending; the former experienced a 5.8% increase and the latter a 5.2% increase.

Organizing an event? Be sure to register it at our MeetUp page at meetup.com/gdams. This is an excellent tool to spread the word about the concrete details of your event. The more, the better! Lets show the world how global this day really is.

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North America
On January 5th, President Obama outlined a plan to press correspondents at the Pentagon regarding the near-term future of U.S. military spending. The President explained that some cuts would occur over the next ten years, but emphasized that the defense budget wasnt really going to be cut: Over the next 10 years, the growth in the defense budget will slow, but the fact of the matter is this: it will still grow, because we have global responsibilities that demand our leadership. In fact, the defense budget will still be larger than it was toward the end of the Bush administration.
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In 2010, U.S. military spending topped $698 billion, an increase of 2.8% from 2009. This marks a slowdown in spending growth compared with the 7.4% average annual increase over the past decade. On January 26th, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta elaborated on the presidents statements as he detailed a blueprint for the next decade that would entail a combined military budget $467 billion lower than previous projections. Nevertheless, the Pentagons base budget will continue to rise, reaching $567 billion by 2017. The 2012 base budget has been approved at $531 billion, plus an additional $115 billion for war spending in Iraq and Afghanistan. Besides these so-called savings, Panetta and Obama spent a great deal of time emphasizing the militarys commitment to NATO and the possibility of a land war with Iran. The two have continuously repeated that all options remain on the table with regards to the Islamic Republic. That cuts to military spending will take shape gradually over the next ten years, during which they could be altered or reversed to suit the interests of the Defense Department, calls the credibility of the governments stated intentions into question. In Canada, Prime Minister Steven Harper has been forced to make $4 billion in cuts to government spending, and Canadas Department of National Defense will be affected. Canadas 2010 military budget, however, does not reflect this new reality, as the government spent $22.8 billionan increase of 3.3% in spending from the previous year. Just how much of the burden of austerity in the coming years will be borne by the military has yet to be determined.
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GDAMS 2011: Look Back, Get Inspired!

This picture from Nairobi, Kenya, was sent in by Umoja as One.

Latin America
Over the past decade as the economic prosperity of Latin America has continued to grow, military expenditures have steadily increased. Strong economic growth in the region, with Brazil leading in GDP, has made it easier for South American countries to increase spending. Over the past decade, Latin American military spending has grown from $42 billion in 2001 to $70 billion in 2010. While this growth is significant, it is dwarfed by the approximately $790 billion spent by North America in 2010. With a rising GDP, Brazil continued in 2010 to be South Americas biggest spender. Brazils ever-increasing role on the international stage, including its bid for a permanent spot on the UN Security Council, has led to a desire for increased military capabilities. Brazil has risen from the country with the 30th highest military expenditure worldwide in 2001 to the 11th highest in 2010. Additionally military expenditure as a percentage of Brazils GDP grew to 1.6% over the past year. In Ottowa, Canada, GDAMS participants protested outside a national election debate. Check out our Event Reports and Photos page to see how our message was delivered around the world on April 12th, 2011!

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Similarly, Colombia and Peru have experienced a surge in expenditures but for different reasons. In an effort to crush internal resistance groups, both Colombia and Peru hiked military spending in 2010. As the top recipient of U.S. military aid in the western hemisphere, Colombias expenditures have increased 72% since 2001, as the country continues its U.S.-backed militarization. Since 2001, Peru and Colombia have seen $800 million and $3.9 billion increases respectively.

Central America
Military spending in Central America has increased significantly over the past five years. For example, in El Salvador spending increased from $106 million to $133 million, in Guatemala spending rose from $134 million to $160 million, and the BBC claimed that in Honduras spending went from $63 million to $172 million. The SIPRI database, meanwhile, reported $235 million spent in Honduras in 2010. Some critics have offered that the U.S. is providing military aid to Central America as a means to counterbalance Venezuela and other South American states, using the rhetoric of the War on Drugs as a cover. In 2010, Mexico spent $4.86 billion on its armed forces, which represented a 25% increase over the previous 4 years. The Mexican defense budget was expected to grow by 6.67% to $5.26 billion in 2011 or by an average of 4.48% over the next decade. The Mexican Defense Ministry has proposed creation of 18 new Special Forces battalions containing 600 personnel each for a total of 11,000 additional staff. Obama requested $310 million for Mexicos drug war in 2011 under the Mrida Initiative, which according to the State Department has allocated $1.5 billion since 2008. As U.S. personnel oversaw the illicit transport of arms into the hands of Mexican drug cartels through Operation Fast and Furious, and a death toll likely upwards of 60,000, Plan Mexico has amounted to a bloody war on the poor, incentivizing corruption, normalizing violence and institutionalizing torture.

Development Costs: Whats at Stake?

UNICEF has appealed this year for $1.28 billion for 98 million women and children in 25 underdeveloped countries. Thats less than the U.S. military spends in 1 day! The UN has estimated that a global commitment of $44 billion could eradicate world hunger. To transition into a sustainable green economy, the UN calls for a minimum commitment of $40 billion. Meanwhile, the U.S. Department of Defense is the biggest polluter on the planet! The Urban Land Institute and Ernst & Young estimate that deteriorating U.S. infrastructure would cost $2.2 trillion to repair!

Middle East and North Africa

2011 was a tumultuous year in the Middle East and North Africa. On the Arabian Peninsula, it was a year of continued militarization. Saudi Arabia spent a staggering 10.4% of its GDP (four times the global average) in 2010 on its military, and continued on that track with the purchase of $30 billion worth of U.S. fighter jets in December 2011 (on top of the record $60 billion the House of Saud handed over to the U.S. Military-Industrial Complex last year).

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The United Arab Emirates spent $3.5 billion on bunker-busters and other weapons, and Kuwait purchased nearly $1 billion worth of Patriot missiles. As talk of war with Iran escalates, the arms race is on for U.S. allies in the region. After months of popular unrest, president Ali Abdullah Saleh finally left Yemen for the U.S. this month, though his Gulf Cooperation Council-brokered exit left power in the hands of his cronies. American military aid to Yemen doubled in 2011, even as 225 were killed in the uprising and over 1,000 injured. The uprising in Bahrain resulted in some 55 deaths, hundreds of injuries and hundreds more political incarcerations. The government, declaring a state of emergency implementing martial law, called in military support from the Saudidominated Gulf Cooperation Council. As Bahrain hosts the U.S. Navy's fifth fleet, Washington largely stayed silent on the violent, ethnically-driven government response to peaceful protests, and looked away as activists and the medical personnel who cared for them were kidnapped and tortured by police forces. Indeed, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton welcomed the Bahraini Foreign Minister in Washington in October 2011 as protestors faced death sentences for their peaceful activities in Bahrain. Israel's military spending peaked in 2011 at approximately $22.5 billion, but after Israelis demonstrated over the summer to get more funding for social programs, the Netanyahu administration announced significant cuts for 2012 and 2013 in military spending. The US announced in December 2011 that it would be deploying 9000 troops to Israel in 2012 to build a joint task force in preparation for a possible war in the Middle East. In 2011 the U.S. provided $3 billion in Foreign Military Financing to Israel. Revolution has dramatically changed North Africas military landscape over the past year. In Egypt, the military government that succeeded Hosni Mubarak has recently cracked down on protestors and has been slow to fulfill its promise of a democratic Egypt. Meanwhile, the Libyan uprising was transformed into a Western military invasion, tearing apart infrastructure and civil society. By October, according to Joe Biden, the U.S. alone had spent $2 billion on what the administration refused to call a war. During Gadhafis regime, military spending was relatively low. However, between 2005 and 2008, Libya received approximately $1 billion in arms transfer agreements with Western Europe and $300 million with Russia. Prior to his ouster, Tunisian president Ben Ali controlled his potentially threatening military by trimming the defense budget, delaying promotions, and requiring early retirement for skilled officers. In contrast, this month Defense Minister Abdelkarim El-Zbidi requested US assistance for military equipment, facilities and training, pointing to a potential future increase in military spending for the country. Currently, this defense aid is being framed as a crucial means to economic and social stability.

Bahrains Pearl Roundabout, black with the smoke of Royal Police projectiles.

The Israeli Air Force is subsidized by $3 billion of U.S. tax dollars each year.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair had a good relationship with Gaddafi. Since 2005, the UK sold more than $156 million in weapons to Libya.

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The Middle East and Africa have the lowest rates of disclosure on military spending. Assuming that military spending across the region increased one percent from its 2010 average, the region would have spent over $120 billion on military expenditures. As the costs of quelling populations in Egypt, Yemen and Syria have gone undisclosed, this estimate may be low.

! ! ! Drone strikes in Somalia have proliferated during the Obama administration. ! ! ! ! !

Africa
As warfare continues to plague the resource-rich Congo, U.S. military engagement in the Horn of Africa has steadily risen and threatens to reach new heights. The United States continues to escalate its drone war on the Horn of Africa with a rising civilian death toll. In late October 2011, the Washington Post confirmed that the United States erected a multi-million dollar drone base in Arba Minch, Ethiopia. Originally, the drones were stated to be unarmed, but it is now clear that the U.S. is flying weaponized Reaper drones from the base. An annex at the airfield will also hold drones with the capacity to employ Hellfire missiles and satellite-guided bombs. Kenya has also become a hotspot of U.S. military activity in the horn. Although U.S. officials denied collaborating with Kenya to invade Somalia, the U.S. had increased its military aid to Kenya to $700 million by late November 2011. Military assistance and counter-terrorism support comprised much of this figure. In total, Kenya has increased its military spending to 2.8% of its GDP in 2011, and this number is likely to rise. Under the guise of increasing further stability to the region of East Africa, the U.S. has also consistently supported the International Military Education and Training program in the Democratic Republic of Congo. In 2010, approximately $500,000 was awarded to the program, and the same amount will likely be given to the DRC this year, despite use of child soldiers" amidst an ever-rising death toll atop the more than 5.4 million killed since 1998.

Kenyan Human Rights activist AlAmin Kimanthi was rendered to Uganda by the U.S.-backed Ugandan government. There he was tortured by his captors and interrogated by U.S. and British agents ! !

East/Southeast Asia
The United States is shifting its military attention to the Pacific, China is returning to double-digit military increases, and other countries in the region are boosting military spending as their economies recover from the financial crisis. The United States is beefing up military commitments with the Philippines and Indonesia, and expressing concerns about a China threat. It also provided Taiwan with a recent upgrade of its F-16 fighters. After dropping to a single-digit increase in military spending in 2010, China returned to double-digit increases in 2012.
Chinese military spending, up 12.7%, has prompted the U.S. and its Pacific allies to pump more money and weapons into the region even though at around $90 billion, China spends less than 20% of the U.S. military budget.

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In May, Beijing announced that it would increase military spending by 12.7%, bringing its official annual expenditure to just over $90 billion. China has been putting special emphasis on naval modernization and began trials of its new aircraft carrier, a refurbished former Soviet ship. Japan, despite the cost of recovering from last years earthquake/tsunami, is moving ahead with the purchase of F-35 fighter jets. It is also easing its ban on arms exports. South Korea continues to increase its military spending and is rapidly increasing its military exports. It is also building a controversial naval base on Jeju Island that has sounded alarm bells in China and elsewhere. Southeast Asian countries are also increasing their military spending, in part as a response to China. Indonesia, which has the largest military in Southeast Asia, has announced a 35% increase for 2012. In September, the Philippines added another $142 million on naval outlays, over and above its increased funds for 2011.
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! In the Philippines, the army and police have been linked by Human Rights Watch to death squads responsible for hundreds of executions.! ! !

Australia
In 2009, Australias Ministry of Defense issued a White Paper entitled Defending Australia in the Asia-Pacific Century: Force 2030, which outlines an aggressive plan for Australian military expansion. The document promises a significant focus on enhancing our maritime capabilities. By the mid-2030s, we will have a heavier and more potent maritime force. Australia has made no effort to conceal that its ramped-up military spending is intended to counter growing Chinese influence in the Pacific. So far SinoAustralian exchanges have remained strictly verbal, and not all signs point to confrontation. Exercise Co-operation Spirit, a recent joint Chinese-Australian military exercise focused on earthquake disaster response, shows that the two countries have remained generally cordial despite increasing tensions. However, renewed U.S. initiatives in East Asia in conjunction with Australias apparent ambition to curb Chinese expansion, such cooperation may be short-lived. And last November, president Obama announced the deployment of 2,500 Marines to Australian bases on the Northern coast.

! President Obama addresses U.S. and Australian troops in Darwin, where 2500 more Marines will be deployed.

South Asia
In South Asia, already one of the worlds most militarized regions, regional rivalries continue to drive significant increases in military acquisitions. Alarmed by the opening of China-friendly ports in Sri Lanka and Pakistan and by Chinas military spending hikes, the Indian government increased its military budget some 12% in 2011 to purchase new fighter jets and modernize its navy. The Indian military is also actively repressing rural indigenous populations as part of Operation Green Hunt.
Indian soldiers parade the corpse of a female peasant villager killed in Operation Green Hunt. President Obama describes the U.S.-India relationship as one of the defining partnerships of the 21st Century.

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In neighboring Pakistan, which has been racked by Islamist militancy and a power structure perpetually wary of encroachment by India, military spending also saw a 12% increase in 2011. Analysts suspect the actual increase is greater, since certain payroll expenses have been reclassified into the civilian budget. This was the second consecutive double-digit increase in the military budget, even as development spending was cut in half over the same period. However, even as the actual disbursement of military funds remains largely opaque, the military is encountering increasing scrutiny in the wake of notable controversies, including the cross-border U.S. raid from Afghanistan that killed Osama bin Laden and the murder of Pakistani journalist Syed Saleem Shahzad. And disagreements with the U.S. over drone strikes that kill civilians and the double murder committed with diplomatic immunity by CIA agent Raymond Davis may see the flow of U.S. dollars to the Pakistani military slow down as the government refuses to keep its borders open to U.S. arms shipments to troops in Afghanistan. Meanwhile, Indias eastern neighbor Bangladesh, a significant contributor of forces to international peacekeeping missions, has embarked on a five-year plan to boost its spending by nearly 50% on new acquisitions. Government officials cite the countrys outdated military equipment and numerous peacekeeping commitments, but observers also see an effort to carve out an exclusive economic zone, which may be rich in offshore oil deposits. The Dhaka-based GDAMS partner Changemaker has led a campaign to commit the country to the UN Millennium Development Goals and to implement the UN Program of Action to curb small arms traffic, which flourishes along the BangladeshBurma border.
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! Pakistani men stand behind the graves of four civilians killed in by a U.S. drone strike. Drones have strained U.S.-Pakistan relations, having killed as many as 2,179 civilians.

Western Europe
To a far greater degree than in the U.S., budgetary constraints within Europe brought on by the global financial crisis have forced a reduction in military expenditure for a majority of countries. As reported by the Wall Street Journal: In the wake of the world-wide financial crisis, defense spending by European members of NATO is expected to decline by 2.9%, after adjusting for inflation, between 2010 and 2015. The U.K, France, Spain and Denmark all reduced spending in 2011. Countries that witnessed growth in spending included Norway, Portugal and Italy. While defense spending in the Netherlands has fallen sharply since 2006 and is expected to continue on this trend until 2015, the country did witness growth in 2010 to a total of $11billion. Germany also increased military spending in 2010, though projected defense budgets for the next five years indicate that Germany will reduce spending by 21%, while the UK is projected to cut their defense budget by 11% and France by 2%.

NATO refused to investigate civilian deaths caused by its bombing campaign in Libya in 2011. Estimates of civilian casualties of the Western intervention range from a few hundred, to more than 1,100.

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Time to Start Thinking About Your Action!
In the U.S. April 17th is Tax Day. If you are organizing an event in the U.S. be sure to link the issues: its your money! Dont let it go to waste, death and destruction! Start working on your Visual Display! Use the statistics in this newsletter, and stay tuned for more graphics, factsheets and handouts from the GDAMS team! Show people in your city just how much money is going into the military, and what that money could do if spent otherwise! Plan your conference, seminar or film screening! Educate your community about the issues and discuss strategies of how to effect real change! Keep us in the loop! Be sure to let us know what you are planning so we can share all of our ideas online!

Eastern/Central Europe
Defense budgets in East Europe are finally expected to expand again in 2012. This is in contrast to previous years when many East European military budgets were slashed in order to cope with the 2008 2009 global economic crisis. For example, although 2010 East European defense spending totaled $76.7 billion, it is expected to increase to $161.3 billion by the end of 2015. Estonia reported it would fulfill its NATO commitments in 2012 by increasing its defense budget by 21% for a total of 340.6 million Euros. Estonia is the only Baltic State meeting the 2% of GDP NATO requirement. The Baltic is purportedly lacking in air defense, which is unsettling for NATO considering Russias defense budget in 2011 was about $63 billion and expected to rise 3.2% in 2013. Poland supplied more than half of Central and East Europes military budget for 2011, spending $17.5 billion. Southern Europe, meanwhile, saw large military budget cuts. For example, Bulgarias defense budget was reduced by 28%. Despite Bulgarian budget reductions, the defense industry has been crucial to Bulgarias economy. In 2011 Bulgaria exported $380 million of weapons and recently signed military accords with Israel for joint defense trainings. Furthermore, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Croatia, Slovakia and Romania are looking to purchase used Eurofighter planes from Germany in the coming year. American ambassador to NATO, Ivo Daalder, said that the proposed missile defense system in East Europe would continue as planned to protect from threats of Iranian attacks, despite Russian outrage at the installation and the complete lack of actual Iranian threats to attack Europe. The U.S. missile shield plans calls for Raytheon SM-3 interceptor sites in Romania and Poland and the installation of a radar site in Turkey. Therefore, while European voters have generally been more interested in social and economic stability spending, it appears that the threat of war with Iran is causing NATO and the US to push Central and East European member states to ramp up military spending steadily over the next several years.

Dont Forget
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