The reality of arms trade compared to its depiction in popular Hollywood Movie - Essay Example

?The Reality of Arms Trade compared to its depiction in popular Hollywood Movie. Arms Trade has impeded the prosperity of this world and its negativeeffects are just increasing as it has become a nuisance for the well-being of the people. The global arms industry comprises of various governments and individual commercial companies who manufacture and sell weapons and other advanced form of military technology and equipment. This industry has grown in both volume and its reach. Now more and more developing countries are being served by these arms producing entities. A huge sum of cash is being spent on research, development, manufacture and supply of military equipment to the developing world. These defense contractors produce guns, ammunition, military aircraft, missile and other defense related equipment. Experts estimate that nearly 1.5 trillion dollars are wasted on the various military expenditures worldwide. Although the percentage has come down from 4% in 1990 to 2.7% at present, the volume has increased significantly and the sale has been focused more towards the economically deprived countries. (Shah, World Military Spending) These countries lack enough funds to provide for the well-being of its people but somehow they manage to spend a substantial amount of their GDP on defense budgets. The movie Lord of War does portray a true picture of the global arms industry existing in the world. Nevertheless, it can be argued that the degree of its reality is different since these things are hidden from the general public. The incidents depicted in this movie clearly highlight how in real life certain factors push one to pursue the worst of jobs. The life story of Yuri portrays him as a person caught up in a situation where he has to deal in arms trade in order to give others a chance to protect themselves. His initial intention is to provide the people with a necessity of life, but later on he turns into an arms dealer who builds contacts and uses his networks to sell arms and ammunition without caring for the lives of others. The way the trade has been shown, where force and power has been used to get hold of weapons, is a true picture of reality. Arms trade is one of the deadliest causes of chaos in the world. It not only allows military dictators to rule ruthlessly over the population but also gives them the power to continue their suppression and oppression over the suffering population. The deal that is struck between the arms lord and the dealer is usually of millions of dollars and both parties are completely unresponsive to the effects such transactions would have over the future of their nations. The use of such arms is highly questionable; on one end these deals are struck to protect the people from the ruthless rule of their dictators, and on the other it is seen as a source of strengthening the grip of evil doers over the sufferers. For instance, the movie story shows that it was apparent that the deal between the African military ruler and the arms dealer would bring about a massacre of nearby villages and loss of thousands of lives, but still the deal was carried out. It is likely that the dealer is rarely concerned about the interests of the people who will suffer as a result of these weapon deals. It has been debated also depicted in the movie that after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, thousands of AK-47 and other Russian weaponry flowed into the hands of arms dealers. Since it was lying idle in warehouses and military depots, Russian military generals illegally sold them to arms dealers around the globe in order to make their personal gains. This surely resulted in the availability of one of the best assault rifles of all times and was soon seen in the hands of mobsters and warlords on all continents. It is astonishing to know that around 76% of world’s total expenditure is accounted on defense budgets. This amounts to a humungous $1.22 trillion, out of which 42.8% comes from the United States. (Sipri, Recent trends in military expenditure) This reveals that no matter what the officials from United States say, nearly half of the world’s defense spending is done by them which could otherwise have been spent on much needed basic necessities of life in third world countries. Therefore, there is a paradox since Arms trade is only promoting war and disturbing the balance of power between the world’s nations. It is estimated that each year bullets are manufactured in numbers which are more than twice the population of the planet we live in. (Tonnessen-Krokan) Considering this, the government agencies along with peace-keeping agencies have failed to regulate the illegal arms trade that continues to kill thousands of innocents on a daily basis especially in countries like Democratic Republic of Congo, Sierra Leone and Syria, among several others. (Guardian) The same has been shown in the movie where African nations are portrayed as the sufferers of this evil trade between their dictators and suppliers of arms. The movie takes a high point by showing how there is no value for the life of an average citizen and the death of a few merely goes unnoticed and has little or no effect at all on the rulers of that specific country. There are many instances where governments have internal sources of weapons production and instead of reducing that, they are further capitalizing that facility to produce more and supply to the rest of the world. The United States leads in the world arms exporter list, exporting an approximate $8,641 million worth of arms to other countries or independent contractors. (JINJIRRIE) The same has been portrayed in the movie where the major players in the world arms trade originated from the US thus supporting the above mentioned fact. In some cases, this has been done in the form of military aid in order to combat insurgents or terrorism, while in others it has been done as an official trade between other governments where military equipment ranging from guns, aircrafts and defense technology has been traded in order to strengthen the cordial relations between its allies. Nevertheless, such trades form only a small fraction of the enormous arms trades taking place all around the globe. It is at times in favor of the governments to provide weapons to its neighbors or allies in order to make them militarily self sufficient in case of an attack by a mutual enemy. All these intentions are not explicitly known since only certain things can be seen on the surface and are made available to the public. As a result, much of the public sits in the darkness without any knowledge of what is happening in their surroundings and how their tax money is being used to produce weapons and then being sold to other developing or war afflicted nations, which only destabilizes the world economy and distorts peace. Recent studies conducted by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute indicate the trend how arms dealers are targeting western-owned maritime companies to carry out their business. This type of trafficking carried out by sea gives the arms dealer a safe way to smuggle their goods under the banner of renowned companies that belong to US, Greece and Germany. These ships carry thousands of containers which are practically impossible to search one by one, therefore only a few handpicked ones are searched by security or custom officers. On most occasions the customs or security personnel have to believe the details of the container as written on the cargo document. Arms dealer have carefully disguised their operations under containerization and continue to do so until more rigorous methods of detection are devised. (Norton-Taylor) The movie showcases the bitter reality of how there needs to be an existence of a ‘necessary evil’ within the society in order to tackle the greater menaces and suppress the sprouting up of more heinous evils in the society. Since governments are bound by legal obligations to not supply to enemies of the enemies, they feel it is necessary to have an intermediary or an arms freelancer who can carry out the job on their behalf. This means that they want someone, in case of the movie, Nicolas Cage who acts as an agent helping governments carrying out activities they cannot do officially. It is imperative that certain comparisons be drawn from the movie to real life. For instance, during the end of the film, a high end official steps in to set Nicolas Cage free from the prison and does not impose any arms trafficking crime on him. Instead, he sets him free so that he can go back into the world again and do what he was previously doing; that is supply weapons to the beneficiaries of the governments and help the government’s cause. There is a whole other debate whether that is a moral thing to do or not and in many cases government sees its own interests first before the interests of the general public and keeps them under the image that the government is acting as a promoter of good and not evil. Whereas on an official level when governments enter into arms exchange deal it looks like it is for the protection of the nation but in reality that situation might differ. This revolves around a very subjective nature and can vary according to the actual and intended use of arms compared to the perceived and anticipated use of the same. Arms exhibitions are also held on an extensive scale now, where massive new and advanced weapons are displayed and major buyers of arms are invited to have a firsthand look at these. Examples include the Karachi Expo centre where I.D.E.A.S Exhibition was held in order to promote the defense equipment made by Pakistan to the world. According to a rough estimate, these defense exports were worth over $500 million USD in the year 2006 and have been growing annually since the demand for top notch weapons has increased. (Siddiqui) Similar clips were shown in the movie whereby Nicolas Cage met the arms dealer and proposed to him his idea of selling arms. Although the difference is that in reality these exhibitions are more on an official level, compared to the movie where it showed them to be an underground act where only the black trade people could come and buy. It is not startling to know that amongst the world’s top importers of arms, India tops the list, followed by countries like Saudi Arabia, Australia, South Korea and Singapore. (Sipri, India world's largest arms importer according to new SIPRI data on international arms transfers) Saudi Arabia is investing heavily on upgrading its defense system and equipping its military with the latest and most up to date weapons both in quantity and quality. Countries like Australia, South Korea and even Saudi Arabia are close allies to the United States; therefore it becomes very easy for them to import high quality weapons from US manufacturers under the official government stamp. Although critiques argue that arms trade of any sort is detrimental, the justifications given by the government officials put forward the issue of growing terrorism and insecurity in the world which makes it essential for countries with resources to get well-equipped to defend themselves in case of an attack by internal or external agents. Africa has seen the most violence when it comes to arms trade, ranging from its army of teenage kids to its sale of blood diamonds in order to acquire the weapons. Cruel dictators go to various extents to obtain these weapons and then force those under them to obey them. The issue of child army has only been seen when there have been civil wars and unrest in countries like Sierra Leone and Congo where kids as small as 10 years old were kidnapped and handed guns to fight in the war. This is one of the greatest concerns in our society as of today, whereby 75% arms are being traded with the developing countries who lack funds for food. The question raised here is whether the western powers create this need for weapons or are these somehow imposed on them. The five permanent members of the Security Council along with Italy and Germany alone accounted for 85% of the arms sold between 2002 and 2009. (Shah, Arms Trade—a major cause of suffering) Military world spending is on an all time high and military aid will in no way foster the world peace but will instead create a greater need for defense hence leading to arms trade. Families have been destroyed in this ongoing struggle to gain weapons and unless proper regulations are enforced there will be no change in this spending spree by all the governments. Developing countries would continue to invest in weapons more than in food and even if thousands die, no one will pay heed to it. Bibliography Guardian. "Arms trade fuels violence in Syria." 13 February 2012. TheGuardian. . JINJIRRIE. "Obama Nation Part 2 – Lowkey." 7 September 2011. KADAITCHA. . Norton-Taylor, Richard. "Sea trafficking report reveals how ships move guns and drugs." 30 January 2012. TheGuardian. . Shah, Anup. "Arms Trade—a major cause of suffering." 23 October 2011. Global Issues. . —. "World Military Spending." 2 May 2011. Global Issues. . Siddiqui, Salman. "Orders worth over $500m booked at Expo Pakistan." 23 October 2011. TheNews. . Sipri. "India world's largest arms importer according to new SIPRI data on international arms transfers." 14 March 2011. SIPRI. . —. "Recent trends in military expenditure." 2011. SIPRI. . Tonnessen-Krokan, Borghild. "Small, But Lethal: Including ammunition in the armstreaty." 3 March 2011. Arms Trade Treaty Monitor. . Read More