Security Dilemma – Ari Tolany on Arms Sales and Oversight

What kind of relationships does the United States build when it gives or sells arms to countries abroad is a big question, one that sits at the heart of day-to-day foreign policy. Ari Tolany, Director of CIP’s Security Assistance Technology, and the Arms Trade (SAM) program, recently went on the Security Dilemma podcast to talk about arms transfers, transparency, and what it means to attempt to build friendships through the promise of weapons.

Said Tolany:

“Basically we’re losing a lot of transparency and granularity in our reporting, and I know it seems wonky, and it seems technically, but fundamentally, the way that so many people engage with the United States is not with our soft power or the various aspects of American culture we like to think of as promoting a US brand around the world, it’s at the barrel of a gun. When we have less information about that, we are less able to conduct effective oversight or check-in on concerning issues around defense companies like graft and corruption.”

The episode, hosted by AJ Manuzzi and John Allen Gay of the John Quincy Adams Society, walks through popular arguments and counter-arguments to arms transparency, the way arms sales make the US a participant in the wars of partners and allies, and what happens when the US tries to tie arms sales to respect for human rights, without ever threatening to withhold sales should weapons be used to violate human rights.

Tolany also discusses the shallow fear that the US not selling a country arms means irreparably harming that country’s relationship with the United States. Says Tolany:

“The notion that arms transfers are a solid foundation for international partnership building is flawed. If a partner can just as easily turn to China and Russia, I would argue that arms transfers are only papering over a relationship that is fundamentally misaligned.” 

Listen to Ari Tolany on Arms Sales and Oversight at the Security Dilemma podcast.