‘Does arms spending lead to war?‘ Honest History, 4 November 2014 and updated
The article compares defence spending as a proportion of gross domestic product – the proportion has been around two per cent for more than 50 years – with Australian spending on arms imports, which goes up and down markedly from year to year and where we are big players when compared with the rest of the world. The article asks eight questions related to the issue of whether the desire for the best military ‘kit’ creates an incentive to use it in combat.
A related article looks into Northrop Grumman’s Australian expansion plans while this is a 2014 report on the financing of nuclear weapons production world-wide. And in April 2015 it became clear that Australia was the world’s sixth largest arms importer. SIPRI figures in this article show the arms spending of the United States roughly equates that of the next seven countries. World Socialist Web Site analysis of the Australian defence budget 2015; see also Defence Ministers, ABC, News Limited, Fairfax, Australian Strategic Policy Institute.
