Boeing Wins $242M for 17 AH-64E Apaches for UAE
October 8, 2018Robotic Sniper Rifle from Syrian Engineer
October 14, 2018US Arms Sales Overseas Skyrocketed 33 percent in 2018
The U.S. inked $55.6 billion in foreign military sales during fiscal year 2018, easily smashing past the previous year’s total — and the Pentagon’s point man for security cooperation expects more in the future.
“This is a 33 percent increase over last year and I’m very optimistic that this positive trajectory will continue,” said Lt. Gen. Charles Hooper, the head of the Defence Security Cooperation Agency, during a speech at the AUSA conference. “Our partners know a good thing when they see one.”
Included in that total are $3.52 billion for cases funded by the State Department’s Foreign Military Financing program; $4.42 billion for cases funded under Defence Department authorities; and $47.71 billion funded through pure FMS cases, per the State Department.
In FY17, the U.S. sold $41.93 billion in FMS deals, and the Pentagon has not been shy about hyping the final dollar total for this year. In July, Hooper said the department had already inked $46.9 billion in deals, and a Pentagon report released last year said that the U.S. had inked $54.45 billion through the end of August.
Sales totals are volatile year over year, depending on what partner nations seek to buy. In FY16, sales totalled $33.6 billion, while FY15 totalled just more than $47 billion and FY14 totalled $34.2 billion.
In FY18 the State Department cleared roughly $70 billion in potential FMS deals, spread over 70 individual requests.