The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), one of the world's leading research institutes on arms control and disarmament, released its annual report last Monday covering the years between 2005 and 2009. The report draws a negative picture of how the arms race has increased despite a serious economic crisis. The global financial crisis has not deterred some of the world's developed and developing nations from bolstering their military arsenals with expensive new weapons systems, including sophisticated fighter planes, combat helicopters, submarines, armored vehicles and air defense systems, the report said. Arms transfers for 2005-2009 are 22 percent higher than in 2000-2004, SIPRI said.
The day the SIPRI report was released, Turkish media ran a story about the Turkish navy opening a bid to acquire a Landing Platform Dock (LPD) that they said would significantly increase the striking power of the navy. The same story notes that once it acquires it, Turkey will become among five or six countries in the world that own such a navy platform. None of the stories, however, even dared question whether Turkey really needs such an expensive ship. Statistics released the next day showed the unemployment rate as having reached 13.5 percent, while unofficial figures put this number at 20 percent. Added to the problem is Turkey's reliance on abroad for about 70 percent of its critical arms technologies despite efforts to reduce this dependency. Therefore, many of Turkey's resources allocated for defense do not create meaningful job opportunities in the defense sector; to the contrary, they turn into a heavy burden on taxpayers.
The five largest arms purchasers in the 2005-2009 period were China, India, South Korea, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Greece, according to figures released on Monday by SIPRI.
The extended list of prolific arms buyers also includes Turkey, Singapore, Pakistan, Malaysia, Israel, Algeria, Morocco, Libya, Egypt, Iran, South Africa, Saudi Arabia, Brazil, Sudan, Chile and Venezuela.
According to SIPRI, the five largest arms suppliers during 2005-2009 were the United States, Russia, Germany, France and Britain, accounting for more than 75 percent of all exports of major conventional weapons. Germany is categorized as the country that sold the most to Turkey during this period. Turkey is a traditional buyer of navy platforms from Germany; it signed a deal with this country for the purchase of advanced AIP submarines worth about 2.5 billion euros in July 2008.
Though Turkey did not rank among the top five arms buyers in the 2005-2009 period, its rival neighbor and fellow NATO member Greece did. This explains, among other things, why Greece came to the brink of economic collapse, paying the price for engaging in a bitter arms race with Turkey. Turkey, for its part, has continuously been paying the price for its arms acquisitions regardless of whether they are a necessary means of deterrence. The absence of democratic civilian control over the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) raises serious question marks about the rationale for Turkish arms purchases.
In the meantime, mechanisms civilian authorities have attempted to put into force to scrutinize military expenditures have been met with serious opposition and objections from the Turkish military. A delegation from the General Staff recently participated in a parliamentary subcommittee meeting discussing the long-awaited draft law on the Supreme Court of Accounts and raised several objections against the auditing of military expenditures and military goods, including arms, hiding behind the secrecy shield. The Court of Auditors bill stipulates the auditing of all institutions while ensuring that secrecy rules required during this process are honored.
It is essential for the TSK to turn into an accountable and transparent institution for the sake of Turkish security interests as well as to further democratic standards.
