Buried inside Section 5114(b)(4) of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2022 was a repeal of 1994 law that required the U.S. State Department to publish an annual list of arms sales to foreign countries. The “World Military Expenditures and Arms Transfers” report (WMEAT) put sunlight every year on what weapons the U.S. was selling to foreign countries.
Conveniently timed with the $60+ billion aid package to Ukraine, the U.S. State Dept, now says the WMEAT report will not be published any longer. If a person was to believe the Ukraine arms deals were essentially money laundering operations, well, this announcement by the State Dept. might be interpreted as a way to hide it. [LINK]
State Dept – WMEAT 2021, which the Department of State published in December 2021, is the final edition of World Military Expenditures and Arms Transfers (WMEAT). Section 5114(b)(4) of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2022 repealed the 1994 statutory provision that required the Department of State to publish an edition of WMEAT every year. Consistent with this repeal, the Department of State will cease to produce and publish WMEAT.
Copies of all editions of WMEAT dating from 1974 to 2021 remain publicly accessible as Adobe PDF or Excel spreadsheet documents (LINK)