Biden admin hits pause on Trump foreign weapon sales, launches review

Updated 1/27/2021 at 3:56 pm est with new comments from Blinken

WASHINGTON — The Biden administration has temporarily paused movement on weapon sales cleared by the Trump administration, including a weapons package for the United Arab Emirates, as part of a broad review of arms transfers abroad.

A State Department spokesman described the action, taken the day after Secretary of State Anthony Blinken was sworn in, as “temporarily pausing the implementation of some pending U.S. defense transfers and sales under Foreign Military Sales and Direct Commercial Sales to allow incoming leadership an opportunity to review” the decisions.

“This is a routine administrative action typical to most any transition, and demonstrates the Administration’s commitment to transparency and good governance, as well as ensuring U.S. arms sales meet our strategic objectives of building stronger, interoperable, and more capable security partners,” the spokesman said. The pause was first reported by Bloomberg.

It is unclear how long the pause will last for, nor how many foreign weapon sales are wrapped up in it. But the dollar amounts at stake for industry are significant: the state department has stated that the U.S. sold $175 billion in weapons to foreign partners and allies in fiscal 2020 alone.

It seems likely the review will pay special focus to agreements cleared by the State Department in the latter half of 2020. In the two and a half months between the Nov. 3 presidential election and the Jan. 20 inauguration of President Joe Biden, the Trump administration cleared 14 FMS packages, worth an estimated $26.3 billion.

Many of those packages, such as C-17 sustainment for Canada or F-16 support for Romania, will likely sail through with no problems, but the review is likely to look closely as the proposed sale of F-35 joint strike fighters, drones and munitions to the United Arab Emirates.

That sale, which the Trump administration rushed to get into a formal agreement literally hours before Biden was sworn in, has been controversial. Members of Congress previously raised concerns that the deal is being rushed without proper consideration. Blinken told reporters in late October that the deal is “something we would look at very, very carefully.”

However, during a Wednesday press conference, Blinken downplayed the review, saying “Generally speaking, when it comes to arm sales, it is typical at the start of an administration to review any pending sales to make sure that what is being considered is something that advances our strategic objectives and advances our foreign policy. So that’s what we’re doing.”

As proposed, the UAE deal comes with an estimated $23.37 billion price tag, which includes up to 50 F-35A fighters worth $10.4 billion, 18 MQ-9B drones worth $2.97 billion, and $10 billion worth of air-to-air and air-to-ground munitions. Those dollar totals are estimates and may shift during final negotiations.

Another sale that may be targeted in the review are ongoing weapons transfers to Saudi Arabia, which were pushed through using a bureaucratic move that avoided congressional oversight.

Aaron Mehta was deputy editor and senior Pentagon correspondent for Defense News, covering policy, strategy and acquisition at the highest levels of the Defense Department and its international partners.

2021年1月27日下午3:56（美国东部时间）更新，新增Blinken的评论

华盛顿——作为对海外武器转让进行广泛审查的一部分，拜登政府已暂时中止了特朗普政府批准的武器销售，其中包括向阿拉伯联合酋长国出售的武器包。

美国国务院发言人称，在国务卿安东尼·布林肯宣誓就职的第二天采取的这一行动是“暂时中止执行一些待决的美国国防转让和销售，这些转让和销售属于对外军售和直接商业销售，以便让新任领导层有机会审查”这些决定。

发言人表示：“这是一项例行行政操作，在大多数过渡时期都很常见，体现了本届政府对透明度和良好治理的承诺，以及确保美国军售符合我们构建更强大、更具互操作性和更有能力的安全伙伴的战略目标。”彭博社率先报道了这一暂停消息。

目前尚不清楚暂停军售会持续多久，也不清楚有多少对外武器销售会受到影响。但对武器行业而言，这笔交易涉及的金额巨大：美国国务院曾表示，仅在2020财年，美国就向外国伙伴和盟友出售了价值1750亿美元的武器。

此次审查很可能会特别关注国务院在 2020 年下半年批准的协议。在 11 月 3 日总统大选和 1 月 20 日乔·拜登总统就职典礼之间的两个半月里，特朗普政府批准了 14 项对外军售协议，总价值估计为 263 亿美元。

很多此类项目，例如向加拿大提供 C-17 保障或向罗马尼亚提供 F-16 支持，可能会顺利通过，但此次审查可能会格外关注向阿拉伯联合酋长国出售 F-35 联合攻击战斗机、无人机和弹药的提议。

特朗普政府在拜登宣誓就职前几个小时匆忙达成正式协议，促成了这笔交易，但该交易一直备受争议。国会议员此前曾表示，这笔交易未经充分考虑就仓促完成。布林肯在10月下旬告诉记者，这笔交易“我们会非常非常仔细地审视”。

然而，在周三的新闻发布会上，布林肯淡化了此次审查，他说：“一般来说，在武器销售方面，政府上任之初通常会对所有待定的军售进行审查，以确保正在考虑的军售能够推进我们的战略目标和外交政策。所以，我们正在这样做。”

根据提议，阿联酋的这笔交易预计价值233.7亿美元，其中包括价值104亿美元的至多50架F-35A战斗机、价值29.7亿美元的18架MQ-9B无人机，以及价值100亿美元的空对空和空对地弹药。这些金额均为预估值，最终价格可能会在谈判过程中有所调整。

此次审查可能针对的另一项军售是正在进行的向沙特阿拉伯的武器转让，这些转让是通过一种规避国会监督的官僚手段强行推进的。

Aaron Mehta 曾任《国防新闻》副主编兼五角大楼高级记者，负责报道国防部及其国际合作伙伴最高层的政策、战略和采购事宜。