The Hidden Market: The Effects of Corruption in the International Arms Trade

The international arms trade is a global business permeated with corruption, and its dealings have remained largely hidden behind a cloak of government-sanctioned secrecy. In this startling new book, Joe Roeber draws on his many years of experience as a journalist and economist to uncover the complex, deeply hidden truths behind an industry whose influence is vast, and whose effect on the lives of people around the world is far-reaching.Roeber reveals how arms dealers bribe Third World countries into buying weapons they may not need with money they cannot afford to spend. This is turn inflates the global market for arms, leads to major economic and political distortions, increases defense budgets, and weakens democratic institutions. The cost is measured in billions per year and is borne largely by the citizens of some of the poorest countries in the world -- and by United States and other Western taxpayers, who ultimately subsidize foreign arms sales.In this groundbreaking work, Roeber exposes a high-stakes game in which governments serve as both players and pawns. The book ends with a persuasive argument for effective multilateral action, and for setting up a special anticorruption agency to monitor and control the arms trade.