Tag: defense contractors

The Pentagon spent $4 trillion over 5 years. Contractors got 54% of it.

Advocates of ever-higher Pentagon spending frequently argue that we must throw more money at the department to “support the troops.” But recent budget proposals and a new research paper issued by the Quincy Institute and the Costs of War Project at Brown University suggest otherwise.

The paper, which I co-authored with Stephen Semler, found that 54% of the Pentagon’s $4.4 trillion in discretionary spending from 2020 to 2024 went to military contractors. The top five alone — Lockheed Martin ($313 billion), RTX (formerly Raytheon, $145 billion), Boeing ($115 billion), General Dynamics ($116 billion), and Northrop Grumman ($81 billion) – received $771 billion in Pentagon contracts over that five year period.

This huge infusion of funds to arms makers comes at the expense of benefits for active duty personnel and veterans of America’s post-9/11 wars. Despite pay increases in recent years, there are still hundreds of thousands of military families who rely on food stamps, live in subpar housing, or suffer from other financial hardships.

Meanwhile, there are plans to cut tens of thousands of personnel at the Veterans Administration, close Veterans health centers, and even to reduce staffing at veteran suicide hotlines. And many of the programs veterans and their families depend on — from food stamps to Medicaid and more — are slated for sharp cuts in the budget bill signed by President Trump earlier this month.

It would be one thing if all of the hundreds of billions of dollars lavished on weapons contractors were being well spent in service of a better defense. But they are not. Overpriced and underperforming weapons systems like the F-35 combat aircraft and the Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) have shown themselves to be quite effective at consuming taxpayer dollars, even as the run huge cost overruns, suffer lengthy schedule delays, and, in the case of the F-35, are unavailable for use much of the time due to serious maintenance problems.

The problems with the Sentinel and the F-35 are likely to pale in comparison with the sums that may be wasted in pursuit of President Trump’s proposal for a leak-proof “Golden Dome” missile defense system, a costly pipe dream that many experts feel is both physically impossible and strategically unwise. In the more than four decades and hundreds of billions of dollars spent since Ronald Reagan’s pledge to build an impenetrable shield against incoming ICBMs, the Pentagon has yet to succeed in a test conducted under realistic conditions, and has even failed in a large number of the carefully scripted efforts.

And Golden Dome is more ambitious than Star Wars — it is supposed to intercept not just ICBMs, but hypersonic missiles, low-flying drones, and anything else that might be launched at the United States.

The good news is that if you are a weapons contractor, whether from the Big Five or the emerging military tech sector in Silicon Valley, Golden Dome will be a gold mine, regardless of whether it ever produces a useful defense system.

Keep reading

Hegseth presses defense industry to ramp up munitions amid depleted stocks, China threat

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth gathered some of the leaders of America’s largest military contractors for a closed-door meeting at the Pentagon last week, urging them to ramp up the production of critically needed munitions amidst depleted weapons stocks and a growing threat from China, Just the News has learned.

A senior Trump administration official, who declined to be named in order to describe a private discussion, told Just the News that the main reason for Thursday’s closed-door meeting with defense company leaders — which included well-known firms such as Raytheon, Lockheed Martin, and BAE Systems — was to seek to hold munitions manufacturers accountable so that U.S. warfighters are equipped to face 21st century threats.

The closed-door meeting came shortly after Hegseth gave an impassioned defense of the powerful U.S. military strikes against Iranian nuclear sites earlier in June.

The official also told Just the News that Hegseth and Deputy Defense Secretary Steve Feinberg, who was also at the meeting with the industry leaders, are working to fix the inefficiencies enabled and ignored by their predecessors, and that the duo encouraged the defense company executives to rise to the moment to meet the significant challenge.

Keep reading

Russian Strikes Damage Boeing Building in Ukraine

A large Russian drone and missile barrage damaged a building in Ukraine where Boeing operates. Last year, the American company and Kiev signed a memorandum agreeing to step up arms production.

The Financial Times reported speaking with Ukrainian officials and reviewing images that confirmed the Boeing building sustained damage on Sunday night. The strike comes as the American arms maker has been building a relationship with Kiev that would see more weapons produced in Ukraine.

In February, Ukrainian Defense Minister Rustem Umerov and Boeing president Steve Parker discussed joint “manufacturing ammunition and aerial strike systems.” A top Boeing official said the damage to the building did not cause “operational disruption.”

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andriy Sybiha said the attack on a US firm should convince Washington to provide more support to Kiev. “Russian strikes on American companies in Ukraine are yet another example of Putin’s disregard for US peace efforts,” he told the outlet. “The fact that Russia targets American businesses emphasises the importance of continued US involvement – both in peace efforts and in the security of Ukraine and the rest of Europe.”

Russia has stepped up attacks in recent weeks following a Ukrainian operation in Russia that destroyed or damaged several of Moscow’s strategic bombers.

Keep reading

Whistleblower claims Lockheed Martin eliminated whites from bonuses – ‘and they wrote it all down’

A whistleblower has come forward claiming America’s largest defense contractor has been awarding bonuses based on skin color rather than merit.

The whistleblower told right-wing DEI expert Christopher Rufo that they were preparing year-end bonus recommendations for Lockheed Martin’s aeronautics division in 2022 when they were told their “comp adder” list contained too many white people.

“I got a call from [human resources director] La Wanda [Moorer] last night regarding diversity stats on comp adder,” top Lockheed Martin official Santiago Bulnes wrote to the whistleblower in an email, according to a report published by Rufo at City Journal.

“They took a run at getting your few approved and we’re told that we need to fit in the box. I asked her to send you the list of diversity names to simplify the task of finding the best in the group,” he added.

Afterward, other officials in Lockheed’s human resources department reportedly told the whistleblower to add over a dozen minorities to the “comp adder” list and remove an equal number of white people, never mind whether or not the people deserved to be on the list or not.

The whistleblower was reportedly outraged that Lockheed was requiring managers like them to reward bonuses “on the basis of their [employees’] skin color alone and contrary to documented performance.”

Keep reading

Raytheon delivers advanced radar to U.S. for tracking hypersonic threats

The U.S. Missile Defense Agency has received the first AN/TPY-2 advanced radar system to defend against next-generation threats.

The new AN/TPY-2 system was built by Raytheon and comes equipped with a complete Gallium Nitride, or GaN, populated array, giving it greater sensitivity to missiles and expanding surveillance capacity while supporting the U.S.‘s hypersonic defense mission, according to the company.

“This is the most advanced version of AN/TPY-2 that Raytheon has built, leveraging years of investment and innovation to produce superior capability at a lower cost to the U.S. armed forces,” Sam Deneke, president of air and space defense systems at Raytheon, said in a statement. “As demand increases for missile defense of the homeland, the AN/TPY-2 radar is ready to meet the mission.”

Keep reading

Trump, Saudis secure $600B investment deal to include billions in US defense weapons

President Trump on Tuesday secured a $600 billion commitment from Saudi Arabia to invest in the United States along with a multibillion-dollar defense partnership following a meeting with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in Riyadh.

The investment, according to a White House fact sheet, will strengthen energy security, defense, technology and access to global infrastructure and critical minerals. It includes a $142 billion defense and security deal that equips Saudi Arabia with state-of-the-art war equipment provided by dozens of U.S. firms.

The equipment includes air and missile defense and air force and space advancements.

The White House called the deal “historic and transformative for both countries” and said it brings in “a new golden era of partnership.”

Days after Trump’s inauguration, the crown prince first announced the Arab nation would invest $600 billion in the U.S. over the four years of Trump’s second term. The White House is detailing those investments following the meeting in Saudi Arabia.

As part of the deal, Saudi Arabian company DataVolt is moving forward with plans to invest $20 billion in artificial intelligence data centers and energy infrastructure in the U.S., and top companies such as Google, Oracle, Salesforce and Uber, among others, are investing $80 billion in technologies in both countries.

Also included in the deal are infrastructure projects American companies Hill International, Jacobs, Parsons, and AECOM are taking on in Saudi Arabia, including at King Salman International Airport, to total $2 billion in U.S. services exports.

Keep reading

Trump Admin Chooses Boeing To Construct the ‘Most Lethal Aircraft Ever Built’

The Pentagon has awarded Boeing a billion-dollar contract to build the Air Force’s most advanced fighter jet, President Donald Trump announced Friday.

The Next Generation Air Dominance program will replace Lockheed Martin’s F-22 Raptor with Boeing’s F-47, a sixth-generation jet designed to operate alongside drones in combat. While details of the new jet remain classified, the aircraft is expected to feature stealth capabilities, advanced sensors, and new engines, Reuters reported.

“The F-47 will be the most advanced, most capable, most lethal aircraft ever built,” Trump said at the White House. “An experimental version of the plane has secretly been flying for almost five years, and we’re confident that it massively overpowers capabilities of any other nation.”

The new plane comes as part of a “family of systems” intended to “counter adversaries such as China and Russia,” according to Reuters. The contract is valued at more than $20 billion, with Boeing expected to receive hundreds of billions of dollars in orders.

Keep reading

We’re #1 in Selling Weapons!

We’re #1 (once again) in selling weapons! Amazingly, the USA now accounts for 43% of the world’s trade in deadly weaponry. No country beats more plowshares into swords and pruning hooks into spears than America, which is also, obviously, the most Christian nation in the world.

Let’s take a look at a useful chart from Stephen Semler (be sure to check out his blog on Substack)…

Finding #1: The US is the world’s largest arms dealer

The US accounts for 43% of global arms exports, more than the next seven largest arms-exporting countries combined. All the countries outside the top eight account for less than 17% of the worldwide total.

For another perspective on America’s record-breaking year of selling deadly weaponry, check out this column by Lenny Broytman.

Way back in 2012, I wrote a column for TomDispatch: “Weapons ‘r’ us,” in which I examined America’s dominance of the weapons trade. Here’s what I wrote back then:

Yes, we’re the world’s foremost “merchants of death,” the title of a best-selling exposé of the international arms trade published to acclaim in the U.S. in 1934. Back then, most Americans saw themselves as war-avoiders rather than as war-profiteers. The evil war-profiteers were mainly European arms makers like Germany’s Krupp, France’s Schneider, or Britain’s Vickers.

Keep reading

Drone incursions target ‘Plant 42,’ said to be the birthplace to top secret tech

 In August 2024, alarming drone encounters were documented for seven nights above a highly secretive desert facility, according to new reports.

While mysterious drone incursions have made headlines in recent months, documents are now coming to light highlighting disturbing incidents around restricted airspace, including a desert facility known as “Plant 42,” said to be the birthplace of top-secret technology.

The facility, located in Palmdale, CA, is an aerospace brain trust with distinct ties to Area 51 in Nevada. Most notably, it uses JANET, the nickname of the hush-hush airline that shuttles workers from Las Vegas to Area 51 or to Area 52 near Tonopah. Plant 42 is described as a Mojave Desert enclave of brilliant engineers and aerospace brainiacs working on projects for  NASA, the US Air Force, and the CIA.

Plant 42 is the birthplace of many amazing machines, including the soon-to-be-unveiled B-21 Raider and the next generation of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). All the big names are present at Plant 42. From Lockheed Martin’s Skunk Works to Northrop Grumman to McDonnell Douglas, the cutting-edge technologies deemed vital to national security come through the facility.

Keep reading