ABSTRACT
The expansion of Middle Eastern military forces has been dependent on massive arms transfers from outside the region. These transfers have also created a complex matrix of political and economic relationships between buyer and supplier, often tying conflicts in the Middle East to the tensions between the superpowers or the politics of other regional conflicts. If the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency percentages showing arms transfers to the Middle East included Libya, Algeria, Tunisia, and Morocco as part of the Middle East, the recent annual percentage of world arms imports would always have exceeded 40%. The high levels of arms imports to the Middle East reflect both the past competition between the superpowers and North Atlantic Treaty Organization and the Warsaw Pact and the new competition between seller nations in the West, Communist bloc, and Third World. There is an inevitable interaction between the conflicts and tensions in the region and the role of key supplier states.
