The arms bazaar

International arms sales is one of the issues that I got into as a student of IR in the early 80s. I read Andrew Pierre's Global Politics of Arms Sales, which was so good that I almost pursued the issue as a career concern. I read Sampson's book at that time, and it was the perfect complement to the academic side of it: Sampson went to the places where catastrophe was brewing from arms sales run amok, evoking it in the vivid language of a real writer and with the eye of a first-rate reporter. Sampson explains the economics, investigates the characters, and describes the environments they operate in. It is a true tour de force, as only the best journalists can accomplish. However, the book is dated, as it was written in the latter part of the Cold War. With the US-Soviet rivalry, the dynamic was altogether different from today, when it was far more political to sell to your allies and potential clients. Now, it is pure economics on the selling side, while the buyers are more or less mercenary capitalist brutes. Warmly recommended. But the interest is largely historical.

The late Anthony Sampson, one of the world's best journalists, gives an excellent insider's look into the arm's industry as it existed in the early to mid-1970s.