Defense contractors like Raytheon and Lockheed Martin have large incentives to promote conflict and intervention, but how much business do American gun manufacturers even do with militaries?
I can’t find numbers, but my intuition is that individuals consume over 90% of their output. There’s too few militaries rich enough to equip soldiers with US-made guns, and too many US gun buyers.
ChatGPT tells me there are about 20 million soldiers worldwide. That includes roughly two million Chinese, 1.4 million Indians, a million Russians, 1.2 million North Koreans. Of those only India has a small deployment of American small arms from Sig. For the sake of argument, let’s say each is issued a rifle and a sidearm, 40 million guns.
It’s difficult to estimate gun sales, but in 2020 there were 40 million background checks run for gun purchases in the United States. Each check could represent multiple sales.
And arms purchased by the military can remain in service for decades.
I can’t find numbers, but my intuition is that individuals consume over 90% of their output. There’s too few militaries rich enough to equip soldiers with US-made guns, and too many US gun buyers.
ChatGPT tells me there are about 20 million soldiers worldwide. That includes roughly two million Chinese, 1.4 million Indians, a million Russians, 1.2 million North Koreans. Of those only India has a small deployment of American small arms from Sig. For the sake of argument, let’s say each is issued a rifle and a sidearm, 40 million guns.
It’s difficult to estimate gun sales, but in 2020 there were 40 million background checks run for gun purchases in the United States. Each check could represent multiple sales.
And arms purchased by the military can remain in service for decades.