Arms intervention: Weimar Germany, post-imperial influence and weapons trafficking in warlord China

The Treaty of Versailles aimed to strip Germany of both its colonial empire and the global reach of its arms industry. Yet the conflicts in warlord-era China led to the reestablishment of German influence on the other side of the world via the arms trade. Weimar Germany had declared a policy of neutrality and refused to take sides in the Chinese civil war in an effort to demonstrate that as a post-colonial power, it could now act as an honest broker. From below, however, traffickers based in Germany and German merchants in China worked to evade Versailles restrictions and an international arms embargo to supply warlords with weapons of war. Although the German state officially aimed to remain neutral, criminal elements, rogue diplomats, black marketeers and eventually military adventurers re-established German influence in the region by becoming key advisors and suppliers to the victorious Guomindang. Illicit actors in Germany and China proved to be crucial in linking the two countries and in eventually overturning the arms control regimes that were imposed in the wake of World War I.

Effectiveness of Arms Control: The Case of Saudi Arabia

Using a four-level dashboard, this chapter offers a quantitative and a qualitative analysis of the effectiveness of an arms embargo against Saudi Arabia. The chapter elaborates on the question as to how political, security and economic motives have impacted the (un)willingness of major arms selling states to join the arms embargo against Saudi Arabia.

Arming a few dictators but not others: The politics of UK arms sales to Chile (1973–1989) and Argentina (1976–1983)

The United Kingdom imposed an arms embargo on Chile in 1974 but not on Argentina after the 1976 coup, despite brutal military dictatorships in both countries. What explains this difference? What can this difference reveal about the determinants of government decisions regarding arms exports? Using mainly archival evidence, this article demonstrates that this difference is explained by a stronger advocacy network in the United Kingdom campaigning on Chile, which was largely due to a greater identification of the British left with the Chilean struggle. The hub of this network was the Chile Solidarity Campaign, which mediated the influence of the transnational anti-Pinochet movement on the UK government. These findings suggest that shared values or identities make transnational issues more likely to resonate with domestic audiences. Evidence also indicates the importance of activists’ connections with gatekeepers, focus on specific arms deals, and demonstrated causal chains between arms exports and repression.

South Sudan peace process faces ingrained stagnation

Significance However, criticisms of the government’s attitude towards the deal are mounting, among the peace agreement’s signatories as well as international actors. Impacts Non-signatory groups are unlikely to join the deal, but some individuals or sub-groups may be co-opted with offers of money or positions. A UN arms embargo and US and European targeted sanctions will be maintained. Assessed humanitarian aid needs will remain high.

The Military Operation Eunavfor MED Irini – A Downscale of the EU’s Involvement in the Migration Crisis

Even though at a lower intensity from its 2015-2016 top, the migration crisis at the southern borders of the European Union is far from being over. But as it succeeds the military operation EUNAVFOR MED Sophia in the Mediterranean Sea, the new operation EUNAVFOR MED Irini has a very different mandate, focusing less on the migration events happening in the international waters and more on the United Nations arms embargo on Libya. Using as scientific tools the qualitative analysis of social documents and the exploratory case study, this paper argues that EUNAVFOR MED Irini, the newest military operation of the European Union, does not reflect the same level of the organisation’s commitment to address the core causes that continue to generate the flow of illegal migrants.