United Press International,
MOSCOW: The growing Russian-U.S. rivalry for arms sales in Latin America is arousing political as well as economic tensions as Russia reaches out to the vehement anti-American president of Venezuela, Hugo Chavez.
In a market which is experiencing a global slowdown and therefore becoming increasingly competitive each year, Washington's wariness is perfectly understandable. Russian arms sales are now expanding into what has long been a safe haven for U.S. defense firms.
In fact, the Russians have little alternative. Squeezed out of their traditional Eastern European and Arab markets back in the 1990s, they are aggressively fueling their resurgence by extending their reach to regions long dominated by the United States. If the White House, through its policies, promotes the American arms trade in Russia's backyard, why not grab a market share in the overstretched area of U.S. interests, Russian arms executives say.
Originally, Russia's decision to sell arms to Venezuela was purely economic, believes Alexei Arbatov, a well-known Russian political expert and a board member of the Carnegie Moscow Center. Domestic defense orders, though growing, still amount to a mere quarter of Russia's Soviet-era defense production capacity, and defense producers are forced to go abroad to survive.
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