Shut Down Arms Factories to Stop Wars: Dismantling the Global War Profiteering Machine

Posted on 23rd August, 2025 (02:00 hrs)

ABSTRACT

The global arms industry—worth nearly $95 billion annually—is both a driver of human suffering and a silent engine of ecological collapse. Wars claim over 2,000 lives daily, displace millions, and shatter societies, while leaving behind poisoned aquifers, fragmented habitats, and toxic soils contaminated by unexploded ordnance and chemical residues. Arms manufacturers like Lockheed Martin and RTX thrive on this devastation, rewarded by soaring stock prices whenever conflict erupts, while shadowy brokers such as Viktor Bout and Aboubakar Hima profit from prolonging wars that ravage both communities and ecosystems. India exemplifies this global dilemma, channeling vast sums into defense while underfunding water, health, education, and environmental resilience. The campaign “Shut Down Arms Factories to Stop Wars” demands dismantling this war economy by halting weapons production, regulating brokers with ecological due diligence, mandating transparency of emissions and toxic legacies, and reallocating resources toward human well-being and planetary stewardship. Peace cannot be defined as the mere absence of war—it must mean fertile soils, clean water, healthy bodies, and thriving ecosystems within Earth’s limits. Yet even the green transition carries risks: critical mineral extraction for renewables, if pursued without justice, threatens to replicate the violence and exploitation of fossil fuel regimes. A just future requires confronting militarism, curbing extractivism, and investing in life over destruction. Only by linking disarmament with ecological restoration can humanity secure genuine peace within planetary boundaries.

Introduction

The global arms industry—worth nearly $95 billion annually—represents one of humanity’s most destructive economic systems. It not only perpetuates endless conflicts, claiming thousands of lives daily, but also destabilizes regions, displaces populations, and leaves behind toxic legacies that will outlast the wars themselves. Crucially, its operations are inseparably tied to ecological devastation: every phase of the weapons lifecycle—from mineral extraction and energy-intensive manufacturing to live-fire testing, deployment, and post-conflict cleanup—exacts an ecological toll that compounds the human cost.

The largest arms manufacturers profit handsomely from this cycle of destruction. Lockheed Martin, with $65 billion in 2023 revenue, and RTX, with $39.6 billion, recorded stock surges after Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine—Lockheed up by 18%, Northrop Grumman by 22%, RTX by 8%. While markets rewarded these firms, communities in Ukraine, Yemen, Syria, Sudan, Gaza, and beyond bore the costs in lost lives, displacement, and environmental collapse. Conflict supply chains accelerate greenhouse-gas emissions, contaminate groundwater with PFAS firefighting foams, and fragment habitats that sustain biodiversity.

Arms brokers compound the harm. Figures like Viktor Bout (“the Merchant of Death”) and Aboubakar Hima operate as shadowy intermediaries, arranging both legal and illicit deals, often with corrupt officials or sanctioned regimes. Their profits come at the expense of human security and ecological health: illicit weapons prolong conflicts, arm militias that drive deforestation and poaching, and leave unexploded ordnance (UXO) contaminating soils and aquifers for decades.

India illustrates the global dilemma starkly. Once the world’s largest arms importer (11% of global imports in 2018–22; now second at 8.3% in 2020–24), New Delhi’s 2025–26 budget allocates ₹6,81,210 crore to defense, even as interest payments total ₹12,76,338 crore—crowding out fiscal space for urgent social and ecological needs. In contrast, Jal Shakti receives ₹99,503 crore (with ₹67,000 crore for Jal Jeevan Mission) and the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC) just ~₹3,413 crore. At its starkest: the same rupee can harden a border or restore a watershed.

The campaign “Shut Down Arms Factories to Stop Wars” insists that continuing to fund militarization while neglecting human development and ecological survival is untenable. It calls for public resources to be redirected toward resilient water systems, clean air, regenerative agriculture, healthy forests and soils, and community safety against climate extremes—investments that foster security without destruction.

Our Vision: A World Beyond the Arms Trade

A world without the arms trade would be a world where security is measured not in tanks and missiles but in access to healthcare, education, clean water, and ecological stability. Resources once funneled into weapons would instead be invested in low-carbon, life-sustaining systems: renewable energy grids, flood defenses, drought-resilient agriculture, and public health.

Workers now trapped in the arms economy would be retrained to manufacture wind turbines, medical equipment, disaster-resilient housing, and water-purification systems. Communities living near polluted weapons-testing ranges would see remediation and restoration. Indigenous peoples and frontline defenders would be empowered as custodians of forests, wetlands, and rivers—lands too often militarized or destroyed in the name of “national security.”

This vision makes clear that peace and ecology are indivisible. The dismantling of the techno-war economy is also the restoration of Earth’s life-support systems.

Key Objectives

1. Halt Arms Production & Repurpose Factories
   • Shut down arms factories owned by Lockheed Martin, RTX, Rostec, BAE Systems, and others.
   • Retool production lines to build renewable energy infrastructure, medical devices, and disaster-resilient housing.
   • Legally bind companies to remediate contaminated sites (PFAS, perchlorates, heavy metals) and provide wage guarantees and retraining for workers.
2. Regulate Brokers—with Environmental Due Diligence
   • Enforce stringent rules on brokers, requiring Environmental and Human Rights Due Diligence (EHRDD).
   • Close loopholes exploited by actors like Bout and Hima.
   • Impose legal liability for ecological damages arising from trafficked arms: UXO-contaminated farmland, oil fires, mangrove loss, deforestation along smuggling corridors.
3. Promote Transparency
   • Mandate disclosure of arms transfers, emissions (Scope 1–3), toxic discharges, and land/water impacts.
   • Strengthen the Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) by aligning disclosure standards with climate and biodiversity conventions.
   • End military exemptions that conceal conflict-linked emissions and pollution from climate reporting.
4. Reallocate Resources—from War to Resilience
   • Redirect the global $2.443 trillion (2024) defense budget toward education, healthcare, climate adaptation, and ecological restoration.
   • In India, scaling education (₹128,650 crore) and health (₹98,311 crore) spending could transform human well-being while securing resilience against climate disasters.
5. Raise Awareness of War’s Hidden Costs
   • Expose war profiteering’s ecological ledger: carbon surges from mobilization, toxic plumes from test sites, wildlife mortality from armed groups, poisoned aquifers from UXO.
   • Mobilize veterans, defense workers, indigenous guardians, scientists, and frontline communities as spokespeople for peace within planetary limits.

The Rationale: Human and Ecological Costs Are Inseparable

Wars are counted in daily death tolls—more than 2,000 lives lost to armed violence each day (2006–2025). But wars are also inscribed in landscapes: forests clear-cut for supply routes, wetlands drained by trench warfare, mangroves blasted by shelling, rivers clogged with rubble and toxins.

• Human toll: mass displacement, famine, collapsed healthcare systems, gender-based violence, intergenerational trauma.
• Ecological toll: habitat loss, water contamination, soil toxicity, carbon emissions from militarized transport, hazardous waste from munitions.

These costs are intertwined. A poisoned aquifer deepens famine. Deforestation accelerates floods that devastate refugee camps. The trauma of displacement is magnified when return is impossible because homes sit atop minefields or contaminated soils.

Arms brokers amplify this double crisis: prolonging wars for profit while leaving toxic and ecological liabilities to affected communities. Hima’s $400 million fraudulent deals in Nigeria, Bout’s trafficking across Africa and Asia, Morales’ inflated Ukraine contracts—each illustrates how corruption thrives while both people and ecosystems pay.

Evidence from Markets—and from the Atmosphere

Wars enrich arms manufacturers:

• Lockheed Martin: 18% stock rise post-Ukraine invasion.
• Northrop Grumman: 22% surge.
• RTX: 8% gain.
• iShares U.S. Aerospace & Defense ETF consistently outperforming broader indices during conflicts.

Simultaneously, wars accelerate ecological collapse:

• Aviation fuel burned in airlifts.
• Diesel guzzled by tanks and convoys.
• Carbon-intensive reconstruction after bombardments.
• Persistent contamination of soil and water by munitions residues.

Without mandatory ecological accounting, these impacts remain invisible to taxpayers and absent from climate targets.

Arms Brokers: Linchpins of Violence and Ecological Harm

Brokers arrange logistics, mask end-users, and earn commissions while exporting risk to communities and ecosystems. Legal brokers must register under ITAR Part 129 in the U.S., but illicit operators exploit shell companies and flags of convenience. The 2009 North Korea–Iran arms seizure exemplifies these murky practices.

During wars, broker activity spikes—driving up prices, prolonging conflicts, and leaving landscapes ravaged. Forests become militarized corridors, wetlands dry up, and indigenous lands are militarily occupied. Their ecological imprint is as profound as their human one.

Strategies for Change

• Global Advocacy for Conversion: Transform F-35 sub-assembly lines into renewable grid equipment factories; radar fabs into power-electronics hubs for renewables. Condition public contracts on decarbonization and zero-toxics commitments.
• Strengthen Regulation (EHRDD & MRV): Expand the ATT to include environmental and human rights due diligence, with mandatory measurement, reporting, and verification of emissions and toxic releases.
• Public Mobilization & Disclosure: Create open-access conflict-carbon trackers, PFAS and UXO pollution maps, and biodiversity loss estimates. Organize demonstrations at arms factories, broker offices, and shareholder meetings.
• Economic Reallocation: Redirect defense R&D (e.g., ₹26,816.82 crore from DRDO) to climate-ready agriculture, disaster early-warning systems, and clean-industry clusters with worker guarantees.
• Expose Corruption and Toxic Aftermath: Tie arms scandals (e.g., Rafale kickbacks, Bofors, BAE’s Al-Yamamah) directly to pollution, displacement, and biodiversity collapse. Demand escrowed cleanup funds before any arms delivery.

Global Arms Landscape in 2025: Sustainability Gaps

SIPRI’s 2023 data shows the Top 100 arms companies earned $632 billion in revenue, a 4.2% increase from 2022. Leading firms:

• Lockheed Martin (USA): $65B (F-35, Javelin)
• AVIC (China): $45B (J-20, drones)
• RTX (USA): $39.6B (Patriot, Tomahawk)
• Northrop Grumman (USA): $32.4B (B-21, missile defense)
• Boeing (USA): $30.8B (Apache, F-15)
• General Dynamics (USA): $30.4B (M1 Abrams)
• BAE Systems (UK): ~$25B (Typhoon)
• Rostec (Russia): ~$25B (S-400, Su-30)
• NORINCO (China): ~$20B (tanks, missiles)
• Rheinmetall (Germany): ~$15B (Leopard 2)

U.S. companies hold 50% of global revenues (~$317B). Export dominance is even sharper: the U.S. (43%), France (9.6%), Russia (7.8%), China (5.9%), and Germany (5.6%) together control 72% of arms flows. India imports heavily from Russia (~45%), France (~29%), and the U.S. (~11%), while pursuing “self-reliance” through programs like iDEX.

Yet despite ESG rhetoric, military emissions, toxic releases, and biodiversity destruction remain largely absent from corporate reporting. No major arms producer integrates planetary boundaries into disclosures, leaving sustainability pledges hollow.

Call to Action: Join the Movement

We call on governments, investors, workers, civil society, and individuals to:

• Demand closure of arms factories.
• Enforce strict regulation of brokers with ecological accountability.
• Require transparent emissions and pollution reporting from all arms producers.
• Redirect budgets from militarization to health, education, climate adaptation, and ecosystem restoration.
• Build a just transition for defense workers, with retraining and guarantees for livelihoods.

Take part in protests, petitions, shareholder actions, and open data campaigns. Make the full costs of the arms trade—human and planetary—visible and undeniable.

We hereby issue the following call to action:

SHUT DOWN ARMS FACTORIES TO STOP WARS!

#ShutDownArmsFactories_To_Stop_War, #StopTheWarEconomy, #DisarmForPeace, #WarProfiteeringKills, #EcocideAndWar, #PlanetOverProfits, #DemilitarizeForLife, #PeaceWithinLimits, #EndArmsTrade, #JusticeNotGuns, #ToxicLegacyOfWar, #EcologicalDisarmament, #NoGreenWithoutPeace, #LifeOverDestruction, #PlanetaryPeace,

Conclusion: Peace Within Planetary Limits

The arms industry thrives on human suffering and ecological collapse. Stock surges mirror lives lost, while toxic pollution and biodiversity loss deepen the wounds of war. India’s defense-heavy budgets echo a global dilemma: missiles versus hospitals, fighter jets versus forests, bombs versus clean water.

The path forward is clear: shut down or convert arms factories, regulate brokers, remediate toxic legacies, and reallocate resources to human development and ecological resilience. Only by dismantling the techno-war economy can humanity retreat back within planetary boundaries and ensure both peace and survival.

Peace is not the absence of war alone. It is the presence of thriving rivers, fertile soils, clean air, healthy bodies, and safe communities. It is life lived within the limits of the Earth.

APPENDIX

Note of Caution: Renewables Are Not a Panacea!

While renewable energy technologies—solar panels, wind turbines, electric vehicles, and batteries—are often celebrated as the solution to climate change, it is crucial to recognize that they are not inherently free of social and ecological harm. The global rush for critical minerals like lithium, cobalt, and rare earths demonstrates that clean energy can reproduce the very patterns of exploitation we seek to leave behind.

• In the Democratic Republic of Congo, coltan, cobalt, wolfram, and cassiterite mining fuels armed conflicts. Children work in perilous conditions, local water sources are contaminated with heavy metals, forests are cleared, and entire ecosystems collapse. Rebel groups and militarized state actors protect these operations, turning renewable supply chains into theatres of violence.
• In Zambia, a copper mine tailings dam collapse released toxic waste into the Kafue River, contaminating water for millions and destroying farmland and fisheries.
• In India, the Critical Minerals Mission accelerates extraction from sacred and ecologically sensitive indigenous lands, often bypassing collective consent and constitutional protections, exemplifying what can be termed climate colonialism under a green banner.

These cases reveal a hard truth: renewable technologies, if pursued without justice and care, can perpetuate human suffering, environmental degradation, and conflict—merely shifting the costs from fossil fuels to new sites of extraction. The lesson is clear: a true energy transition cannot focus only on carbon reduction or technical fixes. It must be rooted in justice, respect for indigenous rights, ecological stewardship, and anti-militarism. Otherwise, the so-called “green transition” risks becoming another cycle of exploitation—only in a different guise.