THE proposed deal between Iranian air force and Le Personne is just a small example of a flourishing arms trade.
Nearly a third of the £3,700m output of Britain's 8,000 arms companies is exported and Iran is the single largest Duver. military twice the size of the British. So these private capitalists have a direct stake in maintaining the Iranian status quo.
But the main feature of the modern arms trade is state participation. No longer are the arms merchants regarded as moral bounders who would happily sell guns to Dom siacs recent history of the Middle East shows that that contradiction remains).
"The morality lies with the user', the verdict of Ronald Ellis, the Head of Detence Sales. It is a view found general approval since stateregulated arms exports have become an Socialist Challenge 1 February 1979 page 8 instrument of foreign policy as well as a centrally planned intervention into the the economy.
On a deal such as the Personne contract there is little contact with the British state. substantial sale both parties may have to deal with the state at a number of points: establishment The Defence Sales Organisation, a department of the Ministry of Defence, is the main arms sales agent.
The Labour government set it up in 1966 on the report by managing director was the beginning of a long relationship between Leyland and though the out of the three DSO Heads, including the present one, have been Leyland directors. is The Minister responsible was Denis Healey. At the time Labour still had a Minister of Disarmament, a problem which Healey brushed away with: "we must also take what practical steps we small Le The DSO than an But for any departments of the UTC.
service basis.
As with recommendation "British Neyland Donald Stokes. or more sinister.
the DSO: two over