The United States is the largest seller of military weapons to foreign countries, with the total sales surging to $318.7 billion in 2024 as a result of increased demand from the Russian invasion of Ukraine. While foreign countries can buy weapons directly from manufacturers, the U.S. government is required to approve of the sale, giving it a role in every transaction. Given the U.S. government’s role in weapons sales, public opinion should constrain the decisions of democratically elected officials.
However, there has been limited study of U.S. public opinion on the issue, which limits the ability of public opinion to affect the U.S. government’s decisions. While many U.S. voters may not place a high priority on U.S. foreign policy, they may generally object to behavior that damages the United States’ credibility in the world or is generally unethical. Other voters may simply be opposed to actions that would entangle the United States in global affairs.
Selling military weapons presents significant ethical issues because they are designed to kill people, and the seller loses control of the weapons once the transaction is completed. Aside from making sure that the buyer will not use weapons against the United States, the U.S. government also has ethical obligations to consider whether the buyer will be able to maintain control of the weapons or sell them to a third party. Weapons sales to a third party, which is how many U.S. weapons are getting to Ukraine, also force the United States government to consider whether the weapons may be used against a party that the U.S. does not want to harm, such as an allied nation or civilians.
While there are clear ethical pitfalls in selling weapons, there are some benefits for the United States. Selling weapons to military allies allows them to defend themselves from threats without directly risking the lives of U.S. soldiers. The U.S. government also has the ability to sell weapons from its own stockpile, which can also be a form of government revenue. Some buyers, such as Taiwan, have to buy weapons from the United States because they don’t have an alternative seller to go to, which allows the U.S. to sell weapons to them at higher prices.
In 2019, the Chicago Council on Global Affairs asked about support for U.S. weapons sales while framing it in terms of U.S. safety. The survey found that 70% of respondents thought it made the United States less safe. The particular framing of this question may have induced respondents to be more opposed. The same survey also asked questions about Saudi Arabia, which has been using U.S. weapons in their intervention in Yemen’s civil war, which has resulted in accusations of human rights violations. These findings notably contrast with a 2024 Chicago Council on Global Affairs survey that found a majority of Americans supported selling weapons to Ukraine.
It’s clear that the context of the weapons sale matters for both the U.S. government when making the sale and for public opinion in determining when to support the sales. To determine what contexts the U.S. public supports selling weapons, I developed a survey experiment asking members of the U.S. public about specific contexts for weapons sales. The survey had 523 American adult respondents and was conducted from February 12th through February 26th by Centiment.
Respondents were randomly assigned to evaluate one of the following four statements:
V1: The United States should sell military weapons to foreign countries.
V2: The United States should sell military weapons to foreign countries in which the United States has military alliances.
V3: The United States should sell military weapons to foreign countries that are accused of human rights violations.
V4: The United States should sell military weapons to foreign countries in which the United States has military alliances that are accused of human rights violations.
Respondents had to choose an option from “strongly oppose” to “strongly support” on a five-point Likert scale. The results are displayed below.
Support among the American public for selling weapons to foreign countries is generally low. The results may indicate that people are broadly uncomfortable with the potential safety and ethical considerations, and all four versions of the prompt provided little to no information to minimize these costs in the minds of respondents. The lack of context may explain why I found less support for selling weapons in this experiment than in other surveys asking about more specific contexts such as selling weapons to Ukraine since Russia invaded.
Respondents were less willing to oppose weapons sales to allies and more strongly opposed to selling weapons to countries that are accused of human rights violations. This aligns with expectations about potential safety and ethical considerations associated with selling weapons.
Regression analysis finds that women were less supportive than men of selling weapons. Wealthier respondents were slightly more likely to support weapons sales, though the effect is very small. No statistically significant pattern emerged along ideological or party lines.
Respondents who said that they paid more attention to international news and respondents who supported greater U.S. involvement in global affairs were more likely to support weapons sales. This effect was one and a half times stronger when the respondent was shown a version where the country buying the weapons was not accused of human rights violations. More informed respondents may have considered current international crises, such as the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and who the U.S. sells weapons to when responding to the prompt in a way that less informed respondents did not.
After the experimental question was asked, I asked respondents to provide their opinion on a number of countries on a five-point Likert scale. This included two countries that are currently in military conflicts that the United States sells weapons to: Ukraine and Israel. Respondents who had more positive opinions of these countries were more supportive of weapons sales when respondents were presented with a version of the experiment that did not include accusations of human rights violations. Similar patterns emerged for Taiwan, but there was not a clear statistically significant pattern for other allies that were not facing immediate military threats such as Canada. This indicates that American allies have a path to get support for purchasing weapons from the American public if they clearly contextualize their situation and explain how the weapons will be used.
*This survey was conducted in conjunction with the WKU International Public Opinion Lab.
