Association for Defending Victims of Terrorism – Implemented government-to-government U.S. Foreign Military Sales (FMS) rose 49.1 percent in 2022, while authorized direct commercial arms (DCA) transfers rose 48.6 percent in the same period, the State Department announced Jan. 25—with the former being driven mainly by the billions of dollars in aid for Ukraine.
Those numbers very well may not cover the true size of the increase. Many cases are in the system—with letters of offer or agreement, for example—but not yet authorized or congressionally approved. The State Department does account for that fact by using a three-year rolling average in tracking changes to FMS and DCA.
The overall FMS three-year rolling average actually declined 2.7 percent, from $47.08 billion to $45.8 billion, but “implemented” deals over the same period rose from $35.8 billion to $51.9 billion, making a 49.1 percent increase.
