From: tran@peora.sdc.ccur.com (Nhan Tran)
Subject: Re: NEWS/VN: VN is among the top military spender
Date: Mon, 9 Nov 1992 21:00:17 GMT
Organization: Concurrent Computer Corp, Orlando, Fl

In article <1992Nov7.015945.24477@informix.com>, giao@informix.com (Giao Tien Vu) writes:
> Even though I'm grateful that anh Nhan Tran has spent the time and efforts
> to post the news for us,  I would like to dispute the choice for this
> message header (actually the UPI article's title is misleading as well).
> The statistics that the economists used were in the period between
> 1978 and 1989.  That was the past.  The more proper verbs should be "was"
> and "garnered."  With the Soviet Union's collapse and the reduction in
> the Vietnamese armed forces, the number between 1989 and 1992 should be
> smaller.  Actually, the original list probably changed a lot too!
> 
> In article <199211061555.AA05795@peora.sdc.ccur.com> tran@peora.sdc.ccur.com writes:
> >
> >11/05
> >
> >Biggest military spenders garner the most aid
> >
> >   TOKYO (UPI) -- The developing world's biggest military spenders are
> >collecting more international aid than poor countries that restrain arms
> >expenditures, according to research presented Thursday by two World Bank
> >economists.
> >   The 13 developing countries ranked as the highest military spenders received
> >an average total of $5.9 billiion per year in assistance from 1978 to 1989.
> >   That compares with $5.3 billion received by the 35 nations registering as 
> >the lowest military spenders among a list of 114 countries, the economists 
> >found.
> >   Co-author Jalaleddin Jalali told an international conference on arms
> >reduction and economic development the high military spenders were those
> >countries which ranked in the top 50 percent in three categories: military
> >expenditures as a percentage of the gross national product and total government
> >expenditures plus military imports as a percentage of all imports.
> >   Ten out of the 34 countries ranked as the largest military spenders were 
> >also among the world's top 20 aid recipients, the findings showed, and 21 were 
> >among the top half.
> >   The 13 spenders falling into the top 25 percent of the three categories were
> >Iraq, Vietnam, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Angola, Libya, Jordan, Laos, Yemen,
> >Iran, Ethiopia and Mozambique.
> 
> Even though the premise of the research was well-intended, I have to say
> that the results are hardly conclusive.  The more meaningful numbers would
> be amount of aids and military spending per capita.  If $5.3 billion is
> going to 35 very small countries, obviously the citizens of those countries
> are getting a bigger share of the pie compared to a populous country like
> Vietnam.
> 
> Another skewed factor in the research is that the authors appeared to ignore
> the difference between economic and military aids and lumped them
> together.  So the conclusion is not whether or not the world has been coddling
> dictators.  It's rather: the world has been encouraging the military hawks in
> these countries to waste money in the military programs for no real
> improvements in their economies so that the armed industries could
> prosper.
> 
> Just my two cents worth :-)
> 
> Giao


Thank you for pointing that out. As you can see, these news from news wire 
are without bias, misleading facts, distorted truth, inaccuracy, ...
Perhaps, with his acute sense for accuracy and fairness, anh Giao could help 
to scrutinize and point out the inaccuracy in these "news".

Nha^n

Newsgroups: soc.culture.vietnamese