WASHINGTON (PTI): India's weapons procurement from the United States jumped from meagre US$ 6.2 million to a whopping US$ 3.4 billion in the final year of the Donald Trump administration, according to official data.

The jump in sale of American weapons to India comes at a time when sale of weapons from the US to other countries has dipped to US$ 50.8 billion in 2020 from US$ 55.7 billion 2019.

In 2019, the sale of US weapons to foreign countries was US$ 55.7 billion, according to data from the Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA). In 2017, the sale of US weapons to other countries was US$ 41.9 billion.

According to the statistics released by the DSCA, major buyers of American weapons in 2020 were India (US$ 3.4 billion up from US$ 6.2 million in fiscal year 2019); Morocco (US$ 4.5 billion up from US$ 12.4 million); Poland (US$ 4.7 billion up from US$ 673 million); Singapore (US$ 1.3 billion up from US$ 137 million); Taiwan (US$ 11.8 billion up from US$ 876 million); and the United Arab Emirates (US$ 3.6 billion up from US$ 1.1 billion).

Several countries reported drop in purchase of weapons from the US.

Prominent among them were Saudi Arabia which came down from US$ 14.9 billion in 2019 to US$ 1.2 billion in 2020, Afghanistan (US$ 1.1 billion down from US$ 1.6 billion), Belgium (US$ 41.8 million down from US$ 5.5 billion), Iraq (US$ 368 million down from US$ 1.4 billion), and South Korea (US$ 2.1 billion down from US$ 2.7 billion).

According to the 2020 edition of the Historical Sales Book, India purchased weapons worth US$ 754.4 million in 2017 and US$ 282 million in 2018. Between 1950 and 2020, US sale of weapons to India under Foreign Military Sales (FMS) category was US$ 12.8 billion.

For Pakistan, the official figures reflected that sale of weapons under FMS did happen, even though there was a freeze in any military and security assistance to Islamabad from the Trump Administration.

In 2020, US sale of weapons to Pakistan was US$ 146 million; in 2018, it was US$ 65 million, and in 2017, it was US$ 22 million.

In 2019, there was no sale of US military weapons to Pakistan. In fact, the US refunded US$ 10.8 million to Pakistan, taken for the purchase of weapons.

Between 1950 and 2020, Pakistan purchased weapons worth US$ 10 billion from the US under FMS.

However, the total supply of American military weapons to Pakistan is much more, as a major chunk of weapons to Pakistan has gone from the United States as military and security assistance.