President Donald Trump has signed an executive order to establish and implement a strategy designed to ensure that future arms sales prioritize U.S. interests by using foreign purchases and capital to build U.S production and capacity and strengthen the U.S. defense industrial base.
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What Are the Objectives of the America First Arms Transfer Strategy?
According to a White House fact sheet published Friday, the America First Arms Transfer Strategy aims to use U.S. arms transfers as a mechanism to bolster foreign policy and the domestic defense industrial base.
The strategy seeks to expand production capacity for weapons systems most relevant to the National Security Strategy; support domestic reindustrialization and improve the resilience of the U.S. defense industrial base; prioritize transfers to allies and partners that invest in their own defense capabilities and hold strategic geographic importance; and strengthen critical supply chains.
What Are the EO’s Directives to Federal Leaders?
The executive order directs senior federal officials to implement the America First Arms Transfer Strategy through coordinated planning and oversight across key departments.
Under the EO, the secretaries of war, state and commerce must create a sales catalog of prioritized systems and platforms that support the strategy’s goals; improve advocacy efforts for U.S. arms transfers in line with the strategy’s objectives; publish quarterly performance metrics on defense sales case execution; and identify efficiencies in the enhanced end use monitoring criteria, congressional notification process and the third-party transfer process.
The order also calls for the establishment of the Promoting American Military Sales Task Force, to be chaired by the assistant to the president for national security affairs, to oversee implementation and report quarterly on progress and performance metrics.
In November, War Secretary Pete Hegseth, a 2026 Wash100 awardee, issued new guidance aimed at unifying its arms transfer and security cooperation enterprise to strengthen burden-sharing with allies and partners and enhance the U.S. defense industrial base.
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